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75th comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 12 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (692)
I just penned a few thoughts on maintaining proper pessimism about Methods's future. (I also teased Eliezer and, indirectly, Less Wrong commenters a bit. It's all tongue-in-cheek and in a spirit of friendship.)
If anyone can think of a better title for that post, do let me know. I couldn't come up with a pithy Rationalist phrase that quite fit it.
I think things could end up worse than that. Harry's solution, whatever it may be, could well tip off Lucius that he is not in fact Voldemort. And once he's got Hermione out, Lord Malfoy would go after this first-year hard, before he can grow up. A few threats to a few parents and Harry and Hermione will find themselves seized by five seventh-years and portkeyed to Malfoy Manor.
But Harry is in fact Voldemort - in a certain unconscious sense.
Lucius decided that he is Harrymort because of Harry's reply to Quirrel's Christmas speech, but he would never have thought about it if the preexisting Harry Potter - Voldemort connection had not brought the hypothesis to mind. And that connection, the hints that make up the real majority of the evidence for the Harrymort hypothesis, is made of true evidence.
If Lucius now came to disbelieve in Harrymort, he would not be discarding a completely false hypothesis.
Maybe the reason McGonagall knew that Dumbledore was behind the Santa Claus portkey is because only the headmaster could create a portkey that would work inside the Hogwarts wards. Quirrell took Harry outside the wards in order to portkey him to Diagon Alley.
Your point still stands though because there are surely other things that they could do.
Edit: Wow, did I do that?
Then again, Snape didn't realize that just from hearing about the portkey. This theory's probably inaccurate.
Retracting as per pedanterrific's comment.
Rationality is the technique that turns motivations into plans. It is not a technique to generate motivation, except very indirectly.
Strongly disagree. Maintaining and managing motivation should be built into any practical plan for trying to achieve a goal. This applies both in the abstract sense (all rational agents will self modify so that they more effectively achieve their goals) and as a ubiquitous consideration in human rational planning.
This is what I meant by "very indirectly."
[edit] "Very" might have been an overstatement; it probably should have just been "indirectly."
We can also add that a large component of 'motivation' can also be compartmentalized off into a general 'motivation' goal - leaving only specific reinforcement and boredom minimisation aspect as part of the more direct plan.
Hmm I don't think that's a very good description. Rationality means setting rational goals to accomplish what you actually want, and then understanding the world around you and yourself well enough to systematically and logically accomplish those goals. It would certainly include studying yourself to understand how to generate motivation.
That sounds circular to me.
That sounds like turning motivations (i.e. goals) into plans.
Indeed, as an indirect step.
The adjective ‘rational’ is just superfluous there; the grandparent should simply remove it.
"Rational," as an adjective for goals, typically means something like "internally consistent" or "long-sighted" or "wise," and so in general "rational goals" and "goals" mean different things. In a definition for rationality, though, it's inappropriate.
I didn't mean that it was superfluous in front of ‘goals’ but that it was superfluous in a definition of ‘rationality’, so we agree about that. And Pringlescan's definition makes sense if it's removed.
If you're defining rationality as the definition given on this site, you're right. If you're defining rationality as the thing that's actually discussed on here, you're not.
They could use some more sequences on how to motivate yourself, if I recall there was one written by lukefrog but it wasn't very good.
What do you claim would be a good definition for rationality as actually discussed?
How to think clearly.
Deconstruct that, it means little
How to develop correct beliefs about the world, with an emphasis on compensating for systematic errors and biases caused by suboptimal hardware.
That clinches it; 75th is my alter ego. You know, a la Tyler Durden or something.