Reading the What topics would you like to see more of on LessWrong? thread gave me the impression that many people here would appreciate introductory material to several of the topics that are often discussed in lesswrong. I have therefore decided to link in the direction of the ECON 159...
A monthly thread for posting rationality-related quotes you've seen recently (or had stored in your quotesfile for ages). * Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post...
Can somebody explain to me why Harry was so into House points before Azkaban recalibrated his sense of perspective? It makes sense why most people seek them; you take several dozen kids, split them up into different groups, and soon enough you hear them talking about how they can't let those Gryffindor jerkasses win the House Cup and so on. But it seems to me like you need to identify with your House to an unhealthy degree to take so much pleasure in earning points for it. Hermione obviously has that problem (cf. her speech about House Ravenclaw in ch. 34), but I would have expected Harry to avoid falling into such... (read more)
This attempted murder was well-planned to evade detection both by the wards of Hogwarts and the Headmaster's timely eye.
Quirrell sure loves his stealth puns. Is there any reason he is not openly telling Hermione about Dumbledore's time turner?
The Defense Professor turned his head down from the sky to regard her; and she saw, in the light of the doorway, that he was smiling - or at least half his face was smiling.
Is Quirrell's half-smile a reference to Robin Hanson's picture?
It's implied in Ch. 38 and all subsequent Lucius/Harry interactions. Specially relevant is the ironic "I prefer to deal with the part of House Malfoy that's my own age", which Lucius understands in a completely different way than Harry intends.
I think he meant that in case of failure, the happy ending will simply become the "false ending" instead of the "true ending". Since we get both either way, there really isn't a difference.
But I'm still confused; why not? What are the benefits of servitude over marriage?
Before McGonagall's stunt, I was worried the marriage would require consummation to be legally binding.
It comes from his 7 point scale for measuring belief along the theist/atheist spectrum.
It sounds like you are talking about Khan Academy, Just Math Tutorials, Math TV, Midnight Tutor, or a similar website. As far as I'm aware, none of the people involved with those sites post at LessWrong.
For pure anecdote, I am a nice guy (I think) who always complained about the "bad boy" thing, and now I am raising a step-daughter from my wife's youthful short term relationship with a guy everyone would still call a "bad boy." My wife is winning at natural selection! As is that jerk :(
Reading this anecdote made me wonder if it would be possible for a group of rational "nice guys" to cooperate with each other, refusing relationships with and shunning women who had previously been involved with and fathered children by "bad boys" even though each one of them would have to sacrifice the benefit they would individually get from entering... (read more)
Or any other demographic whose primary defining characteristic is their age group, really.
Reading the What topics would you like to see more of on LessWrong? thread gave me the impression that many people here would appreciate introductory material to several of the topics that are often discussed in lesswrong. I have therefore decided to link in the direction of the ECON 159 course lectures at Open Yale courses and YouTube and to the Game Theory 101 video series in hopes that people will find them useful.
A monthly thread for posting rationality-related quotes you've seen recently (or had stored in your quotesfile for ages).
I definitely remember this from the third book. The adults are talking about the Potters' deaths in the Three Broomsticks Inn and someone mentions that Dumbledore himself offered to become the secret keeper, but was turned down with insistences that Sirius Black would never betray them.
EDIT: Found it.