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All of closeness's Comments + Replies

March 2016 Media Thread
closeness00

I gave you a thumbs up in agreement but didn't give one to Gwern for his links. Pointing-something-out bias?

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1gwern
We don't know. Since you asked, here's the comment from one of the more recent meta-analyses to discuss dose in connection with all-cause mortality, Autier 2014: 1μg=40IU, so 10μg=400IU, 20μg=800IU, and 1250μg=5000IU. Personally, I'm not sure I agree. The mechanistic theory and correlations do not predict that 400IU is ideal, it doesn't seem enough to get blood serum levels of 25(OH)D to what seems optimal, and I don't even read Rejnmark the same way: look at the Figure 3 forest plot. To me, this looks like after correcting for Smith's use of D2 rather than D3 (D2 usually performs worse), that there are too few studies using higher doses to make any kind of claim (Table 1; almost all the daily studies use <=20μg), and the studies which we do have tend to point to higher being better within this restricted range of dosages. That said, I cannot prove that 5k IU is equally or more effective, so if anyone is feeling risk-averse or dubious on that score, they should stick with 800IU doses.
Who are your favourite rationalist bloggers?
closeness140

How one person can write so much, of such quality, with such consistency is beyond me.

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5IlyaShpitser
What do Isaac Newton and Scott Alexander have in common?
Shmi230

He says he can't help it.

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Open Thread, Apr. 06 - Apr. 12, 2015
closeness40

Yes, who's going to go through hundreds of comments to find the good ones. And based on the content they're replying to, there's probably some really good stuff in the comment section that's relatively unseen because of this.

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How has lesswrong changed your life?
closeness10

I'm referring to the great filter theory which I first learned about on Less Wrong: http://mason.gmu.edu/~rhanson/greatfilter.html

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How has lesswrong changed your life?
closeness70

I've gone from hoping we find life in the solar system to really hoping we don't.

I notice I am confused a lot.

I can use Bayes theorem well enough to calculate that the probability of me fully understanding Bayes theorem is 0%.

My thoughts about my future have changed from wondering aimlessly about how I can change my life and the world for the better and not being able to do anything about it to knowing quite well how I can change my life and the world for the better and still not doing anything about it

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1Sabiola
Why do you hope we don't find life in the solar system? And what about life outside it?
5closeness
Never mind: http://www.yudkowsky.net/obsolete/bookshelf.html
Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, February 2015, chapter 109
closeness20

Maybe the AI was asked to make the world safe for wizards and figured it was easier to make an entire new world for them than make safe a Muggle dominated one.

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Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, February 2015, chapter 108
closeness00

The door handles of the ministry of magic would be my own choice.

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0LizzardWizzard
Thank you, this is awesome!
Open thread, Dec. 15 - Dec. 21, 2014
closeness00

As soon as I close my eyes to sleep I silently say to myself "I will wake up early in the morning" 100 times. If I do this I will wake up before my alarm without fail, if not I will hit snooze as many times as I can get away with it.

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2CBHacking
Have you ever learned (self-)hypnosis? I tried something quite close to this technique (repeat a phrase or short set of phrases as many times as I could, while intentionally relaxing as though into hypnosis but without the "and at the end of it I wake up again" key) after I learned self-hypnosis, and it achieved things I would not have thought were possible. Getting up without lazing in bed is interesting and handy, but programming my brain to wake up at 4AM (when you went to bed at 11PM or so) without an alarm of any kind was just freaky. I could hit within five minutes or so of my target time (it may help that I tended to fall asleep such that the last thing I saw before falling asleep was the time on my alarm clock) and I would wake up alert, enough so that it felt natural to get out of bed. Of course, being roughly 13 at the time, I didn't use this power for anything particularly valuable - usually just to sneak downstairs and play more StarCraft than I was allowed to play mid-week, then sneak back upstairs and into bed before my alarm went off for school - but the fact that I could do it still astonishes me. It's a lot less reliable now, either because I've long since fallen out of practice with self-hypnosis or because my sleep schedule is now a lot more irregular but arguably less flexible to start with. I should start practicing again... maybe even see if I can find my hypnosis lesson tapes (and something that will play audiocassette) for a reminder. "I will wake up, alert and feeling rested, at 7:45 in the morning and immediately get out of bed. I will wake up, alert and feeling rested, at 7:45 in the morning and immediately get out of bed. I will wake..."
Open thread, Oct. 20 - Oct. 26, 2014
closeness110

People who look for ways to become more rational are probably far more rational than average already.

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4[anonymous]
I would disagree and say that people who look for ways to "become rational" in the LessWrong sense are just exposed to a class of internet-based advice systems (like lifehacker and similar) that promote the idea that you can "hack" things to make them better. Rationality is the ultimate lifehack; it's One Weird Trick to Avoid Scope Insensitivity. Outside of this subculture, people look for ways to improve all the time; people even look for ways to improve globally all the time. The way they do this isn't always "rational," or even effective, but if rationality is winning, it's clear that people look for ways to win all the time. They might do this by improving their communication skills, or their listening skills, or trying to become "centered" or "balanced" in some way that will propagate out to everything they do.
6[anonymous]
I don't find this obvious. Why do you think this?
1the-citizen
Agreed. So basically, what made them look?
Open thread, Oct. 20 - Oct. 26, 2014
closeness50

I think this is very important, I myself noticed that when I was younger, the longer I was unemployed, the more I started reading about socialist ideas and getting into politics. Then when I started working again it went out the window and I moved on to learning about other things.

Similarly, maybe I'm here because I just happened to be in the mood to read some fan fiction that day?

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LINK: Blood from youth keeps you young
closeness190

I foresee rationalist Dracula fan-fiction in our future.

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Open Thread, May 26 - June 1, 2014
closeness20

It would be more about informing than enforcing. There are already rules here which make registered charities show where their money goes, so a mechanism for comparing effectiveness wouldn't be a big leap.

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2Lumifer
I submit that an official government definition of what constitutes the effectiveness of a charity would be a huge leap.
Open Thread, May 26 - June 1, 2014
closeness-20

I think the easiest way would be to show smallest number of euros per live saved, and charities which have minimal to do with saving lives wouldn't be considered useful at all. Givewell.orgs' charity list seems like the best one to promote, as for charities which work within Ireland, that would be more difficult.

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3Lumifer
That's a rather... extreme attitude. So you want a government policy which explicitly says that charities which do not directly save lives are worthless?
Open Thread, May 26 - June 1, 2014
closeness20

Changing where international aid goes. Regulating charities so they have to apply a criteria showing how effective they spend money. This is in Ireland btw.

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3Lumifer
What measure of effectiveness would you propose such that it is easy to calculate and applicable to all charities?
Open Thread, May 26 - June 1, 2014
closeness10

I'm thinking of ways to promote effective altruism, such as speaking at colleges and political lobbying. Any thoughts/recommendations?

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2ChristianKl
Start a local EA meetup.
2Lumifer
Which political things do you want to lobby for?
0MathiasZaman
There was something on the Effective Altruist facebook page (I think) about how political lobbying only really makes a difference if you have a lot of cash to burn.
May Monthly Bragging Thread
closeness330

Passed my first programming course (Java). Came up with two arduino products for a farm that could be very profitable if successful. Learned something new every day. Went a whole month without feeling depressed.

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Open Thread, October 27 - 31, 2013
closeness40

Why isn't there a pill that makes a broken heart go away?

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0joaolkf
They are on it: http://www.academia.edu/2764401/If_I_could_just_stop_loving_you_Anti-love_biotechnology_and_the_ethics_of_a_chemical_breakup
1Lumifer
Just time is both necessary and sufficient.
1Nisan
It will get better over time.
-1drethelin
Arguably MDMA in the proper context. The chain of reasoning as as follows: One of the quickest traditional cures for sadness about a broken off relationship is a new relationship ---> the cure for a broken heart is to meet and fall in love with someone else as fast as possible ---> MDMA lowers inhibition and raises affection and touch (which are crucial for relationship formation) and theoretically should make the process of getting to know someone faster and happier ---> so if you take MDMA around the right people in the right place you can quickly fall into a new love.
3Kaj_Sotala
There might be eventually.
3cousin_it
Something like that was discussed previously. Kevin recommended antidepressants in the comments.
-5JDelta
5Ritalin
Ask Gwern, he probably knows something that's good enough.
Open Thread, September 23-29, 2013
closeness30

Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky.

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Open thread, August 19-25, 2013
closeness40

How can I apply rationality to business?

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9wedrifid
* Avoid sunk costs. * If stuff doesn't work figure out why and (in most cases) do different stuff. * When predicting how long a project will take consider how long similar tasks tend to take and use that as a (rather strong) guide.