I had a bit of car trouble, but I managed to get here get my coffee and the wifi password, and then realize I forgot a sign or anything of the kind. I'm sitting in the corner near the register if anybody happens to be waiting

A related post, 'Friendly AI Research and Taskification':

I don't even see how one would start to research the problem of getting a hypothetical AGI to recognize humans as distinguished beings. Solving this problem would seem to require as a prerequisite an understanding of the make up of the hypothetical AGI; something which people don't seem to have a clear grasp of at the moment. Even if one does have a model for a hypothetical AGI, writing code conducive to it recognizing humans as distinguished beings seems like an intractable task.

If the nature of ethical properties, statements, attitudes, and judgments does ultimately correlate with human brains, it might be possible to derive mathematical models of moral terms or judgments from brain data. The problem with arriving at the meaning of morality solely by means of contemplation is that you risk introducing new meanings based on high-order cognition and intuitions, rather than figuring out what humans as a whole mean by morality.

Two possible steps towards friendly AI/CEV (just some quick ideas):

1.) We want the AGI (CEV) to extrapolate our volition in a certain, ethical way. That is, it shouldn't for example create models of humans and hurt them just to figure out what we dislike. But in the end it won't be enough to write blog posts in English. We might have to put real people into brain scanners and derive mathematically precise thresholds for states like general indisposition and unethical behavior. Such models could then be implemented into the utility-function of an AGI, while blog posts written in natural language can't.

2.) We don't know if CEV is itself wished for and considered ethical by most humans. If you do not assume that all humans are alike, what makes you think that your personal solution, your answer to those questions will be universally accepted? A rich white atheist male living in a western country who is interested in topics like philosophy and mathematics does not seem to be someone who can speak for the rest of the world. If we are very concerned with the ethics of CEV in and of itself, we might have to come up with a way to execute an approximation of CEV before AGI is invented. We might need massive, large-scale social experiments and surveys to see if something like CEV is even desirable. Writing a few vague blog posts about it doesn't seem to get us the certainty we need before altering the universe irrevocably.

Universities subscribe to these databases. There is a kind of redirection via a proxy that happens when I'm logged in via my univ's network which allows me to download articles as you mention. I do have to agree to a "I declare I won't violate copyrights" button before proceeding.

Its cool to be in school :)

I get, "Enter your NetID and Password." Have you considered the possibility that you have a cookie on your computer that eliminates the need for you to log in?

But rationalism doesn’t have a well-defined set of norms/desirable skills to develop.

Actually changing your mind, learning the simple math of various fields,and becoming more luminous seem to represent a set of desirable skills to me, though I admit that is far from comprehensive. See also the twelve virtues of rationality.

I may be experiencing a fluke, but it appears that my university's library's website allows any computer to use it as proxy for viewing and downloading articles from many paywalled sites (in fact, every site it gives me access to with my student login, which is a very large selection). I only discovered this by accident, and I'm hoping it isn't unintentional on their part. If anybody is interested, the address is here. If you try it and it doesn't work, please tell me.

ETA: It appears that my browser simply cached my login, and that this service is unfortunately not actually available to the general public. Sorry for any confusion.

I'll try and make it up; It's the weekend before finals start, but that likely wont be a problem.

Just finished the Mote. Nice twist on evo-psych

Sorry, I have a bit of a skewed perspective about what's obvious. :P Once I perceived the connection to binary trees it seemed plain as day.