Looking at the original 'Allais Paradox' post - under what theorem is the reduction of uncertainty by 100% equivalent to the reduction of uncertainty by 1/67th?

It takes energy to plan ahead - the energy required to plan ahead with 100% certainty of outcome is considerably more than the energy required to plan ahead with 99% certainty. But there's no such difference in energy consumption planning between the possibilities inherent in 67% and 66% - those are functionally equivalent.

So, um, why is this result even slightly surprising?

Edit: - Now, what would be interesting would be the question of the decisions made if the options are $24K with 94% probability to $27K with 93% probability, and variants thereof where the reduction in uncertainty exactly balances out the increase in value.

Don't . . . get any of that on me please. Ick.

In context:

FOUR LAWS OF ADVICE

Learning to give good advice is so important to technologists that special laws of advice have been developed. The first of these is often stated as follows: "The correct advice is the desired advice." However, this form of the law leaves ambiguous whether the recipient wants correct advice or whether the desired advice is by definition the correct advice. A much clearer and completely unambiguous statement is provided by the following version of the First Law of Advice:

The correct advice to give is the advice that is desired.

A classic example of good advice was given to the mayor of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the fall of 1920. A major city highway, built on the side of a hill, began sliding, a piece at a time, onto railroad tracks below. With every heavy rain, more mud and parts of the road washed down, causing many of the railroad tracks to be unusable. Efforts to remove the mud to keep all tracks operable had been too slow following some of the more massive mud slides.

Several solutions were offered by local engineering and construction firms and by concerned citizens. One was to pave the entire side of the hill to prevent erosion. Another was to build a metal structure to support the road and protect the tracks. All the suggestions would have been quite expensive, causing thoughtful people to wonder how or if the city could pay for the necessary work. Furthermore, no one knew if any of the proposed ideas would solve the problem.

AN EXPERT IS CALLED

The mayor knew he needed good advice. Ultimately, he hired G. W. Goethals as a consultant. Goethals had served as chief engineer for the Panama Canal and had considerable experience with landslides. His expertise was evident not only in his experience, but also in his consulting fee of $1,000 per day - an extraordinary sum at that time.

After only one day of study, Goethals was prepared with his advice and with his bill. His advice to the city was simple: "Let it slide."

The opposition party and one of the newspapers made sport of the city administration for paying so much for this advice. The mayor rightly argued that it was a small price to pay to learn that none of the more expensive proposals would work. The mayor chose to follow this most economical advice and permitted the hill to slide.

Whether technically right or wrong, the consultant's advice was the desired advice. It did not involve construction expenses. Furthermore, any other solution would have been under constant attack from engineering and construction firms whose "solutions" had been rejected in favor of the winning contractor. The desired advice was clearly the correct advice.

This classic example also stands up well in terms of the Second Law of Advice:

The desired advice is revealed by the structure of the organization, not by the structure of the technology.

And it also agrees with the Third Law of Advice:

Simple advice is the best advice.

Another classic example of advice that obeys all three laws was the advice given to the vice president of a petroleum company during the 1920s. The company had discovered a major oil deposit of high quality that could be refined economically into gasoline and other products. There was only one problem. The resultant gasoline had a greenish tint. Because all gasoline at that time was clear, like water, the marketing group believed there would be considerable customer resistance to an impure-looking gasoline.

The production manager submitted his proposal for solving the problem. It called for modernization of the refinery. The company's chief chemist objected on the grounds that there was no proof that refinery modifications would result in a better product. Removing the greenish tint was a difficult chemical problem that had defied every attempt at a solution. The chief chemist, therefore, recommended an expanded research program.

FOR ADVICE, GO OUTSIDE

Rather than adopting either solution, the vice president wisely turned to an outside consultant for advice. The consultant was a chemical engineer of good reputation in academic circles, who had consulted before in the petroleum industry.

He listened to the proposal of the chief chemist and then to that of the production manager. He talked to engineers and managers at the refinery and to chemists in the laboratory. Then he returned to the university for further study. If he were to recommend more experimental work, the chief chemist would be pleased. On the other hand, a recommendation to modernize the refinery was the desired advice of the production manager.

The important thing for the consultant, however, was to determine what advice was desired by the vice president. The vice president did not want to be responsible for choosing either of the proposals already presented. He wanted to avoid responsibility for any decision that would appear to favor either of his subordinates. If such a decision had to be made, it would be best to attribute the decision to an outsider. This, the consultant discerned, was the real reason why he was hired. Even better for the vice president would be a totally different solution that played no favorites.

After several weeks of additional work, the consultant was ready with a uniquely neutral recommendation - one that required neither research work nor modernization of the refinery. His advice to the vice president was simple: "Advertise the color."

The marketing success of the greenish gasoline and the fact that most gasoline is now artificially colored demonstrate once again that the advice found by studying the structure of the organization - not the structure of technology - is the desired advice. It also substantiates the Third Law. Indeed, simple advice is the best advice.

(The rest of the chapter is not relevant.)

I think I fundamentally disagree with your premise. I concede, I have seen communities where this happened . . . but by and large, they have been the exception rather than the rule.

The fundamental standard I have seen in communities that survived such things, versus those that didn't fall under two broad patterns.

A) Communities that survived were those where politeness was expected - a minimal standard that dropping below simply meant people had no desire to be seen with you.

B) Communities where the cultural context was that of (And I've never quite worded this correctly in my own mind) acknowledging that you were, in effect, not at home but at a friendly party at a friends house, and had no desire to embarrass yourself or your host by getting drunk and passing out on the porch - {G}.

Either of these attitude seems to be very nearly sufficient to prevent the entire issue (and seem to hasten recovery even on the occasion when it fails), combined they (in my experience) act as a near invulnerable bulwark against party crashers.

Now exactly how these attitudes are nurtured and maintained, I have never quite explained to my own satisfaction - it's definitely an "I know it when I see it" phenomena, however unsatisfying that may be.

But given an expectation of politeness and a sense of being in a friendly venue, but one where there will be a group memory among people whose opinions have some meaning to you, the rest of this problem seems to be self-limiting.

Again, at least in my experience - {G}. Jonnan

This intuitively feels to me very similar to the questions I have about things like memory and the way people act when the situational context has been gamed to cause unethical behavior (see "The Lucifer Effect").

One wants to believe that one's personal memory is not only accurate, but indeed unbiased, but to what extent does the realization that it may not be actually help to mitigate the fact that it may not be? Does my awareness of things such as the Stanford Prison Experiment have any correlation with whether I will or will not be sucked into the group mindset under similar circumstances in reality?

Indeed, what would one do if the answer was "No"?

Jonnan

Fair enough, but I think making the distinction explicit is important, and that Eliezer's edited post is better for it.

Call me superstitious, but I prefer to avoid anything that might get the Laws of Thermodynamics angry. You don't wanna mess with those guys.

Are you saying it didn't work because it didn't curb your hunger or your desire for other, less healthy foods? Or it didn't work because you stuck to the diet of healthy foods and gained weight nonetheless? The latter seems hard to believe, though I suppose it's technically possible to accumulate an excess of calories via turkey and bananas...

What I find interesting is this matches, almost exactly, the 30 pounds I lost when I decided to consistently take a multi-vitamin with every meal on the theory that hunger was caused (at least at times) by vitamin deficiencies, and maybe making sure I was flush with vitamins would help.

Worked great for a month or so - I lost (and have kept off) 30 pounds (Unfortunately that means I'm down to 310). Then it just kinda stopped - I haven't gone back up (indeed there have been moments when it acted like it might start going back down again, but so far I'm stuck in fluctuation mode).

But what it to me interesting is this is the second occasion that happened - the first time was four years ago when I started buying flavored carbonated waters, and drinking those on a regular basis - not fatty at all, and flavored (both in opposition to, arguably, the vitamins), but virtually identical results (I did regain that weight, but only at an identical rate to my previous weight gain.).

Maybe I can switch them out?

Jonnan

You're right that the existence of Omega is information relevant to the existence of other omniscient beings, but in the least convenient world Omega tells you that it is not the Catholic version God, and you still need to decide if that being exists. (And you really do have to decide that specific question because eternal damnation is in the payoff matrix.)

Omniscience is almost a side issue.

Umm - who are these people that would rather donate their time than their money?

I guess, I have never been one of those people - unless someone needs work in my realm of expertise (in my case, tweaking computers to do what you want it to do, fairly cheaply, or training people to use them), I don't volunteer for very much at all.

I do love modern web banking - I can set my bank account to send $5 a month to my local NPR/PBS affiliate, 2nd week of the month, the Monday after my payday (So I can turn it off if I'm unexpectedly tight). The ACLU get it's $5 on the 4th Monday, and if I'm doing well the EFF gets a donation on week 3. It's been a bad year so I can't honestly remember what I had toggled up for week one - it's my weakest week financially (mortgage payment) so my lowest priority was there.

Giving money is great - let them hire who they need. If I show up at a soup kitchen, they needed a computer geek.

Jonnan