I've been looking for reliable evidence of a claim I've heard a few times. The claim is that the closing of sweatshops (by anti-globalization activists) has resulted in many of the child workers becoming prostitutes. The idea is frequently proffered as an example of do-gooder foolishness ignoring basic economics and screwing people over.

However, despite searching for a while, I can't find anything to indicate that this actually happened.

Some guy at the Library of Economics and Liberty mentions it here:

In one famous 1993 case U.S. senator Tom Harkin proposed banning imports from countries that employed children in sweatshops. In response a factory in Bangladesh laid off 50,000 children. What was their next best alternative? According to the British charity Oxfam a large number of them became prostitutes.

But in the article, Paul Krugman mentions the Oxfam study without citation:

In 1993, child workers in Bangladesh were found to be producing clothing for Wal-Mart, and Senator Tom Harkin proposed legislation banning imports from countries employing underage workers. The direct result was that Bangladeshi textile factories stopped employing children. But did the children go back to school? Did they return to happy homes? Not according to Oxfam, which found that the displaced child workers ended up in even worse jobs, or on the streets -- and that a significant number were forced into prostitution.

I looked at some Oxfam stuff, but couldn't find the study.

A similar claim is made in The Race to the Top: The Real Story of Globalization by Tomas Larsson (go here and use the search tool for the word 'prostitution'), but doesn't mention the Oxfam study:

Keith E. Maskus, an economist at the University of Colorado, has studied the issue... He concludes that... "The celebrated French ban of soccer balls sewn in Pakistan for the World Cup in 1998 resulted in significant dislocation of children from employment. Those who tracked them found that a large proportion ended up begging and/or in prostitution,"

I looked for a paper or something by Maskus but came up empty.

I was taught this fact at a Poli Sci class in college, but I'm starting to think it's more likely to be an information cascade. Can anyone do a better job than me?

Thanks in advance.

Not sure if this has been covered on LW, but it seems highly relevant to WBE development. Link here:

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/147gqm/we_are_the_computational_neuroscientists_behind/

A few questioners mention the Singularity and make Skynet jokes.

The abstract from their paper in Science:

A central challenge for cognitive and systems neuroscience is to relate the incredibly complex behavior of animals to the equally complex activity of their brains. Recently described, large-scale neural models have not bridged this gap between neural activity and biological function. In this work, we present a 2.5-million-neuron model of the brain (called “Spaun”) that bridges this gap by exhibiting many different behaviors. The model is presented only with visual image sequences, and it draws all of its responses with a physically modeled arm. Although simplified, the model captures many aspects of neuroanatomy, neurophysiology, and psychological behavior, which we demonstrate via eight diverse tasks.

I'm curious to see LWers' perspectives on the project.

TL;DR: let's visualize what the world looks like if we successfully prepare for the Singularity.

I remember reading once, though I can't remember where, about a technique called 'contrasting'. The idea is to visualize a world where you've accomplished your goals, and visualize the current world, and hold the two worlds in contrast to each other. Apparently there was a study about this; the experimental 'contrasting' group was more successful than the control in accomplishing its goals.

It occurred to me that we need some of this. Strategic insights about the path to FAI are not robust or likely to be highly reliable. And in order to find a path forward, you need to know where you're trying to go. Thus, some contrasting:

It's the year 20XX. The time is 10 AM, on the day that will thereafter be remembered as the beginning of the post-Singularity world. Since the dawn of the century, a movement rose in defense of humanity's future. What began with mailing lists and blog posts became a slew of businesses, political interventions, infrastructure improvements, social influences, and technological innovations designed to ensure the safety of the world.

Despite all odds, we exerted a truly extraordinary effort, and we did it. The AI research is done; we've laboriously tested and re-tested our code, and everyone agrees that the AI is safe. It's time to hit 'Run'.

And so I ask you, before we hit the button: what does this world look like? In the scenario where we nail it, which achievements enabled our success? Socially? Politically? Technologically? What resources did we acquire? Did we have superior technology, or a high degree of secrecy? Was FAI research highly prestigious, attractive, and well-funded? Did we acquire the ability to move quickly, or did we slow unFriendly AI research efforts? What else?

I had a few ideas, which I divided between scenarios where we did a 'fantastic', 'good', or 'sufficient' job at preparing for the Singularity. But I need more ideas! I'd like to fill this out in detail, with the help of Less Wrong. So if you have ideas, write them in the comments, and I'll update the list.

Some meta points:

• This speculation is going to be, well, pretty speculative. That's fine - I'm just trying to put some points on the map. 
• However, I'd like to get a list of reasonable possibilities, not detailed sci-fi stories. Do your best.
• In most cases, I'd like to consolidate categories of possibilities. For example, we could consolidate "the FAI team has exclusive access to smart drugs" and "the FAI team has exclusive access to brain-computer interfaces" into "the FAI team has exclusive access to intelligence-amplification technology." 
• However, I don't want too much consolidation. For example, I wouldn't want to consolidate "the FAI team gets an incredible amount of government funding" and "the FAI team has exclusive access to intelligence-amplification technology" into "the FAI team has a lot of power".
• Lots of these possibilities are going to be mutually exclusive; don't see them as aspects of the same scenario, but rather different scenarios.

Anyway - I'll start.

Visualizing the pre-FAI world

• Fantastic scenarios
  • The FAI team has exclusive access to intelligence amplification technology, and use it to ensure Friendliness & strategically reduce X-risk.
  • The government supports Friendliness research, and contributes significant resources to the problem. 
  • The government actively implements legislation which FAI experts and strategists believe has a high probability of making AI research safer.
  • FAI research becomes a highly prestigious and well-funded field, relative to AGI research.
  • Powerful social memes exist regarding AI safety; any new proposal for AI research is met with a strong reaction (among the populace and among academics alike) asking about safety precautions. It is low status to research AI without concern for Friendliness.
  • The FAI team discovers important strategic insights through a growing ecosystem of prediction technology; using stables of experts, prediction markets, and opinion aggregation.
  • The FAI team implements deliberate X-risk reduction efforts to stave off non-AI X-risks. Those might include a global nanotech immune system, cheap and rigorous biotech tests and safeguards, nuclear safeguards, etc.
  • The FAI team implements the infrastructure for a high-security research effort, perhaps offshore, implementing the best available security measures designed to reduce harmful information leaks.
  • Giles writes: Large amounts of funding are available, via government or through business. The FAI team and its support network may have used superior rationality to acquire very large amounts of money.
  • Giles writes: The technical problem of establishing Friendliness is easier than expected; we are able t construct a 'utility function' (or a procedure for determining such a function) in order to implement human values that people (including people with a broad range of expertise) are happy with.
  • Crude_Dolorium writes: FAI research proceeds much faster than AI research, so by the time we can make a superhuman AI, we already know how to make it Friendly (and we know what we really want that to mean).
• Pretty good scenarios
  • Intelligence amplification technology access isn't exclusive to the FAI team, but it is differentially adopted by the FAI team and their supporting network, resulting in a net increase in FAI team intelligence relative to baseline. The FAI team uses it to ensure Friendliness and implement strategy surrounding FAI research.
  • The government has extended some kind of support for Friendliness research, such as limited funding. No protective legislation is forthcoming.
  • FAI research becomes slightly more high status than today, and additional researchers are attracted to answer important open questions about FAI.
  • Friendliness and rationality memes grow at a reasonable rate, and by the time the Friendliness program occurs, society is more sane.
  • We get slightly better at making predictions, mostly by refining our current research and discussion strategies. This allows us a few key insights that are instrumental in reducing X-risk.
  • Some X-risk reduction efforts have been implemented, but with varying levels of success. Insights about which X-risk efforts matter are of dubious quality, and the success of each effort doesn't correlate well to the seriousness of the X-risk. Nevertheless, some X-risk reduction is achieved, and humanity survives long enough to implement FAI.
  • Some security efforts are implemented, making it difficult but not impossible for pre-Friendly AI tech to be leaked. Nevertheless, no leaks happen.
  • Giles writes: Funding is harder to come by, but small donations, limited government funding, or moderately successful business efforts suffice to fund the FAI team.
  • Giles writes: The technical problem of aggregating values through a Friendliness function is difficult; people have contradictory and differing values. However, there is broad agreement as to how to aggregate preferences. Most people accept that FAI needs to respect values of humanity as a whole, not just their own.
  • Crude_Dolorium writes: Superhuman AI arrives before we learn how to make it Friendly, but we do learn how to make an 'Anchorite' AI that definitely won't take over the world. The first superhuman AIs use this architecture, and we use them to solve the harder problems of FAI before anyone sets off an exploding UFAI.
• Sufficiently good scenarios
  • Intelligence amplification technology is widespread, preventing any differential adoption by the FAI team. However, FAI researchers are able to keep up with competing efforts to use that technology for AI research.
  • The government doesn't support Friendliness research, but the research group stays out of trouble and avoids government interference.
  • FAI research never becomes prestigious or high-status, but the FAI team is able to answer the important questions anyway.
  • Memes regarding Friendliness aren't significantly more widespread than today, but  the movement has grown enough to attract the talent necessary to implement a Friendliness program.
  • Predictive ability is no better than it is today, but the few insights we've gathered suffice to build the FAI team and make the project happen.
  • There are no significant and successful X-risk reduction efforts, but humanity survives long enough to implement FAI anyway.
  • No significant security measures are implemented for the FAI project. Still, via cooperation and because the team is relatively unknown, no dangerous leaks occur.
  • Giles writes: The team is forced to operate on a shoestring budget, but succeeds anyway because the problem turns out to not be incredibly sensitive to funding constraints.
  • Giles writes: The technical problem of aggregating values is incredibly difficult. Many important human values contradict each other, and we have discovered no "best" solution to those conflicts. Most people agree on the need for a compromise but quibble over how that compromise should be reached. Nevertheless, we come up with a satisfactory compromise.
  • Crude_Dolorium writes: The problems of Friendliness aren't solved in time, or the solutions don't apply to practical architectures, or the creators of the first superhuman AIs don't use them, so the AIs have only unreliable safeguards. They're given cheap, attainable goals; the creators have tools to read the AIs' minds to ensure they're not trying anything naughty, and killswitches to stop them; they have an aversion to increasing their intelligence beyond a certain point, and to whatever other failure modes the creators anticipate; they're given little or no network connectivity; they're kept ignorant of facts more relevant to exploding than to their assigned tasks; they require special hardware, so it's harder for them to explode; and they're otherwise designed to be safer if not actually safe. Fortunately they don't encounter any really dangerous failure modes before they're replaced with descendants that really are safe.

My roommate recently sent me a review article that LW might find interesting:

Conclusions:  Low levels of alcohol intake (1-2 drinks per day for women and 2-4 drinks per day for men) are inversely associated with total mortality in both men and women. Our findings, while confirming the hazards of excess drinking, indicate potential windows of alcohol intake that may confer a net beneficial effect of moderate drinking, at least in terms of survival.

Personal observation says that LWers tend not to drink very much or often. Perhaps that should change, to the degree suggested by the article?

Full article here.

My uncle works in insurance. I recently mentioned that I'm planning to sign up for cryonics.

"That's amazing," he said. "Convincing a young person to buy life insurance? That has to be the greatest scam ever."

I took the comment lightly, not caring to argue about it. But it got me thinking - couldn't cryonics be a great opportunity for insurance companies to make a bunch of money?

Consider:

1. Were there a much stronger demand for cryonics, cryonics organizations would flourish through competition, outside investment, and internal reinvestment. Costs would likely fall, and this would be good for cryonicists in general.
2. If cryonics organizations flourish, this increases the probability of cryonics working. I can think of a bunch of ways in which this could happen; perhaps, for example, it would encourage the creation of safety nets whereby the failure of individual companies doesn't result in anyone getting thawed. It would increase R&D on both perfusion and revivification, encourage entrepreneurs to explore new related business models, etcetera.
3. Increasing the demand for cryonics increases the demand for life insurance policies; thus insurance companies have a strong incentive to increase the demand for cryonics. Many large insurance companies would like nothing more than to usher in a generation of young people that want to buy life insurance.¹
   
4. The demand for cryonics could be increased by an insightful marketing campaign by an excellent marketing agency with an enormous budget... like those used by big insurance companies.² A quick Googling says that ad spending by insurance companies exceeded $4.15 billion in 2009.

Almost a year ago, Strange7 suggested that cryonics organizations could run this kind of marketing campaign. I think he's wrong - there's no way CI or Alcor have the money. But the biggest insurance companies do have the money, and I'd be shocked if these companies or their agencies aren't already dumping all kinds of money into market research.

What would doing this require? 

1. That an open-minded person in the insurance industry who is in the position to direct this kind of funding exists. I don't have a sense of how likely this is.
2. That we can locate/get an audience with the person from step 1. I think research and networking could get this done, especially if the higher-status among us are interested.
3. That we can find someone who is capable and willing to explain this clearly and convincingly to the person from step 1. I'm not sure it would be that difficult. In the startup world, strangers convince strangers to speculatively spend millions of dollars every week. Hell, I'll do it.

I want to live in a world where cryonics ads air on TV just as often as ads for everything else people spend money on. I really can see an insurance company owning this project - if they can a) successfully revamp the image of cryonics and b) become known as the household name for it when the market gets big, they will make lots of money.

What do you think? Where has my reasoning failed? Does anyone here know anyone powerful in insurance? 

Lastly, taking a cue from ciphergoth: this is not the place to rehash all the old arguments about cryonics. I'm asking about a very specific idea about marketing and life insurance, not requesting commentary on cryonics itself. Thanks!

¹ Perhaps modeling the potential size of the market would offer insight here. If it turns out that this idea is not insane, I'll find a way to make it happen. I could use your help.

² Consider what happened with diamonds in the 1900s:

... N. W. Ayer suggested that through a well-orchestrated advertising and public-relations campaign it could have a significant impact on the "social attitudes of the public at large and thereby channel American spending toward larger and more expensive diamonds instead of "competitive luxuries." Specifically, the Ayer study stressed the need to strengthen the association in the public's mind of diamonds with romance. Since "young men buy over 90% of all engagement rings" it would be crucial to inculcate in them the idea that diamonds were a gift of love: the larger and finer the diamond, the greater the expression of love. Similarly, young women had to be encouraged to view diamonds as an integral part of any romantic courtship.

Aside from cryonics and eating better, what else can we do to live long lives?

Using this tool, I looked up the risks of death for my demographic group. As a 15-24 year old male in the United States, the most likely cause of my death is a traffic accident; and so I’m taking steps to avoid that. Below I have included the results of my research as well as the actions I will take to implement my findings. Perhaps my research can help you as well.¹

Before diving into the results, I will note that this data took me one hour to collect. It’s definitely not comprehensive, and I know that working together, we can do much better. So if you have other resources or data-backed recommendations on how to avoid dying in a traffic accident, leave a comment below and I’ll update this post.

General points

Changing your behavior can reduce your risk of death in a car crash. A 1985 report on British and American crash data discovered that “driver error, intoxication and other human factors contribute wholly or partly to about 93% of crashes.” Other drivers’ behavior matters too, of course, but you might as well optimize your own.²

Secondly, overconfidence appears to be a large factor in peoples’ thinking about traffic safety. A speaker for the National Highway Traffic Safety Association (NHTSA) stated that “Ninety-five percent of crashes are caused by human error… but 75% of drivers say they're more careful than most other drivers. Less extreme evidence for overconfidence about driving is presented here.

One possible cause for this was suggested by the Transport Research Laboratory, which explains that “...the feeling of being confident in more and more challenging situations is experienced as evidence of driving ability, and that 'proven' ability reinforces the feelings of confidence. Confidence feeds itself and grows unchecked until something happens – a near-miss or an accident.”

So if you’re tempted to use this post as an opportunity to feel superior to other drivers, remember: you’re probably overconfident too! Don’t just humbly confess your imperfections – change your behavior.

Top causes of accidents

Distraction

Driver distraction is one of the largest causes of traffic accident deaths. The Director of Traffic Safety at the American Automobile Association stated that "The research tells us that somewhere between 25-50 percent of all motor vehicle crashes in this country really have driver distraction as their root cause." The NHTSA reports the number as 16%.

If we are to reduce distractions while driving, we ought to identify which distractors are the worst. One is cell phone use. My solution: Don’t make calls in the car, and turn off your phone’s sound so that you aren’t tempted.

I brainstormed other major distractors and thought of ways to reduce their distracting effects.

Distractor: Looking at directions on my phone as I drive

• Solution: Download a great turn-by-turn navigation app (recommendations are welcome).
• Solution: Buy a GPS.

Distractor: Texting, Facebook, slowing down to gawk at an accident, looking at scenery

• Solution [For System 2]: Consciously accept that texting (Facebook, gawking, scenery) causes accidents.
• Solution [For System 1]: Once a week, vividly and emotionally imagine texting (using Facebook, gawking at an accident) and then crashing & dying.
• Solution: Turn off your phone’s sound while driving, so you won’t answer texts.

Distractor: Fatigue

• Solution [For System 2]: Ask yourself if you’re tired before you plan to get in the car. Use Anki or a weekly review list to remember the association.
• Solution [For System 1]: Once a week, vividly and emotionally imagine dozing off while driving and then dying.

Distractor: Other passengers

• Solution: Develop an identity as someone who drives safely and thinks it’s low status to be distracting in the car. Achieve this by meditating on the commitment, writing a journal entry about it, using Anki, or saying it every day when you wake up in the morning.
• Solution [In the moment]: Tell people to chill out while you’re driving. Mentally simulate doing this ahead of time, so you don’t hesitate to do it when it matters.

Distractor: Adjusting the radio

• Solution: If avoiding using the car radio is unrealistic, minimize your interaction with it by only using the hotkey buttons rather than manually searching through channels.
• Solution: If you’re constantly tempted to change the channel (like I am), buy an iPod cable so you can listen to your own music and set playlists that you like, so you won't constantly want to change the song.

A last interesting fact about distraction, from Wikipedia:

Recent research conducted by British scientists suggests that music can also have an effect [on driving]; classical music is considered to be calming, yet too much could relax the driver to a condition of distraction. On the other hand, hard rock may encourage the driver to step on the acceleration pedal, thus creating a potentially dangerous situation on the road.

Speeding

The Road and Traffic Authority of New South Wales claims that “speeding… is a factor in about 40 percent of road deaths.” Data from the NHTSA puts the number at 30%.

Speeding also increases the severity of crashes; “in a 60 km/h speed limit area, the risk of involvement in a casualty crash doubles with each 5 km/h increase in travelling speed above 60 km/h.”

Stop. Think about that for a second. I’ll convert it to the Imperial system for my fellow Americans: “in a [37.3 mph] speed limit area, the risk of involvement in a casualty crash doubles with each [3.1 mph] increase in travelling speed above [37.3 mph].” Remember that next time you drive a 'mere' 5 mph over the limit.

Equally shocking is this paragraph from the Freakonomics blog:

Kockelman et al. estimated that the difference between a crash on a 55 mph limit road and a crash on a 65 mph one means a 24 percent increase in the chances the accident will be fatal. Along with the higher incidence of crashes happening in the first place, a difference in limit between 55 and 65 adds up to a 28 percent increase in the overall fatality count.

Driving too slowly can be dangerous too. An NHTSA presentation cites two studies that found a U-shaped relationship between vehicle speed and crash incidence; thus “Crash rates were lowest for drivers traveling near the mean speed, and increased with deviations above and below the mean.”

However, driving fast is still far more dangerous than driving slowly. This relationship appears to be exponential, as you can see on the tenth slide of the presentation.

• Solution: Watch this 30 second video for a vivid comparison of head-on crashes at 60 km/hr (37 mph) and 100 km/hr (60 mph). Imagine yourself in the car. Imagine your tearful friends and family. 
• Solution: Develop an identity as someone who drives close to the speed limit, by meditating on the commitment, writing a journal entry about it, using Anki, or saying it every day when you wake up in the morning.

Driving conditions

Driving conditions are another source of driving risk.

One factor I discovered was the additional risk from driving at night. Nationwide, 49% of fatal crashes happen at night, with a fatality rate per mile of travel about three times as high as daytime hours. (Source)

• Solution: make an explicit effort to avoid driving at night. Use Anki to remember this association.
• Solution: Look at your schedule and see if you can change a recurring night-time drive to the daytime.

Berkeley research on 1.4 million fatal crashes found that “fatal crashes were 14% more likely to happen on the first snowy day of the season compared with subsequent ones.” The suggested hypothesis is that people take at least a day to recalibrate their driving behavior in light of new snow. 

• Solution: make an explicit effort to avoid driving on the first snowy day after a sequence of non-snowy ones. Use Anki to remember this association.

Another valuable factoid: 77% of weather-related fatalities (and 75% of all crashes!) involve wet pavement.

Statistics are available for other weather-related issues, but the data I found wasn’t adjusted for the relative frequencies of various weather conditions. That’s problematic; it might be that fog, for example, is horrendously dangerous compared to ice or slush, but it’s rarer and thus kills fewer people. I’m interested in looking at appropriately adjusted statistics. 

Other considerations

• Teen drivers are apparently way worse at not dying in cars than older people. So if you’re a teenager, take the outside view and accept that you (not just ‘other dumb teenagers’) may need to take particular care when driving. Relevant information about teen driving is available here.
  
  
• Alcohol use appeared so often during my research that I didn’t even bother including stats about it. Likewise for wearing a seatbelt.
  
  
• Since I’m not in the market for a car, I didn’t look into vehicle choice as a way to decrease personal existential risk. But I do expect this to be relevant to increasing driving safety.
  
  
• “The most dangerous month, it turns out, is August, and Saturday the most dangerous day, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.” I couldn’t tell whether this was because of increased amount of driving or an increased rate of crashes.
  
  
• This site recommends driving with your hands at 9 and 3 for increased control. The same site claims that “Most highway accidents occur in the left lane” because the other lanes have “more ‘escape routes’ should a problem suddenly arise that requires you to quickly change lanes”, but I found no citation for the claim.
  
  
• Bad driver behavior appears to significantly increase the risk of death in an accident, so: don't ride in car with people who drive badly or aggressively. I have a few friends with aggressive driving habits, and I’m planning to either a) tell them to drive more slowly when I’m in the car or b) stop riding in their cars.

Commenters' recommendations

I should note here that I have not personally verified anything posted below. Be sure to look at the original comment and do followup research before depending on these recommendations.

• MartinB recommends taking a driving safety class every few years.
  
  
• Dmytry suggests that bicycling may be good training for constantly keeping one's eyes on the road, though others argue that bicycling itself may be significantly more dangerous than driving anyway.
  
  
• Various commenters suggested simply avoiding driving whenever possible. Living in a city with good public transportation is recommended.
  
  
• David_Gerard recommends driving a bigger car with larger crumple zones (but not an SUV because they roll over). He also recommends avoiding motorcycles altogether and taking advanced driving courses.
  
  
• Craig_Heldreth adds that everyone in the car should be buckled up, as even a single unbuckled passenger can collide with and kill other passengers in a crash. Even cargo as light as a laptop should be secured or put in the trunk.
  
  
• JRMayne offers a list of recommendations that merit reading directly. DuncanS also offers a valuable list.

¹All bolding in the data was added for emphasis by me.

²The report notes that "57% of crashes were due solely to driver factors, 27% to combined roadway and driver factors, 6% to combined vehicle and driver factors, 3% solely to roadway factors, 3% to combined roadway, driver, and vehicle factors, 2% solely to vehicle factors and 1% to combined roadway and vehicle factors.”

It occurred to me this morning that, if it's actually valuable, generating true beliefs about the world must be someone's comparative advantage. If truth is instrumentally important, important people must be finding ways to pay to access it. I can think of several examples of this, but the one that caught my attention was actuarial science.

I know next to nothing about what actuaries actually do, but Wikipedia says:

"Actuaries mathematically evaluate the likelihood of events and quantify the contingent outcomes in order to minimize losses, both emotional and financial, associated with uncertain undesirable events."

Why, that sounds right up our alley. 

So what I'm wondering is: for those who can afford it, wouldn't it be worth contracting with actuaries to make important personal decisions? Not merely with regards to business, but everything else as well? My preliminary ideas include:

• Lifestyle choices to reduce personal risk of death
• Health and wellness decisions
• Vehicle choice for economic and safety considerations
• Where to send your kid to college and otherwise improve life success

What should a rationalist do about confidence? Should he lean harder towards

1. relentlessly psyching himself up to feel like he can do anything, or
2. having true beliefs about his abilities in all areas, coldly predicting his likelihood of success in a given domain?

I don't want to falsely construe these as dichotomous. The real answer will probably dissolve 'confidence' into smaller parts and indicate which parts go where. So which parts of 'confidence' correctly belong in our models of the world (which must never be corrupted) or our motivational systems (which we may cut apart and put together however helps us achieve our goals)? Note that this follows the distinction between epistemic and instrumental rationality.

Eliezer offers a decision criterion in The Sin of Underconfidence:

Does this way of thinking make me stronger, or weaker?  Really truly?

It makes us stronger to know when to lose hope already, and it makes us stronger to have the mental fortitude to kick our asses into shape so we can do the impossible. Lukeprog prescribes boosting optimism "by watching inspirational movies, reading inspirational biographies, and listening to motivational speakers." That probably makes you stronger too.

But I don't know what to do about saying 'I can do it' when the odds are against me. What do you do when you probably won't succeed, but believing that Heaven's army is at your back would increase your chances?

My default answer has always been to maximize confidence, but I acted this way long before I discovered rationality, and I've probably generated confidence for bad reasons as often as I have for good reasons. I'd like to have an answer that prescribes the right action, all of the time. I want know when confidence steers me wrong, and know when to stop increasing my confidence. I want the real answer, not the historically-generated heuristic.

I can't help but feeling like I'm missing something basic here. What do you think?

In a post last August called Alzheimer's vs. Cryonics, I left the following comment:

23andMe recently showed that people of my genotype are more than twice as likely to develop Alzheimer's as others in my ethnic group. I have a 15% chance of getting Alzheimer's before I'm 80, up from 7%. See Patri's post about this.

An initial Googling has generated things like 'eat paleo', 'get caffeine', 'exercise', and 'use your brain'. I'm planning to do further research about decreasing Alzheimer's risk.

I really recommend that everyone do 23andMe for this precise reason.

wedrifid made an insightful response:

I wonder, how much does that single bit of information (doubling the chance) matter to those decisions? Should you have been doing those things anyway, for the Alzheimer's prevention and the other benefits? Is it the motivational factor of the formal personal certification that is important or the actual information?

wedrifid nailed it. Transhumanists have a huge interest in making the necessary lifestyle adjustments to prevent Alzheimer's. Even if cryonics were certain to work, I'd like it to be me that is resurrected when the technology is available, and I won't still be me if Alzheimer's gets its way.

So I've been keeping an eye out for relevant information. I haven't done rigorous research yet, but a friend recently sent me a study: "A molecular link between the active component of marijuana and Alzheimer's disease pathology." I've uploaded the full text of the article here.

A sample from the abstract:

Here, we demonstrate that the active component of marijuana, Delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), competitively inhibits the enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AChE) as well as prevents AChE-induced amyloid beta-peptide (Abeta) aggregation, the key pathological marker of Alzheimer's disease. [...] Compared to currently approved drugs prescribed for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease, THC is a considerably superior inhibitor of Abeta aggregation, and this study provides a previously unrecognized molecular mechanism through which cannabinoid molecules may directly impact the progression of this debilitating disease.

From the conclusion:

It is noteworthy that THC is a considerably more effective inhibitor of AChE-induced [Abeta] deposition than the approved drugs for Alzheimer’s disease treatment, donepezil and tacrine, which reduced [Abeta] aggregation by only 22% and 7%, respectively, at twice the concentration used in our studies.

Therefore, AChE inhibitors such as THC and its analogues may provide an improved therapeutic for Alzheimer’s disease, augmenting acetylcholine levels by preventing neurotransmitter degradation and reducing [Abeta] aggregation, thereby simultaneously treating both the symptoms and progression of Alzheimer’s disease.

I, for one, would like to know if smoking weed could help prevent a fate that's plausibly worse than death-and-cryonics. So for those who know more about biology than I do: how promising are these results? What else has been shown to help prevent Alzheimer's?

I managed to turn an essay assignment into an opportunity to write about the Singularity, and I thought I'd turn to LW for feedback on the paper. The paper is about Thomas Pogge, a German philosopher who works on institutional efforts to end poverty and is a pledger for Giving What We Can. 

I offer a basic argument that he and other poverty activists should work on creating a positive Singularity, sampling liberally from well-known Less Wrong arguments. It's more academic than I would prefer, and it includes some loose talk of 'duties' (which bothers me), but for its goals, these things shouldn't be a huge problem. But maybe they are - I want to know that too.

I've already turned the assignment in, but when I make a better version, I'll send the paper to Pogge himself. I'd like to see if I can successfully introduce him to these ideas. My one conversation with him indicates that he would be open to actually changing his mind. He's clearly thought deeply about how to do good, and may simply have not been exposed to the idea of the Singularity yet.

I want feedback on all aspects of the paper  - style, argumentation, clarity. Be as constructively cruel as I know only you can.

If anyone's up for it, fee free to add feedback using Track Changes and email me a copy - mjcurzi[at]wustl.edu. I obviously welcome comments on the thread as well.

You can read the paper here in various formats.

Upvotes for all. Thank you!