Meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Discussion article for the meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Time tentative, location to be worked out. If you are attending Gen Con and want to meet up with rationalists, please comment if you have a preferred time and location. Posting this now to get it on the calendar and solicit responses. Default location is in the card game area, specific location to be found at the time (and then posted here). UPDATE: setting up at the blue Fantasy Flight tables, by the X-Wing Miniatures banner, in front of the HQ table, just before the banner showing the switch to Asmodee.
Meet up with Less Wrong friends and play games! Learn the newest releases, play classics, and otherwise have fun. A purely social event, running for as long as people want to stay and play, with potential continued discussion over dinner.
As at all events, there is no minimum degree, IQ, reading record, height, age, or neurotypicality to participate. Bring games if you like, learn new games if you like, and expect a range from "I am here for the championships" to "what are we Settling?"
We seemed like the kind of nerds who might go to Gen Con. You can also use the comments here to find others attending, arrange other connections at the event, discuss the con, etc.
Discussion article for the meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Meetup : Ann Arbor meetup
Discussion article for the meetup : Ann Arbor meetup
Our bi-monthly discussion group. There is no minimum to attend in terms of age, reading history, karma, or otherwise. If you can read this, you are welcome. You do not need to have read the Sequences or HPMoR. You do not need a degree. You do not need to be extroverted, neurotypical, or even think of yourself a Less Wrong person.
Accommodations:
We will likely be seated upstairs. I presume that they have an elevator, but I have not checked. If mobility is an issue for you, please send me a message, and I can make sure you are accommodated.
I will bring the stim toys collection again. Feel free to bring your own if that keeps your hands happy. I don't use stim toys, so also feel free to critique the ones I ordered for meetups.
I will be ordering food to share again, so if cost is an issue, there will be feta bread and vegetarian pizza available. You are also free to order on your own or not eat. Even if cost is not an issue, please consider having some of the shared food so that no one feels self-conscious about it. If cost is an issue and you are vegan, please look at the menu and send me a message.
Other accommodations needed? Please comment or message me.
We have two factors that might move the date: students' return and visiting guests. Guests are uncertain but possible; our last Pizza House event was scheduled around Scott Aaronson's visit. Students' return could be a positive or a negative: good if you are a student who wants to make it, bad if we are trying to hold an event near campus during move-in weekend. Undergraduate move-in starts September 4, so we are shooting a bit before that right now.
Discussion article for the meetup : Ann Arbor meetup
Meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Discussion article for the meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Tentative location: Hall F, the green tables just behind the CCG/TCG HQ. They say that space is generally available for open gaming, and failing that, the blue tables just across from HQ would be. If we have managed to pick peak CCG time, we will wait until 2:15 to gather folks and relocate (and will comment here to that effect). That spot is also just outside the exhibit hall, in case you decide you must own your own copy of whatever we play. Please bring your newest game or old favorite.
Meet up with Less Wrong friends and play games! Learn the newest releases, play classics, and otherwise have fun. A purely social event, running for as long as people want to stay and play, with potential continued discussion over dinner.
As at all events, there is no minimum degree, IQ, reading record, height, age, or neurotypicality to participate. Bring games if you like, learn new games if you like, and expect a range from "I am here for the championships" to "what are we Settling?"
We seemed like the kind of nerds who might go to Gen Con. You can also use the comments here to find others attending, arrange other connections at the event, discuss the con, etc.
Discussion article for the meetup : Gen Con: Applied Game Theory
Michigan Meetup Feedback and Planning
Our meetup last weekend was at the downtown Ann Arbor Public Library. There were several comments, requests, and discussion items. This discussion topic goes out to attendees, people who might have wanted to attend but didn't, and members of other meetup groups who have suggestions.
1. Several people mentioned having trouble commenting here on the Less Wrong forums. Some functions are restricted by karma, and if you cannot comment, you cannot accummulate karma.
- Have you verified your e-mail address? This is a common stumbling point.
- Please try to comment on this post. Restrictions on comments are (moderate certainty) looser than comments on starting posts.
- If that does not work, please try to comment on a comment on this post. I will add one specifically for this purpose. Restrictions on comments on comments may be (low certainty) looser than starting new comment threads.
- If someone has already troubleshot new users' problems with commenting, please link.
2. Some people felt intimidated about attending. Prominent community members include programmers, physicists, psychiatrists, philosophy professors, Ph.D.s, and other impressive folks who do not start with P like fanfiction writers. Will I be laughed out of the room if I have not read all the Sequences?
No. Not only is there no minimum requirement to attend, as a group, we are *very excited* about explaining things to people. Our writing can be informationally dense, but our habit of linking to long essays is (often) meant to provide context, not to say, "You must read all the dependencies before you are allowed to talk."
And frankly, we are not that intimidating. Being really impressive makes it easy to become prominent, which via availability bias makes us all look impressive, but our average is way lower than that. And the really impressive people will welcome you to the discussion.
So how can we express this in meetup announcements? I promised to draft a phrasing. Please critique and edit in comments.
Everyone is welcome. There is no minimum in terms of age, education, or reading history. There is no minimum contribution to the community nor requirement to speak. You need not be this tall to ride. If you can read this and are interested in the meetup, we want you to come to the meetup.
3. As part of signalling "be comfortable, you are welcome here," I bought some stim toys from Stimtastic and put them out for whoever might need them. They seemed popular. Comforting, distracting, how did that go for folks? They seemed good for some folks who wanted to do something with their hands, but I was worried that we had a bit much "play" at some points.
Your recommendations on accommodating access needs are welcome. (But I'm not buying chewable stim toys to share; you get to bring your own on those.)
4. The location was sub-optimal. It is a fine meeting space, but the library is under construction, has poor parking options, and does not allow food or drink. Attendees requested somewhere more comfortable, with snacking options. Our previous meeting was at a restaurant, which offers much of that but has more background noise and seemed less socially optimal in terms of coordinating discussion. Prior to that, Michigan meetups had been at Yvain's home.
We moved to Ann Arbor from Livonia because (1) Yvain had been hosting and moved to Ann Arbor, (2) half the Livonia attendees seemed to be Ann Arbor-area folks, and (3) I knew the library had a free meeting room.
Recommendations and volunteers for a meeting site in the area are welcome. I'm in Lansing and not well set up for a group of our size.
5. We had 17 people, although not all at once. It was suggested that we break up into two or more groups for part of the discussion. This is probably a good idea, and it would give more people a chance to participate.
6. Many groups have pre-defined topics or projects. No one leaped at that idea, but we can discuss on here.
7. Rationalist game night game night was another suggestion. I like it. Again, volunteers for hosts are welcome. Many public locations like restaurants are problematic for game nights.
Meetup : Ann Arbor, MI Discussion Meetup 6/13
Discussion article for the meetup : Ann Arbor, MI Discussion Meetup 6/13
We will be resuming bi-monthly meetups, moving to Ann Arbor. We have a meeting room reserved at the Ann Arbor District Library. Please bring your discussion topics, or post them here if you prefer to have the facilitator introduce them for you.
I am considering scheduling Lansing meetups in the off-month, if there is interest a little further north. That might wait until MSU is back in session, depending on our local population.
Discussion article for the meetup : Ann Arbor, MI Discussion Meetup 6/13
Choosing an Inferior Alternative
"Choosing an Inferior Alternative" (ungated version) is a 2006 paper1 by J. Edward Russo, Kurt A. Carlson and Margaret G. Meloy. It is presented as an example of cognitive biases leading to poor decision-making. In this case, participants were asked to rate options based on several characteristics, then the presentation of those options' characteristics was rearranged so that the inferior alternative's good points came first. With the new presentation, a majority of the same participants selected the alternative they had previously rated as inferior. You can read full details in the links above, and feel free to discuss methodological problems.2
This is an interesting result, and perhaps not too surprising here at Less Wrong. People have cognitive biases and can become committed to poor decisions, and you can manipulate those biases and decisions if you know what you are looking for.
What I want to focus on is the first sentence under "Results": "Just as they should have, a minority of participants (.41) selected the inferior [alternative] in the control choice, in which neither [alternative] was intentionally targeted." Either the methodological problems make it moot, or that is a fairly scary sentence.
Why is that scary? 41% of the participants picked what they identified as the inferior alternative in the previous round. The authors note it is below chance and move on. That is (1) not much below chance and (2) 41% of people whose preferences flipped when the presentation was rephrased. This is the control group, so their presentations were not manipulated to make the inferior alternative look good. Preferences change over time but having 41% change in two weeks in the control group seems like a big deal. The relevant comparison should be closer to "unchanged" rather than "chance." The treatment group saw 62% of participants change, so the treatment had about half as big an additional effect as the control.
The effect of rephrasing the options was almost twice as large as the additional effect of manipulating the order of that rephrasing. I am saying that a second time slightly differently because apparently that causes a huge effect in how we perceive things.
"Rationalists should win" has a problem if what we want to win can change that easily or quickly. Intentional manipulation is one thing, but many people switched choices without even being manipulated.
Part of me wants to dismiss this. Methodological problems! Unintentional re-ordering in the control group! Participants were not taking it seriously! The alternatives were restaurants, and I go to different restaurants all the time, not always the "superior alternative," so of course that changes on any given day! Hmm, that last one is pretty compelling, and it would leave the authors' original conclusion intact because the experimental group was significantly different than the control group, although it weakens the coherence of the idea of "an inferior alternative" for restaurants.
But part of me also thinks this is a fairer way to worry about things than our common, univariable considerations. It is rarely the case that Omega offers us a choice with a single, dollar-denominated outcome. We do that on purpose to focus discussion on the important point. Most of our real world choices are a complex mix of factors that are not directly comparable, such as between job options when one pays more, another has less commute, one of them offers more time off, and then their cultures differ in assorted ways large and small that might sound better or worse depending on how you feel that day.
So, on decisions more important than where to eat lunch, you should pause and weigh the alternatives, including rearranging the alternatives ("the enemy gate is down") and deciding which factors are most important to you and considering those first, rather than letting the salespeople for the alternatives present their strong points first. You should try to identify which of your preferences are more variable and put less weight on ones that might change even without manipulation. You should try to focus on your decision-making process in a way that counters biases rather than reinforcing them.
I remain somewhat troubled by the sheer size of that 41% change in a control group. But hey, this is a "Discussion" post, so please toss out your thoughts on our poorly mannered human preferences. Bonus points for working through how this affects our Coherent Extrapolated Volition.
1: It was published in Psychological Science, and I am aware of some issues with their quality control. I don't know if they apply here, but it seemed worth mentioning.
2: Please, go for it. I would except that it would distract from my point here.
Defeating the Villain
We have a recurring theme in the greater Less Wrong community that life should be more like a high fantasy novel. Maybe that is to be expected when a quarter of the community came here via Harry Potter fanfiction, and we also have rationalist group houses named after fantasy locations, descriptions of community members in terms of character archetypes and PCs versus NPCs, semi-serious development of the new atheist gods, and feel free to contribute your favorites in the comments.
A failure mode common to high fantasy novels as well as politics is solving all our problems by defeating the villain. Actually, this is a common narrative structure for our entire storytelling species, and it works well as a narrative structure. The story needs conflict, so we pit a sympathetic protagonist against a compelling antagonist, and we reach a satisfying climax when the two come into direct conflict, good conquers evil, and we live happily ever after.
This isn't an article about whether your opponent really is a villain. Let's make the (large) assumption that you have legitimately identified a villain who is doing evil things. They certainly exist in the world. Defeating this villain is a legitimate goal.
And then what?
Defeating the villain is rarely enough. Building is harder than destroying, and it is very unlikely that something good will spontaneously fill the void when something evil is taken away. It is also insufficient to speak in vague generalities about the ideals to which the post-[whatever] society will adhere. How are you going to avoid the problems caused by whatever you are eliminating, and how are you going to successfully transition from evil to good?
In fantasy novels, this is rarely an issue. The story ends shortly after the climax, either with good ascending or time-skipping to a society made perfect off-camera. Sauron has been vanquished, the rightful king has been restored, cue epilogue(s). And then what? Has the Chosen One shown skill in diplomacy and economics, solving problems not involving swords? What was Aragorn's tax policy? Sauron managed to feed his armies from a wasteland; what kind of agricultural techniques do you have? And indeed, if the book/series needs a sequel, we find that a problem at least as bad as the original fills in the void.
Reality often follows that pattern. Marx explicitly had no plan for what happened after you smashed capitalism. Destroy the oppressors and then ... as it turns out, slightly different oppressors come in and generally kill a fair percentage of the population. It works on the other direction as well; the fall of Soviet communism led not to spontaneous capitalism but rather kleptocracy and Vladmir Putin. For most of my lifetime, a major pillar of American foreign policy has seemed to be the overthrow of hostile dictators (end of plan). For example, Muammar Gaddafi was killed in 2011, and Libya has been in some state of unrest or civil war ever since. Maybe this is one where it would not be best to contribute our favorites in the comments.
This is not to say that you never get improvements that way. Aragorn can hardly be worse than Sauron. Regression to the mean perhaps suggests that you will get something less bad just by luck, as Putin seems clearly less bad than Stalin, although Stalin seems clearly worse than almost any other regime change in history. Some would say that causing civil wars in hostile countries is the goal rather than a failure of American foreign policy, which seems a darker sort of instrumental rationality.
Human flourishing is not the default state of affairs, temporarily suppressed by villainy. Spontaneous order is real, but it still needs institutions and social technology to support it.
Defeating the villain is a (possibly) necessary but (almost certainly) insufficient condition for bringing about good.
One thing I really like about this community is that projects tend to be conceived in the positive rather than the negative. Please keep developing your plans not only in terms of "this is a bad thing to be eliminated" but also "this is a better thing to be created" and "this is how I plan to get there."
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