All of DaystarEld's Comments + Replies

Right, those words definitely seem more accurate to me!

It is the case that Bryce is, ostensibly, just trying to help Ash fulfill their terminal goals while being healthier. The problem is that Bryce presumes that of the available action space, ice cream is fungible for something else that is healthier, and does not listen when Ash reasserts that ice cream itself is the thing they want.

Just because it is a safe bet that Ash will share the value/desire for good health does not mean Ash must prioritize good health in every action they take.

I just donated $1,000. This is not a minor amount for me, and I almost just donated $10 as suggested in Shoshannah's comment,  but I knew I could donate that much without thought or effort, and I wanted to really put at least some effort into this, after seeing how much obvious effort Oliver and others at Lesswrong have been putting in. 

My decision process was as follows:

First, I dealt with my risk aversion/loss aversion/flinch response to giving large sums of money away. This took a couple minutes, much faster than it used to be thanks to things... (read more)

Sure. So, there are some workplaces have implicit cultural norms that aren't written down but are crucial for career advancement. Always being available and responding to emails quickly might be an unspoken expectation, or participating in after-work social events might not be mandatory but would be noted and count against people looking for promotion. Certain dress codes or communication styles might be rewarded or penalized beyond their actual professional relevance.

In a community, this usually comes as a form of purity testing of some kind, but can also... (read more)

I agree that those are the thoughts at the surface-level of Bryce in those situations, and they are not the same as "it's wrong/stupid to enjoy eating ice cream."

But I think in many cases, they often do imply "and you are stupid/irrational if knowing these things does not spoil your enjoyment or shift your hedonic attractor." And even if Bryce genuinely doesn't feel that way, I hope they would still be very careful with their wording to avoid that implication.

The implication that the preference itself is bad only works with assumptions that the preference will cause harm, to yourself or others, even if you don't act on it. But I don't think this is always true; it's often a matter of degree or context, and how the person's inner life works.

We could certainly say it is inconvenient or dysfunctional to have a preference that causes suffering for the self or others, and maybe that's what you mean by "bad." But this still doesn't justify the assertion that "expressing" the preference is "wrong." That's the thing that feels particularly presumptuous, to me, about how preferences should be distinguished from actions.

Ah, yeah I definitely struggle a bit sometimes with people who make objective-assertion-type-statements when promoting or defending things they enjoy. I also gain quite a lot of enjoyment from looking at various kinds of media with a critical eye; I just do my best to keep that criticism in contexts where the listener or reader wants to share it :)

Excellent points! Yes, this is definitely a fun and interesting thing to engage with intellectually so long as both people feel like it's being done in a non-judgmental or agendic way. Part of why I included the paragraphs about non-filtering being hard for some people is that I know there are some brains for which this genuinely doesn't feel like it "should" be hostile or pressurey, since they don't perceive it that way... but as in all things, that's why your point about actually paying attention to what the other person says and taking it seriously is so important.

Makes sense! I probably will not have time to dedicate to do this properly over the next few days, but maybe after that.

I'm a little confused. Do the examples in the post seem purely hypothetical to you? They're all real things I have encountered or heard from others:

1. Whether or not it's rational to have ice cream (or other unhealthy indulgences).
2. Whether or not wanting your high-earning partner to do housework is reasonable.
3. Whether being hurt by unfiltered criticism or judgements is rational.
4. Whether being mono vs open vs poly is a sign of rationality.
5. Whether your career preference is a sign of how smart or rational you are.

Obviously not all are as equally detailed, and I cou... (read more)

Completely agree, and for what it's worth, I don't think anything in the frame of my post contradicts these points.

"You either do or do not feel a want" is not the same as "you either do now or you never will," and I note that conditioning is also a cause of preferences, though I will edit to highlight that this is an ongoing process in case it sounds like I was saying it's all locked-in from some vague "past" or developmental experiences (which was not my intent).

To your first point, I do believe the post covers this; specifically, the idea that e.g. frames and predictions can be mistaken, and correcting those mistakes can change emotional reactivity. Is that not what you mean?

For the second point... if they follow their preferences, they are acting, and if they are wrong it's because it causes harm, no? I do not believe preferences themselves, or expressing them, should ever be considered wrong; that seems an artifact of Puritanical norms and fears.

I think wants that arise from conscious thought are, fundamentally, wants that arise from feelings attached to those conscious thoughts. The conscious thought processes may be mistaken in many ways, but they still evoke memories or predictions that trigger emotions associated with imagined world-states, which translate to wants or not-wants.

I don't see how your question contradicts my statement, nor that link. People absolutely develop in their desires over time, and can change them, but that is not the same as being able to decide, in the moment, that you do not like the taste of pizza if your tongue is having the sensory experience of enjoying it.

Hm. I think I disagree on both counts; we maybe need to operationalize the words, but while I think hatred of others can be very valuable in some cases from a game theoretic perspective, and is very natural given that, lacking it is absolutely not something I've seen consistent in "unwell people," and I've never known it to be "useful" for people who can protect themselves or others without it.

To be clear, anger is extremely valuable for self protection and boundaries, and I never claimed to not get angry. So if that's what you meant, then yes, people who ... (read more)

I appreciate the acknowledgement against psychoanalyzing people in public, and I agree that trying to cargoculting any of this is unlikely to go well, but I'd be curious to know what specific things you think can also fall under "being very unwell?" I just reread the excerpts Chris highlighted and the only thing I can think of is the "letting go of anger" thing, which is only a sign of unwellness, imo, if it leads to being exploited/abused/etc.

I didn't pick the title, but I definitely consider it inclusive rather than exclusive or normative :)

More specifically, I think there are peaks and valleys in psychological health, and I don't think the space I occupy is necessarily one of the highest peaks. But I would say that, regarding suffering or prolonged internal conflict, these measures feel pretty useful for determining two of the axes that point directionally at "health," unless there's a convincing argument that there are points in which more suffering or more internal conflict can be better, w... (read more)

Ah, sorry that wasn't clear! It's not meant to specifically be an example of breaking things down into smaller steps, but rather a situation where, because it's so simple, the useful step instead is positive visualization and attention on what each following step would result in.

Much appreciated! I made some quick tweaks to a couple of them, thanks :)

Glad to hear! To expand on the : your ability to engage in "non-doing" is itself a thing that you can train to predict will go better if tried.

And thanks for sharing; any extra details you'd want to add about what makes it harder would be appreciated :)

Should be fixed now, thanks!

>I think you're preaching to the choir.

Definitely, but if anyone's going to disagree in a way that might change my mind or add points I haven't thought of, I figured it would be people here.

I'm running a small rationality dojo to try to approach this issue from the rat-for-rat-sake direction in a few weeks, trying to incorporate the things I learned from my Seasons of Growth, my Executive Function research, and stuff like Logan's Naturalism sequence (not to mention years of teaching at rat camps and workshops). I plan to do a writeup after, but would also love to chat sometime about this, either before or after.

FWIW I think my main takeaway here is that if you update at all on any point of untrustworthiness of the original sources, that update should propagate toward the rest of the points.

I think most brains are bad at this, naturally, and it's just a hard thing to do without effort, which is why things like Gish gallops and character assassinations work even when debunked.

My secondary takeaway is that people should not update as hard as they do on people threatening to "retaliate" against social harm done to them unless the claims are very obviously true or the... (read more)

I also want to add that I think the community in general has shown a mild failure in treating the legal action threat as evidence of wrongdoing even if the lawsuit would ultimately fail.

It is really bad to treat a libel suit threat as some horrible thing that no one "innocent" would ever do. It's a form of demonizing anyone who has ever used or thought to use the legal system defensively.

Which if intended, seems to be fundentally missing what the point of a legal system should be. It is no doubt a problem that people with lots of power, whether it's fame o... (read more)

I definitely read all examples as "both at the same time."

1) Whatever X publicly condemned thing you can think of, it exists on a spectrum. 

2) There is a lot more of all instances of it happening than you think there are.

3) A lot of it does not look like the kind you are most likely to notice and condemn.

Thanks for this writeup, still undergoing various updates based on the info above and responses from Nonlinear.

One thing I do want to comment on is this:
 

(Personal aside: Regarding the texts from Kat Woods shown above — I have to say, if you want to be allies with me, you must not write texts like these. A lot of bad behavior can be learned from, fixed, and forgiven, but if you take actions to prevent me from being able to learn that the bad behavior is even going on, then I have to always be worried that something far worse is happening that I’m not

This was crossposted, so I can't edit this version's doc to say:

Please post submissions on the EA Forums version of this post!

Heya! Did you ever get the covers for Origin of Species finalized? Would be curious to see them if so :)

Agreed in principle, though it's worth noting that more resourced people tend to have less insecurities in general. People who have a stable family, no economic insecurity, positive peer support, etc, end up less susceptible to cults, as well as bad social dynamics in general.

This isn't to say that people can't create stable confidence for themselves without those things, only that "dependent confidence"  is also a thing that people can have instead that acts protectively, or exposes risk.

Good breakdown of one of the aspects in all this. The insecurity/desperation topic is a really hard one to navigate well, but I agree it's really important.

Hard because when someone feels like an outsider, a group of other likeminded outsiders will naturally want to help them and welcome them, and it can be an uncomplicated good to do so. Important because if someone has only one source of to supply support, resources, social needs, etc, they are far more likely to turn desperate or do desperate things to maintain their place in the community.

Does this mea... (read more)

All good points, and yeah I did consider the issue of "appeals" but considered "accept the judgement you get" part of the implicit (or even explicit if necessary) agreeement made when raising that flag in the first place. Maybe it would require both people to mutually accept it.

But I'm glad the "pool of people" variation was tried, even if it wasn’t sustainable as volunteer work.

FWIW, I don't avoid posting because of worries of criticism or nitpicking at all. I can't recall a moment that's ever happened.

But I do avoid posting once in a while, and avoid commenting, because I don't always have enough confidence that, if things start to move in an unproductive way, there will be any *resolution* to that.

If I'd been on Lesswrong a lot 10 years ago, this wouldn't stop me much. I used to be very... well, not happy exactly, but willing, to spend hours fighting the good fight and highlighting all the ways people are being bullies or engag... (read more)

Strong agree. The interesting coordination/incentive questions that come to mind are things like:

1. Would it help to make criticism have diminishing returns on social status?
2. Would it help if contribution/building boosts criticism visibility?
3. How does a society/garden reach the most productive equilibrium of Socrates? The ideal world where each Socrates is doing something meaningfully different from each other is hard to arrive at while each individually feels like they are Fighting the Good Fight.

Thank you both for writing this and sharing your thoughts on the ecosystem in general. It's always heartening for me, even just as someone who occasionally visits the Bay, to see the amount of attention and thought being put into the effects of things like this on not just the ecosystem there, but also the broader ecosystem that I mostly interact with and work in. Posts like this make me slightly more hopeful for the community's general health prospects.

Hey Blasted, thanks for sharing :) I remember enjoying Well, will try to check out the others when I get a chance.

Thanks for posting this Adam! (For those that don't know, I'm Damon)

I think another writing competition would be a good way to encourage stories like this, and am considering what the best way to structure that might be.

Meanwhile, to add a bit more to the sorts of stories I think would be good to see, I think fiction is powerful because it not just allows to grapple with unusual or alien ideas, but also, if written from the perspective of characters with rich inner lives, see the world through a different lens and perspective. When we’re engaged in a chara... (read more)

I agree that "asserting what someone is doing" can also be considered frame control or manipulation. But I think it's much less often so, or much less dark artsy, because it's referencing observable behavior rather than unverifiable/unfalsifiable elements.

Meanwhile the guru might be supplementing this with non-frame-control techniques. When they argue with you, they imply (maybe in a kind but firm voice, maybe with an undertone of social threat) that you're kinda stupid for disagreeing for them

This exact implication isn't frame control, but the common thing I've seen gurus do that is more subtle is assert why you disagree with them in a way that reinforces their frame. 

"Kinda stupid" is overly crude, and might be spotted and feel off even among those who believe in them, but implying you just don... (read more)

I don't think it's particularly stupid to think this might work; it is in fact how most of our ancestors oriented to relationships. We just have higher standards, these days... for good and for ill.

Great post, will add it to my Relationships Orientations guide.

I will note that society somewhat seems to depend on people prioritizing Building relationships over Entertaining ones, and this is certainly how things worked in the old days such that most of our parents and ancestors did not have the luxury to choose the most entertaining partners. Our standards as a whole have raised when it comes to relationships, in part due to unrealistic fictional representations, but our selective processes for finding partners have not increased proportionally. 

I... (read more)

Great post, thank you for writing it. Helps to have something to link people to when trying to explain this, and also the list of examples are great.

(And also Music in Human Evolution gave me a great "click" sensation, as soon as I read the list of facts in the beginning)

Ah, thanks for saying that. It does feel worth noting that I am a huge proponent of Heroic Responsibility, so let me see if I can try in bullet point form at least, for now...

1) People have much more capacity for agency than society tends to instill in them.

2) The largest problems in the world are such that some people pretty much have to take it upon themselves to dedicate large chunks of their life to solving them, or else no one will.

3) This in fact describes most of the widely admired people in history: those who saw a major problem in the world, decid... (read more)

This all seems broadly correct, to me.

But I think it's worth noting that there's an additional piece of the puzzle that I believe this one is largely codependent on: namely, that burnout often comes from a mismatch between responsibility and power.

This can be seen in not just high-stress jobs like medicine or crisis work, but also regular "office jobs" and interpersonal relationships. The more someone feels responsible for an outcome, whether internally or due to external pressure/expectations, the more power to actually affect change they will need to not... (read more)

First things that come to mind are dance party/club for jealousy, political rally for nationalism.

Thanks for writing all this, found it very interesting and (expectantly) useful! 

One thing that interests me is how to apply it to more abstract concepts; I'm not particularly interested in things found in the state of nature, like bugs and trees and such, but I am fascinated by people, emotions, thoughts, etc. So I find myself thinking things like "What can I do to increase my contact with 'Jealousy' or 'nationalism' etc" and coming up with ways to either find circumstances where people feel those things and observe them, or find ways to induce those... (read more)

These concepts are great. It's really neat noticing how well you're teaching this in such a straightforward way, because it's easy to imagining how someone else could try teaching it in a straightforward way and say it in a much more clumsy or ineffectual method. Like, the importance of noting that patient observation can/must include being able to return to something your attention has bounced off of rather than keeping your attention on it consistently moment to moment feels really hard to overstate!

These categories also feel super useful and worth distinguishing for a number of circumstances, such as one layer of trying to understand why two people could ostensibly experience the same thing, such as eyewitness a robbery, but remember it very differently.

I seriously love this categorization of different ways of "knowing," and am already thinking of ways to use it in some story or another.

Thanks for writing this up, I had similar thoughts.

Overall I'm glad Cathleen wrote this post, as it gave me a lot more insight into what life in Leverage was like and why, and more empathy for what people there have been going through. I really hope she and everyone else manages to carry on, be successful, not be stigmatized, and keep working on things that are important to them.

But also, I have not updated in the direction of "Leverage was actually working on important or meaningful things that are valuable to other people outside its ecosystem." I'm stil... (read more)