Done! Wish I had had a scanner handy going in, I'm curious about the digit ratio.
Is this paper formally modeling human (ir)rational decision making worth understanding?
I've found that I learn new topics best by struggling to understand a jargoney paper. This passed through my inbox today and on the surface it appears to hit a lot of high notes.
Since I'm not an expert, I have no idea if this has any depth to it. Hivemind thoughts?
Modeling Human Decision Making using Extended Behavior Networks, Klaus Dorer
(Note: I'm also pushing myself to post to LW instead of lurking. If this kind of post is unwelcome, I'm happy to hear that feedback.)
Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded.
There is a very large amount of stuff that one is automatically certain of that is correct, though trivial, data like "liquid water is wet". I'm not sure how one would even practically quantify an analysis of what fraction of the statements one is certain of are or are not true. Even if one could efficiently test them, how would one list them (in the current state of science - tracing a full human neural network (and then converting its beliefs into a list of testable statements) is beyond our current capabilities).
I'm curious about this "liquid water is wet" statement. Obviously I agree, but for the sake of argument, could you taboo "is" and tell me the statement again? I'm trying to understand how your algorithm feels from the inside.
If you're curious how to quantify fractions of statements, you might enjoy this puzzle I heard once. Suppose you're an ecological researcher and you need to know the number of fish in a large lake. How would you get a handle on that number?
After describing
blind certainty, a close-mindedness that amounts to an imprisonment so total that the prisoner doesn't even know he's locked up.
David Foster Wallace continues
The point here is that I think this is one part of what teaching me how to think is really supposed to mean. To be just a little less arrogant. To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties. Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded. I have learned this the hard way, as I predict you will, too.
There is a real joy in doing mathematics, in learning ways of thinking that explain and organize and simplify. One can feel this joy discovering new mathematics, rediscovering old mathematics, learning a way of thinking from a person or text, or finding a new way to explain or to view an old mathematical structure.
This inner motivation might lead us to think that we do mathematics solely for its own sake. That’s not true: the social setting is extremely important. We are inspired by other people, we seek appreciation by other people, and we like to help other people solve their mathematical problems.
The entire essay is a beautiful discussion of success and failure in practicing the art of mathematics. Changing the things that need to be changed, much of it applies to practicing the art of rationality.
Language exists only on the surface of our consciousness. The great human struggles are played out in silence and in the ability to express oneself.
Could you give this some more context? My reaction was to downvote.
The word "only" gives me vibes like "language exerts a trivial or insignificant influence on our consciousness". I don't know any of Kroetz's plays, but given that he is a playwright I feel like I'm getting the wrong vibe.
Thinking about this, it seems like there should exist some version of diff which points out differences on the word level rather than the line level. That would be useful for text documents which only have line breaks in between paragraphs. Given how easy I expect it to be to program such a thing almost certainly does exist, but I don't know where to find it.
I'm only familiar with open source tools, but git will do this with "git diff --word-diff FILE1 FILE2" and Emacs diff has the "ediff-toggle-autorefine" command. IMO you still need to insert line breaks before they become useful.
GNU has wdiff though I've never used it: https://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/ (update: the git command above seems to do the same thing)
I'm still looking for an online diff tool that makes the word-level differences obvious. That would be ideal here (my web skills are too weak to make it happen this month).
Is there a convenient place to see just what changed from the old to the new?
Online diff tools aren't usefully handling the paragraphs when I copy-paste, and my solution of download -> insert line breaks -> run through my favorite diff program is probably inconvenient for most.
Being wrong about something feels exactly the same as being right about something.
-- many different people, most recently user chipaca on HN
This is the most forceful version I've seen (assumed it had been posted before, discovered it probably hasn't, won't start a new thread since it's too similar):
But by definition, there can’t be any particular feeling associated with simply being wrong. Indeed, the whole reason it’s possible to be wrong is that, while it is happening, you are oblivious to it. When you are simply going about your business in a state you will later decide was delusional, you have no idea of it whatsoever. You are like the coyote in the Road Runner cartoons, after he has gone off the cliff but before he has looked down. Literally in his case and figuratively in yours, you are already in trouble when you feel like you’re still on solid ground. So I should revise myself: it does feel like something to be wrong. It feels like being right.
But I'm not comfortable endorsing either of these quotes without a comment.
chipaca's quote (and friends) suggest to me that
- my "being wrong" and "being right" are complementary hypotheses, and
- my subjective feelings are not evidence either way.
Schulz's quote (and book) suggest to me that
- my "being wrong" is broadly and overwhelmingly true (my map is not the territory), and
- my subjective feeling of being right is in fact evidence that I am very wrong.
I'd prefer to emphasize that "You are already in trouble when you feel like you’re still on solid ground," or said another way:
Becoming less wrong feels different from the experience of going about my business in a state that I will later decide was delusional.
Subscribe to RSS Feed
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
Thanks for sharing your experience!
In case you or any other LWers would find these interesting, here are some resources I've enjoyed:
I personally worry about moving from "reading history for insight" to "reading history for insight porn". What actions do you take to push back against that tendency?
Finally, FWIW, this sentence jumped off the page when I read it:
There was a time in my life when I would have emphatically agreed. These days I have to disagree, though. I've taken to reading history for the experience of viewing the same events from multiple conflicting perspectives. I feel like it widens my set of available reference classes for common issues. Since shifting to view history as a "reference class generator" I've picked up literature as a "way of being in the world generator".
Note: Here's what I'm not saying. I'm not saying you or anybody else should have the same experience I do. I am saying to watch out for mind-projection at "most fiction can't compete with ... history". It's more accurate to say that your experience of most fiction can't compete with your experience of history ... which isn't really the same thing at all. Especially since you can probably change both experiences, either with some effort or just by waiting a while.