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frustrations I've had with people breaking out some people who break out
Looks like a typo.
Edit: when I am already at this, another typo:
absurdity hueristic
In response to
The Nanny State Didn't Show Up, You Hired It [LINK]
Fixed both.
In response to
The Nanny State Didn't Show Up, You Hired It [LINK]
I'm having trouble parsing this:
It definitely articulates some of the frustrations I've had with people breaking out some people who break out in a rash of Libertarianism over one (on the surface) silly law being passed and reported on and then not
Typo. Fixed.
It's his standard writing style. It's not to everyone's taste, but I find it captivating. It creates a sort of mental soundscape that other ideas can echo off of.
Also, he makes the assumption that you've read other stuff by him, which creates a decent sized inferential distance. This alllows him to cover more material per post. This is a pretty common trope among blogs, including this one. But it can be confusing.
I tend to just ride the wave of confusion until something later clarifies it, but that makes skimming nearly impossible. I like styles that make me read every word as important as it helps me remember what I'm reading.
The Nanny State Didn't Show Up, You Hired It [LINK]
http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2012/09/the_nanny_state_didnt_show_up.html
Saw this and I thought it went so well with Beyond the Reach of God and Blue and Green on Regulation that I just had to post it here. It definitely articulates some of the frustrations I've had with people who break out in a rash of Libertarianism over one (on the surface) silly law being passed and reported on and then not:
A. Using the Principle of Charity to see what the opponent is really about. Even if it's silly, it shouldn't be *that* silly. See Policy Debates Should Not Appear to be One Sided.
B. Considering how it applies in the larger context. You should be free to buy big sodas but not [insert literally anything the government regulates here, which is a ton of stuff]. Why is this sillier than the other thing? See anything Less Wrong has written about the absurdity heuristic.
C. Thinking about your source of information, noting the feeling it's giving you, why it's giving you that feeling. Then realizing that it was specifically designed to give that feeling. If they did this, then dropping the line of thought or, deciding that they're so much smarter than the people in charge. *And then forgetting that the fact that they feel that was part of the plan of those who reported it, too.* Seriously, The Last Psychiatrist is great for that stuff.
Are there any LW groups/people in The Philippines? Like Manila area? TIA,
Living in Tagbilaran on Bohol right now. If you can find other interested parties I might be able to make it to Manila.
How is it uncharitable? Eliezer is emptying his mind as recommended by Doctor Banzai. Not sure how it's a "critique" though.
In response to
Rationality Quotes September 2012
Users always have an idea that what they want is easy, even if they can't really articulate exactly what they do want. Even if they can give you requirements, chances are those will conflict – often in subtle ways – with requirements of others. A lot of the time, we wouldn't even think of these problems as "requirements" – they're just things that everyone expects to work in "the obvious way". The trouble is that humanity has come up with all kinds of entirely different "obvious ways" of doing things. Mankind's model of the universe is a surprisingly complicated one.
Jon Skeet
In response to
Random LW-parodying Statement Generator
The forty twoth virtue of rationality is "Let me not become attached to sex I may not want"
I am running on corrupted the set of all possible fetishes.
In response to
Checking for the Programming Gear
I don't know whether the existence of such a gear is plausible. But to your point, I might say:
"Try this. If you're having fun an hour from now, you have the gear. Good luck!"
As for on-ramps, I would start with HTML as an introduction to thinking like a programmer, and then transitioning over to Python. But opinions vary, so seek the advice of more experienced programmers than myself.
Someone awsome on here recommended Learn Python the Hard Way. I've had school off since Tuesday and I've been kicking it's ass since. It's really fun. I thought it'd be neat to test out what my abilities are like on Project Euclid.
I've solved three so far. I'm particularly proud of coming up with a program to do the Fibonacci sequence. It's a simple program, and probably not as efficient as it could be, but i didn't look at any spoilers and feel like a diabolical genius after having solved it.
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Alone points out that humans create institutions to make their environment safer, and then offload their own responsibilities onto these institutions. He accuses us all of shirking our Heroic Responsibility. I’m not sure this is fair. An individual human can only do so much. I’ve avoided vulnerability to a somewhat silly degree in the past (avoiding caring for others or owning much more than I can carry at a dead run… caring for too much makes you vulnerable). Turns out too much independence can be far more harmful than not enough, because individual humans are weak and small, and we can do things of Power only by combining our efforts. To do something noteworthy, we much focus on our specialty and trust others to do focus on theirs. To create a strong meta-individual, we cannot all be completely responsible for everything – we need some specialists in responsibility as well. Not every cell in the human body can fight off hostile invaders, most of them have other vital tasks.
Oh, I agree, at least to a certain extent. Don't be so green and blue. We really are shirking responsibility. If your morality has responsiblity as the highest virtue, than it might be bad to have a nanny state, but there a serious advantages to having one, such as, as you point out, specialization.
The libertarian in me says it'd be ideal to have a third party, like an advocacy group, or a religion or whatever, taking that responsibility for those who need it while the government did the minimum against fraud and such. But as long as people don't realize they're Beyond the Reach of God, that's going to have problem of it's own.