All of Goobahman's Comments + Replies

There's certainly a lot of webcomics produced nowadays that explain concepts in an amusing and simple manner.

Has anyone had any experience with http://sundayassembly.com ?

I'd love to hear some first hand accounts. It sounds like all the things I enjoyed about going to church when I was a Christian, with the Christianity part.

6Scott Garrabrant
If you enjoyed going to church as a Christian, and considered it enough to make this post, then you should probably just go. There is not much penalty for trying. I go to a UU church, which looks kind of similar. (They are not all atheist, but they are all different things and agree to disagree about theology.) I don't really enjoy the singing that much, at least not the hymns, and I still enjoy the experience as an atheist. Just don't expect to get the same level of intelligence or rationality you get from here though. If you are looking for good philosophical discussion, that probably isn't the place to get it.

thanks for the reply/message.

it looks like Sydney lacks a regular meetup at the moment.

Thanks for that. It's fascinating to get a glimpse of what rationality looks like in the real world rather than just online interchanges.

Note aside, I'm a big fan of your work. Reassures me to know rationalists are on the team for dota 2

bah I really want to get in on these, but I'd have to train it in from Ballarat!

Is it worth the effort? Who will attest?

I'm guessing this is one of Luke's ways of bringing some focus to the research of Rationality in the Academic world, and its significance to the LW community.

I hypothesize that he see's a gap there that needs more bridging.

(just my humble estimation)

If you send me your email I can send you a copy of a powerpoint I made a while back when I was running a short talk on Bayes Theorem.

most of it I got from here however:

http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=13156

<3 lukeprog

Goobahman100

I'll give this a quick go.

I'm Michael. I'm 24 and live in West Sydney. I'm in LW because I pretty much stalk Lukeprog. I'm an ex-christian, who got married way too young, but got lucky in that me and my wife have grown out of faith together and really come to a place where we really support each other in everything we want to do. I love learning and all subjects, but I'm not really an expert on anything, except maybe people, which is probably one of the best places to be an expert. I'm studying professional writing next year. I find communication fascinati... (read more)

1shokwave
We look forward to meeting you!

This is a great idea. the LW community has great content but lacks the personal connection that makes other communities so sucessful, and this addresses it directly. It's fascinating to see what people on this site are like, what 'types' it draws and keeps.

me too :)

I follow Luke around everywhere tbh.

0Peter Wildeford
I pretty much do too.

I feel that this deserves greater celebration.

Hey Luke,

This is great to hear. What drew me to you and your works initially was your extraordinary ability to take concepts foreign to me and make them accessible, easy to understand and even enjoyable. It's good to see that you intend to capitalize on this talent, and I can't wait to see what more comes of it. That being said seeing how far you've come already in the past few years is mind-blowing.

You really make me want to do better. Thank you.

Alas I must cancel. important family gathering on that evening. Hope you get a good turn out

I'd love to come but we'll see.it's quite a trek for me.

0Oklord
Do try. As said I will be there (and presumably at least one associate) regardless, If only to reinforce that I will attend regardless. Probably worth noting that last time the majority of attendees where lurkers.

"Irrationality offers all the things rationality does not: creativity, a sense of “magic”, ecstasy, revelation, cosmic awe, passion and pure psychic power"

i think you misunderstand what we mean by rationality. If we wanted these things, which most of us do, then it'd be rational to be irrational. using the words that way is just silly.

Thanks Kaj, That's some useful stuff.

Could you please direct me to your source, if you have one?

0Kaj_Sotala
For that post, no particular one besides the Impro book I grabbed the status-loaded conversation from. The rest was mostly just put together from life experience.
Goobahman110

Hey Luke,

Thanks again for your work. You are by far the greatest online teacher I've ever come across (though I've never seen you teach face-to-face). you are concise, clear, direct, empathetic, extremely thorough, tactful and accessible. I am in awe of your abilities. You take the fruit that is at the top of the tree and gently place it into my straining arms! Sorry for the exuberant worship but I really want to express my gratitude for your efforts. They definitely aren't wasted on me.

Heavy questions for someone who merely wrote:

"This should be of interest to a few members of this forum"

To understand the potential for bias allows you to be cautious of it, which is good, but this type of critique can be counter-productive and a conversation killer. If a post as simple as this encounters this much scrutiny at initial submission, then we're going to have less and less contributions and discussion.

3Zetetic
Methinks think that maybe you haven't thoroughly familiarized yourself with the standards and practices of this site. Those are pretty commonplace questions and are necessary if this site is going to maintain good epistemic hygiene. The people around here work hard to maintain a well-kept garden, and epistemic hygiene is really just another part of that. Community standards have a learning curve for the new user, but they also let you know what to expect before you present new material. This has been the site standard for a while, so that doesn't seem likely. It is important not to ignore the value of scholarship when posting, lest we want to encourage a slip in the quality of discussion.

One of the big things about improving rationality is 'Getting Crap Done' and I think the problem is that for an online community wherein most of us are anonymous, there's not a lot on here to help us with that.

Now this site has helped me conceptualize and visualize in a way that I didn't realize was possible. It helped me to see things as they are, and how things could be. The problem is that whilst I'm flying ahead in terms of vision, I still sleep in and get to work late, I still play world of warcraft over going to the local toastmasters meetup, I still... (read more)

It's hard to articulate all the benefits it's had in my life, but I'll name some that I've really noticed:

Self evaluation and development: Many of the posts on Bias and human behaviours have helped me understand myself as a very primal creature, and in distinguishing the difference between the rational logic in my head, and the very human part of me that exists in day-to-day, and because I have the tools to understand those subjective parts of me, I can essentially 'manipulate' myself for my own benefit. For example, Luke's article on The Good News of Situ... (read more)

Yeah rationality has helped me realize just how foolish my workplace is.(how irrational it is, actually)

For me, motivation came from doing a cost-benefit analysis on what I do at work.

Firstly, I love most of my colleagues, so I don't want to let them down, so any work associated with them must meet or exceed their expectations and not harm them.

Secondly, I do what I commit to do, so integrity motivates me. That being said, doing extra tends to be wasted on those I do it for. So I don't. it's like 'bare minimum' but in the sense that I do the bare minimum,... (read more)

0mutterc
Excellent, thanks!

Please do this.

I'd love to be able to understand and harness this resource.

but then he had a baby :p

Forgive me if someone has already mentioned this but making sure your sleep space is a nothing else space helps a lot too.

For me, bedtime was a place for cognitive exercise, wherein I awoke my mind to all the things that required thought, generally speaking a poor idea when your trying to get your mind to slow down. Also now that I'm married it's a place for discussion and other enjoyable activities.

Ideally though, the Bed should be for sleep and sleep alone, no thinking, no reading, etc. If your thinking a lot or feel like reading, maybe do it at your des... (read more)

1Goobahman
but then he had a baby :p

I admire your enthusiasm and vision, but I think it needs to be tempered with some realism. What your trying to do is fantastic, but the unfortunately reality is that LW is ultimately an online interaction, and thus has certain limits that would severly impair an initiative such as this. To give you an idea here's my own personal hurdles in fully embracing this:

a) I already engage in face-to-face communities which whilst differnt to what you have described shares many similar values. Energy into this means less energy into them, and currently those group... (read more)

0Giles
I tried raising this idea at the Toronto meetup first and got a similarly lukewarm reaction. I'm totally with you that face to face interaction has great benefits though, so I'll continue to evangelize there (thanks for the reminder and encouragement)

I saw this talk not too long ago on their podcast and it got me quite excited. Most Ted talks I find enjoyable but I'm not such a fan of their drive for diversity for the sake of diversity. (You can get some pretty bizzare types) but this one in particular was exciting because she made something as fundamental to rationality as this interesting and highly accesible; essentially creating another gateway for the masses.

This is the type of thing that Less Wrong needs to get behind if we want the rationality movement to go forward. both depth and breadth are required.

Goobahman120

I always feel sad when I hear about suicide. Wasted potential. But then I think about all wasted potential and suicide just becomes one of many very depressingly true things that I can't pretend away.

Goodybe Chris. At least your not hurting anymore. I'm not sure what to feel or even think about the rest of it.

It makes me want to go to sleep, and not mind so much if I wake up or not. Not in a depressed way. Just in a 'This-is-all-there-is' way. Guess I'll just try my best and enjoy it. Wouldn't be much else to do around here anyway :)

I'm trying to meet up fortnightly with some good friends in hopes of evangelizing rationality, although I'm finding that it's my fundamentals attitudes, transparency and willingness to lead by example that truly effects people. Means I have to push myself, that I have to take this as far as it can go, and not let the hurdles slow me down. It's hard to say the least. You have to be prepared to sacrifice, and push through the negativity. But it's worth it. Rationality is my life hack.

Good luck Andrew.

Should your relocation flukishly land you in Sydney, Australia, I will do what I can to help you!

But this is a very cool utilization of the LessWrong community. I'm excited to see how it goes.

tsuyoku naritai!

how do you pronounce this?

su-yo-coo nar-ee-tie?

I'm going to make it my warcry whenever I need to energize myself.

7[anonymous]
This is close.

Oooo a fellow Wow-er.

I reference EJ quite often actually because I am far too lazy to work the stuff out for myself.

Has EJ thought of increasing scope to other games? (RIFT comes to mind) Increase it's capacity to become a centre of excellence for mathematical gaming? Or even turn the site into a more lucrative endeavour?

From what I've seen you've got a very resourceful community at your disposal here. Much potential for you to utilize.

This does look like a feasible and safe option. Will investigate.

4Unnamed
To add some more detail, you could consider this to be three pieces of advice, in increasing order of specificity: First, if you want to invest your savings to make more money, you should strongly consider the stock market, since it tends to grow faster than other investments. But you should be aware that the stock market sometimes goes down, so you might lose money. So you should think this over and decide if it's what you want to do. Second, if you invest in the stock market, you should go with index funds. Index funds try to match the market, rather than trying to beat the market, which allows them to have lower fees and expenses. It's very very hard to beat the market, and if you try to (e.g., by picking stocks or investing in an actively managed mutual fund) you'll waste a bunch of money on fees and expenses in the process. You can read more about index funds in some of the links in this thread (including mine and James_Miller's). Third, if you invest in index funds, one very good option is Vanguard's US fund VTSMX (or you could split your money between that and VFWIX, their non-US fund). There may be better options for you, but they aren't likely to be much better. Vanguard has an excellent reputation, these funds have very low expenses and few restrictions (especially the US fund, VTSMX), VTSMX does an excellent job of matching the US stock market (and the combination does a good job of matching the world stock market), the minimum investment is only $3,000 (USD), and it's easy to do the investing online. There are other options you could look into, including ETFs (which are stocks that are designed to match the market, rather than mutual funds) and index funds at other brokerages like Schwab and Fidelity, but don't get stuck agonizing over which one to pick because the differences aren't that big.

Thanks James.

Seriously considering an Index Fund.

Also do you have any thoughts to share regarding the ethical ramifications of investing? I'm just concerned that I'd be making profits at the expense of others, and I don't want ignorance to be an excuse for that, but again I have no idea about economics so I'd love to hear from someone who knows what they're talkinga bout?

6MartinB
A very basic finance book, which is also rather oldish is George Claysons: Richest Man in Babylon. It is a series of fables set in the old city of Babylon, teaching people why to save + invest in a broad sense. To cover the ethics of investing: Imagine if you sit an hour at home doing nothing. Compare that to doing something that improves your own live like repairing something in the house, or that improves the life of someone else, like a client in your job. In the second case you did something that made a part of humanity slightly better off. If you get payed for that it is an exchange of your time and abilities against the resources of someone else, who profits from using you, and is probably as happy about the exchange as you are. Now with the money you have the choice of either consuming it - which allows others to profit by serving you, or you can 'invest' it. Which means delaying your own consumption, and instead giving someone else who is in need of capital the possibility to buy an item that helps her to produce more efficiently. As a fee for your capital you either get some fixed sum, or a share of the profits, so in the end both you and the other person profit from that. That is of course a super simplified explanation of a more complicated thing. There are companies you might not want to invest in and others that are really awesome.
[anonymous]110

Investing is not inherently unethical. If you're directly buying a tobacco company's bonds, then yeah, you're helping evil to prosper, but consider the following scenarios. (Remember that money is just a number - what it represents is that you've done work for other people, and in exchange other people are willing to do a certain amount of work for you. Compared to barter, money provides a magical layer of indirection as it sloshes around the economy - you may make widgets for FooCorp, and the money you earn allows you to buy gizmos from BarInc, even if no... (read more)

7roystgnr
The only way you're likely to be making profits at the expense of others is if you pick stocks in industries with significant externalized costs... which I admit may be hard to avoid, especially with an index fund, depending on the true impact of CO2 emissions and on the status of corresponding Pigovian taxes that apply to your investment targets. Otherwise, for the most part you're making profits at the profit of others. Life isn't a zero sum game. Capital markets want your dollars because investment can help create and improve products that are worth more than their inputs plus the investment, and "worth more" is in the opinion of the people who buy those products, who after all wouldn't have bought them if they didn't value them more than the money they spent. Likewise for employees as well as consumers - even "sweat shops" with dismal conditions by first world standards have to supply locally-high wages to attract workers, and historically this ends up raising wages for the country as a whole. Your profits are (infinitesimally) reducing the profits made by other investors. Microeconomics says that if you increase the supply of something, including capital, the price paid to the suppliers typically goes down. But no wealth goes away in this scenario. Other investors' loss is exceeded by employees', consumers' and your gain, and since consumers and employees are on average less wealthy than investors the net gain is even greater in utility than in dollars.
5jsalvatier
Economists are broadly of the opinion that economic activity makes people better off in general. For example, if you invested in your friend's new store, you're helping him (try to) be more productive. He benefits; you benefit, and his customers benefit. His competitors may suffer, but the benefits to others are larger than those losses. Unless you're investing in something that has a large negative impact (say creating lots of smog) you are probably making the world a better place.
2MartinB
Buy some books on the topic and read them. Or watch the khan academy. Economics is one of the topics everyone should have basic knowledge of. One book that springs to mind is: 'why smart people make stupid money mistakes'. I can not assert if it is particularly great, but it is on my re:read stack and recommended by Ramit Sethi, one of the more reasonable private finance bloggers, and an occasional OB/LW reader.

Hey Armok

Have you considered that there may be those who have very similar values as us here at Less Wrong, but rather champion them under a different banner than 'Rationality'?

I'm just thinking it might be worth widening your search, and scracth under the surface a bit more of what's around you to see if you can find any gold.

Short of that, send out a few transmissions in the local forums e.g. newspapers and their websites. and see if you can pick up any signals.

1PhilGoetz
Got any keywords to suggest?

Thanks for all your hard work Luke.

Been following you for almost two years now, since your earlier days on CSA. I had a hunch you would be worth keeping an eye on, and look at you. And I'm sharing in all the benefits! Posts like this, are so well put-together, so accessible but so sophisticated and reliable. It's like an artform.

Keep it up. Your an inspiration.

Meta_ark I would've loved to come along, but I'm actually away that entire weekend.

Nice to see a Sydney meetup though and looking forward to attending in the future!

"It's been said that being half a rationalist is dangerous. How do you communicate enough rationality for it to not be dangerous? "

I think this is quite a hurdle. I struggle a lot when I think about how to get others to be more rational, or communicating ideas that people might only understand half of. The Sequences are great but they tend to build from the ground up, and so it's hard for them to seem relevant. Perhaps a reductive approach? So we try to begin with essays/tools/models that are more relevant to thought processes that the layman would regularly engage in, before asking them to then explore those thought processes.

I'd vote for starting a company.

The Corporate World is in dire need of companies that aren't evil, to both change the tone of the industry and to serve as an example to other companies. It just feels like for almost every company the bottom line is always the dollar, but it'd be nice if that stopped being the norm, and I think by running a company the way you'd want to you could contribute to that cause. (I am assuming your company wouldn't be evil)

Otherwise: Do 'em all at Once!

2[anonymous]
State run companies are those for which the emphasis on bottom line is a lot weaker than for private run companies, and at least in India it is very clear that this makes them worse overall. Terrible customer service, not enough innovation, overall poor work culture etc. If a corporate is not making profits (in ethical and legal ways, obviously), they're clearly not providing a service society values enough or they are doing it inefficiently.
5atucker
Generally, human concepts of fairness don't really extend into economics, physics, biology, or any of the other ways by which the world works. (Also I don't think most companies are that evil, and most are under legal obligations to maximize profit) I'm skeptical about how reliably paulfchristiano could hold something away from its equilibrium.

I agree.

I imagine almost anything would become interesting to me, if I knew that I was doing it with a bunch of (aspiring) rationalists.

"The largest effect in my life has been in fighting mental illness,"

Hey Armok,

I'd love to hear more details on this. Maybe do a post in discussion? Doesn't have to be elaborate or anything but I'm really curious.

0Armok_GoB
No, but I can link to a previous discussion on why not: http://lesswrong.com/lw/4ws/collecting_successes_and_deltas/3qml

NancyLebovitz's comment I think is highly relevant here.

I can only speak from my personal experience, but I've found than part of going through Less Wrong and understanding all the great stuff on this website, is understanding the type of creature I am. At this current moment, I am comparitively a very simple one. In terms of the singularity, and Friendly AI, they are miles from what I am, and I am not at a point where I can emotionally take on those causes. I can intellectual but the fact is the simple creature that I am doesn't comprehend those connecti... (read more)

I saw it and had some similar reflections. Got me thinking about what a highly optimized rational man would look like.

It wasn't perfect by any standards but had some great cinematography and ideas flowing around. If you can forgive the gaping loopholes you'll enjoy the ride.

I'm in West Sydney actually. Not a lot of reason to travel out that way, but if you happen to find yourself there feel free to drop me a line.

I thought 'PERFECT' then I remembered I live half a world away.

Chances of a course by correspondence?

I've always thought going through a course with some of my friends would be a really good exercise.

6Kevin
Singinst tries not to discriminate based on country of national origin. You should apply!
5Louie
Where do you live? I'm in Bali and travel a lot to meet potential allies for enrichment and grooming purposes. Maybe we could meet up?

Test the limits of their free travel offer ;p

Goobahman110

Thank you so much for this post. This is absolute gold for someone like me.

I have only just recently begun a Less Wrong meet up group in Sydney, Australia, and have been scouring around for advice and prior models to go of and you pretty much just provided everything in one freaking awesome post!

What's really encouraging is that in doing comparisons I already see similar happening in my group. Firstly most of the attendants are very good friends of mine, to whom topics pertaining to rationality come up naturally at almost any occasion, their great fun to h... (read more)

I'm fortunate in that I have friends who are already quite into a lot of things that aren't too far from rationality as already is, who were previously part of a political discussion group I used to run, so it was easy for them to get on board with a new project.

As I said previously, I think the greatest challenge is making people understand the relevance of what we're studying and how it's directly applicable to everything they do. A lot of people tend to think it's beyond them, or not for them, or be somewhat dismissive, but once you start engaging them ... (read more)

I'm in Western Sydney, Australia.

will post my results as the group progresses, as i evaluate what works, what doesn't and seek advice from the LW community. still early days though.

Thanks for the interest.

Basically I think what the Less Wrong community is doing here is so fundamentally important to self-development that I thought it was worth sharing. I get frustrated enough at my own bias and irrationality, let alone that of others, that I thought it was worth trying to do something about it.

I found there was little I could offer to the LessWrong community, it's already chockers with brilliance, but the people who need this stuff most are those who are the least likely to find a site like this interesting.

So the way I though I'd be... (read more)

2erratio
How did you sell them on the idea of improving their rationality? I've been trying to teach some of my more receptive friends about it for a while now (by bringing up techniques when appropriate) and been met with apathy, rationalization, and laziness
2atucker
Just wondering, in which metropolitan area are you? I was thinking of doing something similar when I get to college, can you keep us posted on how this works out?

I echo luke's sentiments. Thanks Eliezer. www.Lesswrong.com is a resource that truly strikes at the heart of the matter.

Also: The Karma thing is a good way to prevent trolls and other less desirables from flooding the site with crap, plus find the more appreciated and higher contributors. I think it helps maintain the quality of discussion on this site.

My only problem is that I hate commenting unless I have something to add, which @ lesswrong.com is almost never (thanks to the diligence of the community here) but I need at least 2 points to bring up a top... (read more)

2atucker
I was originally in your boat, and kind of still am. I've found that the more I've been involved, the more I've had to contribute. At first my comments were kind of trite, but I got better. Commenting gives you good feedback, which you can then use to refine your points and knowledge so that you have more to contribute.
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