Comment author: PhoenixComplex7 07 July 2015 01:19:07PM 0 points [-]

Nope! I remembered a meeting happening in Ann Arbor but it appears that was a once-off thing, as I can't find any links to a group based there. Not to mention I couldn't make it there anyhow, anytime soon.

Comment author: Yvain 16 July 2015 02:09:49PM 1 point [-]

There are meetings in the area every couple of months. There's no specific group to link to, but if you give me your email address I will add you to the list.

If you tell me where exactly in Michigan you are, I can try to put you in touch with other Michigan LW/SSC readers. Most are in Ann Arbor, but there are several in the Detroit metro area and at least one in Grand Rapids.

Comment author: gjm 07 May 2015 10:25:03AM 15 points [-]

There was a discussion a little while back (I think in another open thread) about the game of looking at the titles of articles linked from the "Recent on rationality blogs" sidebar and guessing who wrote them. Usually this is pretty easy.

Right now, though, the top link in the list is "The Future is Filters", which seems like an obvious Robin Hanson title. But no! It's Scott, not Robin, and it's about "filter bubbles" rather than "great filters".

I wonder whether Scott is aware of the game and deliberately trying to tease...

Comment author: Yvain 10 May 2015 05:08:30AM *  3 points [-]

I liked the sound of "The Future Is Pipes" and saved that sentence structure in case I needed it.

Comment author: DanArmak 25 February 2015 09:58:08PM *  6 points [-]

People here should be aware of fresh Word of God. Apparently we're NOT in the Mirror.

Comment author: Yvain 26 February 2015 08:48:19PM *  10 points [-]

The Mirror did not touch the ground; the golden frame had no feet. It didn't look like it was hovering; it looked like it was fixed in place, more solid and more motionless than the walls themselves, like it was nailed to the reference frame of the Earth's motion.

The Mirror is in the fourth wall. Now that we-the-readers have seen the mirror, we have to consider that our seeing Eliezer saying this isn't in the mirror might just be part of our coherent extrapolated volition.

Comment author: linkhyrule5 25 February 2015 07:40:08PM 1 point [-]

Presumably, the body was repaired to true health - which also means that the brain was restored to its original state, that is, functional.

At that point, a Muggle can be revived by simply restarting her heart. A witch, apparently, requires a bit of magic.

Comment author: Yvain 25 February 2015 09:46:24PM 2 points [-]

But that suggests that you can resurrect someone non-permanently without the Stone - and possibly keep them alive indefinitely by expending constant magic on it like Harry does with his father's rock.

Comment author: Yvain 25 February 2015 09:44:40PM 9 points [-]

Why is Voldemort not getting rid of Harry in some more final way?

Even if he's worried killing Harry will rebound against him because of the prophecy somehow, he can, I don't know, freeze Harry? Stick Harry in the mirror using whatever happened to Dumbledore? Destroy Harry's brain and memories and leave him an idiot? Shoot Harry into space?

Why is "resurrect Harry's best friend to give him good counsel" a winning move here?

Comment author: Yvain 25 February 2015 07:26:18PM 4 points [-]

How is Voldemort resurrecting Hermione?

With his own resurrection, he's transfiguring stuff into his body, using the Stone to make the transfiguration permanent, then having his spirit repossess the body.

With Hermione, the body was never the problem. Where's he getting the spirit? How does the Stone help?

Comment author: Yvain 25 February 2015 07:08:27PM *  25 points [-]

So Harry gets his wand back, gets his pouch back, Voldemort resurrects Hermione with superpowers, then Voldemort becomes super-weak, his horcruxes mysteriously stop working, and he mentions this is happening loudly enough for Harry to hear and kill him?

Either this is still all in the mirror, or Harry needs to buy lottery tickets right away.

Comment author: Yvain 24 February 2015 11:01:12PM *  12 points [-]

"Well," said Albus Dumbledore. "I do feel stupid."

"I should hope so," Professor Quirrell said easily; if he had been at all shocked himself at being caught, it did not show. A casual wave of his hand changed his robes back to a Professor's clothing.

Dumbledore's grimness had returned and redoubled. "There I am, searching so hard for Voldemort's shade, never noticing that the Defense Professor of Hogwarts is a sickly, half-dead victim possessed by a spirit far more powerful than himself. I would call it senility, if so many others had not missed it as well."

This is Dumbledore admitting he held the Idiot Ball. We've been promised nobody's holding the Idiot Ball. So something's up. I like the theory that mirror is operating as intended and showing Voldemort what he wants to see, that being Dumbledore making a mistake and losing. Alternately, it could be that Dumbledore was somehow able to make a version of him inside the mirror (maybe in his CEV he saw himself inside the mirror protecting the Stone, and that reflection-Dumbledore gained independent existence?). Or he could just have something else up his sleeve.

Comment author: zedzed 16 February 2015 01:39:48AM 3 points [-]

What are some sensible-sounding alternatives to eliminating the snitch entirely?

The best I can think of is have two snitches—red snitch, blue snitch. Whenever a seeker catches their snitch, the opposing team can't score any more; the game ends when the second snitch is caught.

Comment author: Yvain 16 February 2015 05:22:54PM 24 points [-]

Prediction:

Harry gets the Snitch eliminated from Quidditch. Not just in Hogwarts, but in the big leagues as well - they don't want a Germany vs. Austria on their hands.

All of the celebrity Quidditch players of the world - Victor Krum, Ludo Bagman, Finbar Quigley - are distraught by these sudden and drastic changes to a traditional game they've loved for many years. At the ceremony marking the changes, some of them tear up.

The Daily Prophet headline is "BOY WHO LIVED TEARS UP THE STARS"

Eliezer gives all of us a long lecture about how the prior for somebody making celebrities cry is so much higher than the prior for someone literally ripping the Sun apart that the latter hypothesis should never even have entered our consideration, regardless of how much more natural an interpretation of the prophecy it is.

Comment author: Error 16 January 2015 12:54:20AM 3 points [-]

I'm looking for an old post of Eliezer's. If I remember the post correctly, he was commenting that a lot of the negative reaction to evopsych might come from having first encountered it in the hands of dumb internet commentators, instead of <some scholarly book title>.

I don't remember the title he referenced, and the search function is failing me. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Comment author: Yvain 16 January 2015 01:30:44AM 4 points [-]

I can't find the exact post you're talking about, but the book involved was probably The Adapted Mind, since Eliezer often praises it in terms like those.

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