Devil's Advocacy explained: "While many undergraduates prefer teachers to give them the one true answer on policy questions, I try to avoid taking sides. In class discussions, I ask students to take and defend policy positions, and then I defend any undefended major positions, and mention any unmentioned major criticisms of these positions. The important thing is for students to understand the sorts of arguments that an economist would respect. Hanson :-)

Eliezer - a suggestion. I'd really welcome a posting that acts a table of contents to the series: An overview of your argument, laying out the basic narrative with links to each of the posts in the best reading order, somethnig that gives shape to the series.

The great thing about a blog format is the way it develops over time. The bad thing about it is that it's a terrible archive... reverse order, etc etc. I'd like to be able to tell someone 'read Eliezer's series on Quantum Physics... here's a link to the overview page...

Eliezer (and Robin) this series is very interesting and all, but.... aren't you writing this on the wrong blog?

I used to like this blog better when it was all about overcoming bias

"If I had a hammer that seemed to me to work really well, but no one was willing to pay me the going rate for hammers of that quality"

.. then by definition you have mis-estimated the going rate.

hmm... well, it was an interesting month but I'm not sure I didn't enjoy this blog more when it was a blog just about, well, overcoming bias. Eliezer, perhaps you should have your own blog...

BTW I saw you on the TV the other night, talking about the singularity.

It's always odd, isn't it, seeing a person for the first time whom you have previously known only in writing. As always, you didn't look/sound at all like I expected.

Which led me to an interesting line of thought: why does reading someone's writing produce *any* expectation at all of what the person looks/sounds like? It's a bias. Is there a halo effect: we expect intelligent writers to look tall and beautiful? Or is there a einstein-bias: we expect intelligent writers to be wild-looking with messy hair, talking quickly?

Anyway, there you were on the screen. Looking different. "Quick!", I yelled to my wife, who was in the kitchen, "quick, come here! It's Eliezer Yudkowsky!"

hmmm...perhaps I need to get out more.