All of D_Alex's Comments + Replies

D_Alex50

In the "proof" presented, the series 1-1+1... is "shown" to equal to 1/2 by a particular choice of interleaving of the values in the series. But with other methods of interleaving, the sum can be made to "equal" 0, 1 1/3 or indeed AFAICT any rational number between 0 and 1.

So... why is the particular interleaving that gives 1/2 as the answer "correct"?

5shev
Interleaving isn't really the right way of getting consistent results for summations. Formal methods like Cesaro Summation are the better way of doing things, and give the result 1/2 for that series. There's a pretty good overview on this wiki article about summing 1-2+3-4.. .
D_Alex-40

"Powerwall" is just a big battery.

Yes... plus some electronics, like a rectifier, an inverter and control circuitry.

It might help compensate for the irregularities of solar and wind power.

Yes... that's partly what is was conceived to do. It also can compensate for the irregularities in demand.

But it only makes sense to use batteries for that after we have moved to much more renewables.

For storage of solar and wind power, this is a complex matter, and the short answer is "it depends". For demand management, it makes sense now.... (read more)

8tut
"Powerwall" is just a big battery. It might help compensate for the irregularities of solar and wind power. But it only makes sense to use batteries for that after we have moved to much more renewables. It is much more efficient to store the power in the water magazines of existing hydro plants.
D_Alex50

Despite his frequent comments that he's "betting" on Trump and that Silver is "betting" against Trump, Adams's position is that gambling is illegal when pressed to actually bet.

How convenient for him.

D_Alex70

Well... Scott Adams has a lot of money. I am willing to bet that Trump will NOT become president, at EVEN ODDS. Scott, if you read this, how about a wager? I propose a $10,000 stake.

Vaniver100

Scott, if you read this, how about a wager?

Despite his frequent comments that he's "betting" on Trump and that Silver is "betting" against Trump, Adams's position is that gambling is illegal when pressed to actually bet. This means one of the big feedback mechanisms preventing outlandish probabilities is not there, so don't take his stated probabilities as the stated numbers.

(In general, remember how terrible people are at calibration: a 98% chance probably corresponds to about a 70% chance in actuality, if Adams is an expert in the relevant field.)

D_Alex30

If you are after descriptions of society in those days, try "Quo Vadis" by Henryk Sienkiewicz. Historical fiction about early days of Christianity, won a Nobel Prize for literature. Strong religious themes.

2[anonymous]
Feuchtwanger's novels on the Judean war set during early Christianity were also interesting.
D_Alex10

Or could we breed them for intelligence...? With such short periods between generations, we could reach superintelligence, maybe faster than other methods!

0ChristianKl
What could go wrong with breeding a species that hunts their own as prey as a superintelligence?
D_Alex60

The Big Lebowski: "Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man".

D_Alex80

What are my options apart from "emigrate and live next to a cryonics facility"?

You could start a cryonics facility in South Africa.

1[anonymous]
It's full of people who can afford to take out a life insurance in the hundreds of thousands of USD range to a cryo facility. /sarcasm
D_Alex30

Gets a big loan from Russia that prevents an economic collapse (20% likely)

I'll give 10:1 odds against this happening. Russia has its own economic problems now with the drop in the price of oil and Ukrainian conflict, and other issues... China might be more likely, though IMO both Russia and China are a scare ploy by the Greeks.

A somewhat likely possibility is: Greece leaves the EU, triggering an economic collapse, possibly followed by a political collapse. Then spends many, many years trying to sort out itself and wishing it had stayed.

0[anonymous]
(Possibly stupid) off-topic question: Doesn't the colon notation p:q stand for p/q, so odds of 10/1 would contradict the unitary assumption about our universe, or is this just a hyperbole?
3James_Miller
For Greece to leave the EU, as opposed to just the Euro, it would really have to anger the other members.
D_Alex120

I am sure that there are many jobs where mental math makes a huge difference.

I manage a team of engineers, and though pretty much all of them are head and shoulders above me in their specialisation, they think I really know my stuff because I find errors in their work and zero-in on them on the fly. The skill that I have is doing rough approximations in my head. Then from experience: a factor-of-two difference is commonly confusing kg and lb, a factor of 10 - confusing kg and N, a factor of fifty - mistaking degrees and radians (usually in Excel, where rad... (read more)

0[anonymous]
If you don't have to do these kinds of rough calculations many times a day I don't see this as a worthwhile skill (you could simply ask Siri/WolframAlpha, for example), other than perhaps to consolidate one's authority (if you really have to play that game).
D_Alex10

"Ganch" was an unknown word for me too, so i googled it and the first link was from Urban Dictionary... I'll not say what I found, it is inappropriate.

But then I searched some more, quite a lot, until I found this definition, from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia:

Ganch: Middle Asian name for a binding material obtained by heating rock containing gypsum (from 40 to 70 percent) and clay. An aqueous solution of pulverized ganch sets quickly (hardens) and is easy to mold. From the first centuries of the Common Era ganch was used as a material for plaste... (read more)

5Lumifer
Yes, it's basically a variety of gypsum plaster. This may be helpful as the context for the OP...
D_Alex00

I still do not understand your objective in this discussion. It seems that you are implicitly against subsidising renewable energy. Is this correct?

(I work in the oil and gas industry, by the way, so fossil fuel subsidies sort of help me out...).

For that matter, I do not understand the upvotes in this thread. A citation was asked for - then it was provided - and then there are several posts attempting to invalidate the citation, attracting upvotes. Strange.

I want a better source than naked statement of a number from a biased group

We all do... could you... (read more)

-1Alsadius
I am explicitly against subsidies, full stop. I am also of the belief that the fashionable sorts of renewables(wind, solar, etc.) get vastly more subsidies than any other form of power, particularly in the developed world, and this belief is borne out by my own experiences with my local government and with stories from elsewhere. And I thought the US was being discussed, because it usually is, but looking upthread it seems I was in error there. If any country was being discussed it was Germany, though their example is hardly different - they're spending a ton of money for an inferior power source.
D_Alex120

Engineering solutions (RO desalination powered by photovoltaics) exist right now to deliver practically limitless amounts of potable water in a sustainable manner for around $1/m3. That is 1 cent per 10 litre bucket.

I am not sure who is feeling the pain in California... $1/m3 may be too much to pay for broadacre farming. But for city residents, who (in Australia) typically use ~300l/person/day, including lawn care, this seems very affordable.

Incidentally: Perth, Australia, used to rely on dams and groundwater to supply its needs. When I visited the dams 10... (read more)

2[anonymous]
That figure doesn't factor in the costs of transporting the water, but these seem like minor costs to me. I wonder if there are any costs I'm not thinking of. Even if it were 3X as much, it still seems reasonable. According to this site, Americans use ~100l/person/day.
4advancedatheist
I get the impression that Australia's settlers from elsewhere have had to live like settlers on exoplanets in science fiction because of that continent's environmental constraints. You have an accessible ocean but not enough fresh water? Have the Federation Engineering Corps build a wind farm to power a desalination plant.
D_Alex00

cool toys and I've been tempted to get one a few times

If you can use a 3D design program like Google Sketchup - do it! It is a cool toy, it is at least of minor practical use, and you might catch a wave to the future.

Saving money on a 50-cent bracket via buying a $1,000 printer doesn't look particularly rational to me

Naturally. But throwing away a $1000 item for the lack of some stupid bracket that should cost 50 cents but can't be had for any money AFAICT is not great either...

0Lumifer
I agree -- but I don't find its output either cool or useful enough. When the 3D metal printers come down in price, I might reconsider. I find things like this considerably more appealing, but maybe that's just me. Never had this happen to me, ever :-P
D_Alex20

Remember, a lot of renewables get thrown in together without being the same. The renewables that get subsidies are mostly the flashy new ones...

I have provided a few facts... you are trying to put a certain interpretation on them. To what end? What is it exactly that you are trying to argue?

Seriously? 80% of the money spent on anything being non-OECD is hard to fathom...

And now you are denying the data.

What is subsidised and where, is decided by factors that are not necessarily obvious or "sensible", and there is a huge element of politica... (read more)

1Alsadius
If that non-OECD number is to be believed, 2% of non-OECD GDP goes to fuel subsidies. Or, if you prefer to think of it this way, it's close to 1/3 of the total world oil market to fossil fuel subsidies. And this number comes from a think-tank that's obviously out to make an anti-subsidy point, with no detail as to where it came from or why we should believe it. Think tanks aren't to be immediately dismissed, but they frequently exaggerate badly. And the discussion is about why renewables get used. German use of renewables is very different than Canadian or Congolese, and aggregating them leads to muddy thinking and useless stats. Germans use modern renewables because the government is dumping a bloody lot of money into the industry. Canadians use renewables because we have massive amounts of easily-tapped hydroelectric potential, and hydro dams are the cheapest source of power known. Congolese use renewables because they have no better options than burning wood. I'll agree with you that some poor countries spend a lot on subsidizing gasoline, but it's only a lot by poor-country standards, and it's hardly all of them. I want a better source than naked statement of a number from a biased group before I'll believe it adds up to that staggering a sum. And even if it does, that has no impact on the US, where fossil fuel is nearly unsubsidized - if you want me to think that renewables and an "energy internet" are a good choice for the US, then you need to explain how switching from a cheaper source to one that's more expensive even with bigger subsidies is a net cost savings.
D_Alex30

I have a 3D printer (Makerbot 2, not really low end, cost ~$2000), so let me correct a couple of misconceptions in this thread:

  1. 3D printed parts can be, and usually are, quite strong. The strength of a part is directional - the parts are much stronger in the direction parallel to the filament deposition than in the perpendicular direction. But door handles and the like are no problem at all. The parts can also be strong and very light, because printing the inside volume as a honeycomb mesh is possible (and is the default option at least on the printer dri

... (read more)
1Lumifer
I think that at the moment 3D printers (for home use) are toys. Certainly, cool toys and I've been tempted to get one a few times. But then I realize that while the magic of materializing physical objects out of bytes and some plastic filament is great, I just don't need many (if any) small uneven pieces of plastic. The claim that I objected to at the start of this sub-thread is that a 3D printer is now a cost-effective method of producing useful household objects. I didn't think so and I still don't think so. Saving money on a 50-cent bracket via buying a $1,000 printer doesn't look particularly rational to me. Maybe things will change in a few years. We'll see.
D_Alex00

But renewables are vastly smaller than fossil fuels

Not really. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy :

"Based on REN21's 2014 report, renewables contributed 19 percent to our energy consumption and 22 percent to our electricity generation in 2012 and 2013, respectively"

So if you believe Wikipedia (and is there a better general source?), fossil fuels attract more subsidies per unit energy as well as in total.

-1Alsadius
Remember, a lot of renewables get thrown in together without being the same. The renewables that get subsidies are mostly the flashy new ones, like wind, solar, and ethanol. Those are only a few percent of world consumption. Virtually all renewable energy production is either hydroelectric(which is quite profitable, and attracts basically no subsidies) or burning of wood and dung(which almost entirely happens in poor countries that can't afford to subsidize much of anything). Slightly dated graph, but one that gives a good sense of how things break down: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy#/media/File:Total_World_Energy_Consumption_by_Source_2010.png Also, over 80% of fossil fuel subsidies are outside the OECD? Seriously? 80% of the money spent on anything being non-OECD is hard to fathom, because the OECD has somewhere around 80% of the world's money, and a lot more disposable income to blow on subsidizing things.
D_Alex50

Yes, there is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Terrestrial gives reserves of 13 million tonnes, ie 13 billion kg. I think these are "proven" reserves, ie economical to mine at current prices.

The amount of lithium in a Li-ion battery is not that much, roughly 500g/kwhr. So a 10 kW Tesla Power Wall would contain about 5 kg of lithium. We can make 2.6 billion Power Walls... and E. Musk said at the launch that 2 billion would be enough to convert the entire planet's energy usage - including industry and transport - to renewable electricity.

D_Alex10

Yep... take a look at this, one of the largest solar PV plants in the world:

https://www.google.com/maps/search/35.383333,-120.066667/@35.383333,-120.066667,12z/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!2m1!4b1?hl=en&dg=dbrw&newdg=1

It supplies but ~1% of electric power for Los Angeles... However zoom until you can see Los Angeles itself, a little to the southeast.

D_Alex50

Apart from what g_pepper has correctly pointed out regarding size/power of hydro plants...

If we build a lake at the top, 10 meters deep and 1 kilometer on a side

With the right terrain, this is pretty trivial, all you need is a relatively small dam wall closing off a small ravine between mountains... here is a nice example:

http://www.iwb.ch/media/de/picdb/2012/366/nant_de_drance_stausee_vieux.jpg

http://www.iwb.ch/media/de/picdb/2012/367/nant_de_drance_stauseen_vieu.jpg

D_Alex00

Citation please.

"Fossil fuel subsidies reached $90 billion in the OECD and over $500 billion globally in 2011.[1] Renewable energy subsidies reached $88 billion in 2011.[2] "

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies

(This is without even considering that fossil fuel usage imposes external costs such as pollution, that the fossil fuel user does not pay. Some have argued that this amounts to an effective subsidy of the order of a trillion dollars per year).

3Alsadius
But renewables are vastly smaller than fossil fuels, and the relevant number is subsidy per unit energy.
D_Alex00

If we need to look to economics for rationality quotes, we are getting towards the bottom of the barrel, Robin Hanson notwithstanding.

[This comment is no longer endorsed by its author]Reply
1Grant
Macroeconomics? Sure, its highly politicized so in many cases I'll agree with that. But microeconomics is in many ways the study of how to rationally deal with scarcity. IMO, traditional micro assuming homo-economicus is actually more interesting (and useful, outside of politics) than the behavioral stuff for this reason.
D_Alex00

The less you care about "the respect" others show towards you, the less power idiots can exert over you.

I don't think this is generally true. Do you mean:

"The less you care about "the respect" idiots show towards you, the less power idiots can exert over you."??

3Kawoomba
Calling my statement A, and yours B, both are true. A is probabilistically true (i.e., in most cases) iff the majority of people are idiots (and assuming a normal distribution of "impact someone can have on you"), B is 'strictly' true, well as far as strictly holds in social dynamics. If you are a really good idiot oracle, i.e. if you're adept at quickly discerning someone's idiot attribute (or the lack thereof), you should follow B (which is a subset of A , "forall X ..." versus "forall X where P(X)"). If you're not, you should follow A, excepting special cases and, as mentioned, actually undesirable consequences (e.g. professional). For example, there are select people on LW whose approval I covet. So I'm not stringently following A (it's hard to follow one's own advice anyways), but I suppose I'm closer to A than to B, which gives me a better worst-case-scenario in terms of "power idiots exert over you".
D_Alex10

I am having trouble understanding the message here... and consequently how this is a good rationality quote.

Is this trying to say "don't bother trying to please people in childhood"?

Is it "don't bother trying to earn respect as an adult"?

Both are poor advice, in general, IMO.

pjeby160

I think it means something more like, "don't expect the behaviors that pleased adults when you were a child, to get you anywhere as an adult. Children are considered pleasing when they're submissive and dependent, but adults are respected for pleasing themselves first."

The rationality connection is, well, winning.

D_Alex00

The problem is underspecified in a more fundamental way: It does not tell you what to optimise!

One needs to specify both the parameter (eg. expected value) and the time (eg. after 1000 days).

D_Alex10

Stalin was almost universally loved and worshipped among the not-yet-jailed population

This is plain not true, the level of his popular support (not "love and worship") is disputed, but at the "more than half" vs "less than half" level.

But I kind of agree with your conclusion.

0Shmi
Yeah, I don't see the firm stats on the issue. My online search was not very fruitful, either. Judging by the reaction to Stalin's death, the number is definitely at the "more than half" level, but I can't tell much more than that. If you have any relevant links, please feel free to post them. And yeah, my unnecessarily strong statement detracted from the point I was trying to make.
D_Alex10

The problem is that the cost of installing say individual hot water meters to each apartment would more than eliminate the upfront savings, and reading the meters and doing the paperwork would eat up the operating cost savings.

D_Alex60

That's an excellent point! Lets just do some maths:

Water cost here is $2.00/m3

Cost of heating 1000 kg of water 20-->60 deg with gas@ $0.02/MJ: ~4010004*.02/1000 = $3.20 (this is central, individual would be abt double)

So the cost of heating is not far from the cost of water... I think this could work.

Thanks, I will try this and see how it turns out. Might report back in a month or so!

D_Alex00

It is a bad idea. Have a delicious meal instead (it really is not hard), preferably in the company of interesting people. Unless of course you do not derive pleasure from delicious meals, or you do not consider pleasure to be of intrinsic value.

D_Alex50

Do you feel about talking to a realistic AI-engineered chatbot often?

D_Alex50

Hmm, is this not the correct solution for two super-rational players:

Player One: Pick C with probability of 2/3 - e; pick B with probability of 1/3 + e, e being some very small but not negligible number. Player Two: Pick Y

Expected payoff for Player One is 4 2/3 -4e; way better than playing A. For B is 2/3 + 2 e, a tiny bit better than playing X - so B will play Y, since he knows that A is totally rational and would have picked this very strategy.

D_Alex10

A question with no data is something like: Will the Emperor of Alfa Centauri eat fried lummywaps or boiled sanquemels today?

I get your point, but your example is poor - I think we have more than enough data to answer this question: No, with 99%+ probability.

D_Alex40

I am certain that someone will point out to me an example of a high-value industrial work that was allowed to fall into decrepitude and neglect

Ok, since no one else has to date, I will. My example is the Longford Gas Plant, one of the largest and most profitable in the world. It processed pretty much the entire gas oitput of Australia's richest oil province, and supplied virtually all the gas and LPG needs of the city of Melbourne. The revenues generated by the plant were several million dollars PER DAY. Still, the American bungee-management decided to ... (read more)

D_Alex20

From some WSJ article:

The setting of Einstein's initial salary at Princeton illustrates his humility and attitude toward wealth. According to "Albert Einstein: Creator & Rebel" by Banesh Hoffmann, (1972), the 1932 negotiations went as follows: "[Abraham] Flexner invited [Einstein] to name his own salary. A few days later Einstein wrote to suggest what, in view of his needs and . . . fame, he thought was a reasonable figure. Flexner was dismayed. . . . He could not possibly recruit outstanding American scholars at such a salary. . . . To ... (read more)

D_Alex140

What ship are we on, dude?

8somervta
Clearly, it ought to be 'On which ship are we?'
D_Alex80

That's not what happened on the Titanic.

I don't think the article is saying that... what they are saying is that the way WW1 happened was akin to someone saying "Ram the iceberg..." etc, i.e. for clearly stupid reasons.

-2Eugine_Nier
Then it's a bad analogy, it makes to sense to intimidate icebergs, but other countries can be.
D_Alex70

Maybe...

a) having and raising well-educated and well-brought-up kids is expensive, but in the end it is a fantastic investment (and from my own experience, makes one happy) b) having and raising kids who will require charity to survive is cheap, and also immoral

Unfortunately, giving to famine relief promotes b).

2jefftk
The term "famine relief" in this context is unfortunate. Rachels is extending a 1972 paper of Peter Singer's which used that term. The argument is much stronger if you mentally substitute "most effective charity" for "famine relief".
D_Alex30

If ... ... then you are likely to believe you have free will.

Well, that is a bit underwhelming, eh? A self-administered test that tells you what you are likely to believe?

D_Alex00

I'd prefer to see this in Main, it is interesting and important.

0aspera
I'm not sure why it got moved: maybe not central to the thesis of LW, or maybe not high enough quality. I'm going to add some discussion of counter-arguments to the limit method. Maybe that will make a difference. I noticed that the discussion picked up when it got moved, and I learned some useful stuff from it, so I'm not complaining.
D_Alex20

I don't know enough about martial arts to tell you which one is best.

I'll give you my perspective, I have experience in judo, ju-jitsu and tae kwon do.

My evaluation criteria in order of importance:

•Low risk of serious injuries

Judo is best, ju-jitsu by far the worst.

•It includes fights, that trigger evolutionary fears and allow you to overcome them as a form of exposure therapy

Judo is best, it is the only one where you can actually exert yourself to the limit without risk of injuring your partner.

•It increases your ability to coordinate your o

... (read more)
D_Alex00

Hmm. What is the exact length of your, say, pen? Is it a rational number or a real number... I mean the EXACT lengh...?

Note if the answer to the last question is "it is a real number", then it is possible to construct the bet as proposed by the OP.

Before you quote "Planck's Length" in your reply, there is currently no directly proven physical significance of the Planck length (at least according to Wikipedia).

D_Alex20

Dolphin trainer. Also fun for people without strong technical skills.

D_Alex60

Numerical Lottery has randomly selected 1033...

... if you try to factor the number you will be run over by the trolley from the Ultimate Trolley Problem.

This game seems to have a roughly 50% chance of a fatality.

D_Alex20

My theory is that you are embarrassed about how weak the AI argument really is, in retrospect.

And furthermore, this applies to other games where participants refused to publish logs.

D_Alex00

I recommend pretty much anything by Jack Vance. If you like fantasy settings, read "Lyonesse", "Cugel's Saga" and "Rhialto the Marvellous". If you like sci-fi settings, try "Araminta Station" , "Night Lamp" and "Alastor". For a quaint mix of the two, try "Emphyrio" or "Languages of Pao". Vance wrote a bunch of great stuff, so if you like his first book, you have heaps more to look forward to.

Also "Name of the Wind" and "Wise Man's Fear" by Patrick Rothfuss are pretty good.

I also second "Ender's Game".

D_Alex00

I was going to answer "Say you found a cure for cancer while working for pharmaceutical company...", but lets consider something more mundane.

Say you are an engineer working for Unilever. With 3 months of diligent work, you design a shampoo bottle that costs 1 cent less to manufacture, maybe through reduced material usage. There are billions of these bottles made each year, giving a saving to humanity of tens of millions of dollars each year. Compared with savings of this magnitude, your actual salary will be insignificant.

2Pablo
I don't think your analysis adequately addresses the strongest arguments for earning to give. If you can do lots of good by innovating or researching, say, why can't you do even more good by making lots of money and using part of it to pay researchers or innovators?
D_Alex00

IMO, if you really care about us fellow humans do this: Generate utility wholesale, in bulk. Not in bite size chunks. Your actual earnings most likely will not be of any great significance. What you should aim for is to generate great ideas, products, social/political outcomes, rather than a high salary.

CS is a great option for this, provided you use it to deliver better communications, GPS, automation, etc, maybe even AI. If you go on to do crapola iPhone apps and banner ads, not so much.

Scientific research, engineering R&D and the like are also great... (read more)

4Pablo
Why do you think this?
D_Alex120

It explains lutefisk.

Quote from Garrison Keillor's book Lake Wobegon Days: Every Advent we entered the purgatory of lutefisk, a repulsive gelatinous fishlike dish that tasted of soap and gave off an odor that would gag a goat. We did this in honor of Norwegian ancestors, much as if survivors of a famine might celebrate their deliverance by feasting on elm bark. I always felt the cold creeps as Advent approached, knowing that this dread delicacy would be put before me and I'd be told, "Just have a little." Eating a little was like vomiting a lit

... (read more)
3RolfAndreassen
Obviously, that's why they were all above average! No, seriously, lutefisk is peasant food. Rich urban types eat smalahovve.
D_Alex00

The [very, very good ] thing is when you habitually recognize the most common forms of human irrationality, and easily steer away from them.... ... ...it doesn't require any real effort, in the moment.

I agree! But you will encounter situations, pretty often at first and ever more rarely as you get experience in recognising irrationality, where your willpower will be tested. And then it is easier to expend the needed effort if you feel good about the process you are going through.

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