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TheOtherDave comments on Irrationality Game II - Less Wrong Discussion

13 [deleted] 03 July 2012 06:50PM

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Comment author: TheOtherDave 06 July 2012 09:24:27PM 16 points [-]

Are basilisks necessarily fatal? If the majority of basilisks caused insanity or the loss of intellectual capacity instead of death, I would expect to see a large group of people who considered themselves capable of constructing basilisks, but who on inspection turned out to be crazy or not nearly that bright after all.

...

Oh, shit.

Comment author: FiftyTwo 06 July 2012 10:02:56PM 1 point [-]

Are basilisks necessarily fatal

The post specified fatal so I followed it.

For non-fatal basilisks we'd expect to see people flipping suddenly from highly intelligent and sane, to stupid and/or crazy. Specifically after researching basilisk related topics.

Comment author: Armok_GoB 06 July 2012 10:26:16PM 2 points [-]

Yes, this can also be reversed for a good way to see what topics are practically basilisk construction related.

Comment author: [deleted] 07 July 2012 07:59:38AM *  0 points [-]

Yes, but you would get false positives too, such as chess (scroll down to “Real Life” -- warning: TVTropes). Edited to fix link syntax -- how comes after all these months I still get it wrong this often?

Comment author: Armok_GoB 06 July 2012 10:23:43PM 0 points [-]

Yup, this is entirely correct. Learned that the hard way. Vastly so, with such weak basilisks constantly arising from random noise in the memepool, while even knowing how and having all the necessary ingredients a Eliezer-class mind is likely needed for a lethal one.

Great practice for FAI in a way, in that as soon as you make a single misstep you've lost everything forever and wont even know it. Don't try this at home.