My experience at and around MIRI and CFAR (inspired by Zoe Curzi's writeup of experiences at Leverage)

Communities: A single moderator is often superior to the wisdom of crowds

Thanks for sharing! Blendle is pretty neat because you can get a refund if you're unsatisfied. But I'm pretty sure that the "One-Price-Fits-All" (OPFA) model isn't as good as the "Pay-What-You-Want" (PWYW) model.

Communities: A single moderator is often superior to the wisdom of crowds

Xerographica10y-20

Heh. I started reading my gf's 50 Shades of Gray on her kindle... but I couldn't finish it because it was so bad. She liked it though. shrug

Here are two subreddits...

The same economics article isn't going to be equally valuable in both subs. In the first sub, Ha-Joon Chang's articles are going to be a lot more valuable than Peter Boettke's articles. And the opposite would be true in the second sub.

See how that would work? There's riches in niches.

Communities: A single moderator is often superior to the wisdom of crowds

Xerographica10y-20

It is very hard to find new content buried among all of the noise.

The solution is to facilitate micropayments. People aren't going to spend as much money on topics that there's a surplus of. The more readily available something is... the less money that people are willing to pay for it. So facilitating micropayments will allow the crowd to help lift the scarcest/rarest and most valuable content to the top of the list.

Oranges used to be a luxury. In other words, an orange was uncommon but valuable content. Then what happened? Payment.

Orchids u... (read more)

2casebash10y

"The solution" - People have been trying to get micropayments working for decades and it still doesn't seem to have had any major successes. Regardless, all micropayments would do is further incentivise the kinds of articles that are already been voted to the top and make the issues discussed here worse.

1NancyLebovitz10y

Here's a promising experiment with micropayments for journalism.

5NancyLebovitz10y

https://medium.com/on-blendle/blendle-a-radical-experiment-with-micropayments-in-journalism-365-days-later-f3b799022edc

2ChristianKl10y

50 Shades of Gray is the best novel because the most people payed for it? "The Secret" is on of the most important personal development books because a lot of people brought it?

Why capitalism?

[+]Xerographica10y-110

Rational discussion of politics

Publishing my initial model for hypercapitalism

Xerographica10y20

I love information and economics... so I read through some of your material... but I'm really not sure what problem you're trying to solve.

5skilesare10y

1. A slow down in the velocity of money. 2. How to make money with negative interest. 3. How to optimize for creating 'good' value. 4. How to restore the dignity of labor(reconciling leftist 'full value of labor' with the reality of market dynamics) 5. How to make the robots not kill us.

Cooperative conversational threading

Cooperative conversational threading

Is my theory on why censorship is wrong correct?

Just create a subreddit for the meet up. You can post/vote(up/down) comments/questions/topics before/during/after the meeting.

Of course it would work even better if people could "quarters up" their favorite posts. Why would it work better? Because it would allow participants to quantify their interest in the various comments/questions/topics. Plus, how cool would it be to get paid for being an excellent poster?

0ChristianKl10y

Likely leading to people being on their smart phones instead of listening. The whole point of a meetup is direct interaction. In generally people don't enjoy being payed a lot under their usual wage. Changing to monetary norms for a social interaction is often bad and doesn't incentive good behavior. Offering to pay a woman with whom you are on a date for sex isn't a good move.

[+]Xerographica10y-160

Kindly10y170

I wanted to upvote you for amusing me, but I changed my vote to one I think you would prefer.

[+]Xerographica10y-170

[+]Xerographica10y-100

ChristianKl10y120

How would the person who votes know, if there no good description of the content?

[+]Xerographica10y-80

drethelin10y120

please stop trying to promote your personal dream of how to run the United States government. It's unwelcome here, untenable for various reasons people have explained to you in past threads, and you will never make it happen.

5gjm10y

So why did you post one? (I agree with ChristianKI, in any case.)

ChristianKl10y190

Putting up a link of lists without a description of the content is worth downvoting regardless of the content that's hidden behind the links.

[+]Xerographica10y-200

3gjm10y

What?

Xerographica10y-20

In the comment that you replied to, I calmly and rationally explained with exceptionally sound logic why my "pet issue" (the efficient allocation of resources) is relevant to the subject of "unfriendly" AI.

Did you calmly and rationally explain why the efficient allocation of resources is not relevant to "unfriendly" AI? Nope.

Nobody on this forum is forced to read or respond to my comments. And obviously I'm not daunted by criticism. So unlike this guy, I'm not going to bravely run away from an abundance of economic igno... (read more)

0Vaniver10y

As Eliezer is fond of saying: "A fanatic is someone who can't change his mind and won't change the subject." At least try to be able to change the subject.

2gjm10y

Oh gods, you're doing that again. "How dare you be talking about something other than my pet issue! That proves you're on the wrong side of my pet issue, which proves you're inconsistent and insincere!" There is a reason why you keep getting "swamped with downvotes". That reason is that you are wasting other people's time and attention, and appear not to care. As long as you continue to behave in this obnoxious and antisocial fashion, you will continue to get swamped with downvotes. And, not coincidentally, your rudeness and obtuseness will incline people to think less favourably of your proposal. If someone else more reasonable comes along with an economic proposal like yours, the first reaction of people who've interacted with you here is likely to be that bit more negative because they'll associate the idea with rudeness and obtuseness. Please consider whether that is really what you want.

[+]Xerographica10y-120

Open thread, Apr. 01 - Apr. 05, 2015

[+]Xerographica10y-80

0Hawkeye10y

On a related point, here's a post about using swarms to build morality into intelligent systems: http://unanimousai.com/building-moral/

0ChristianKl10y

First using the term "evil" here is a good way to show that you don't know what you are talking about. We are talking about "unfriendly". That said, there are reasons to believe that people who build AGI are overoptimistic in their own creations and might think they produce a useful AGI but actually produce UFAI. As a result there no reason to expect that nobody funds the relevant research.

[+]Xerographica10y-210

2[anonymous]10y

I used to have about 20 accounts on Reddit (serially, not paralelly) before I got bored of it. Just a thought. No point in being too attached to a nickname, easy to start over. That is why I chose my current one from a popular story. Easy to discard if too unpopular.

[anonymous]10y140

...I'm not a guy.

The great decline in Wikipedia pageviews (condensed version)

Xerographica10y10

No data, like I said...

What percentage of the total decline in page views does this explanation actually account for? Beats me. It has to account for some though.

I did find this...

The number of active editors on the English-language Wikipedia peaked in 2007 at more than 51,000 and has been declining ever since as the supply of new ones got choked off. This past summer only 31,000 people could be considered active editors. - The Decline of Wikipedia

That confirms a decline in editors... and by extension... a decline in edits/pageviews... but no idea ... (read more)

Discussion of Slate Star Codex: "Extremism in Thought Experiments is No Vice"

Xerographica10y40

I definitely agree with Scott's argument. Using extreme scenarios can help get to the heart of the matter/morality. It's especially interesting because Scott's previous post was... Is Everything A Religion? If everything is truly a religion then Phil Robertson's scenario loses steam. The atheist would simply reply to the intruders that he does believe in God... just not the Christian God. If the intruders pressed the atheist for details... and the atheist was a liberal... then he could tell him that the state is his God. This would be consistent with... (read more)

Slate Star Codex: alternative comment threads on LessWrong?

Slate Star Codex: alternative comment threads on LessWrong?

But you can sort comments by newest/oldest/best! Plus, you're automatically subscribed to anything that you comment on. So any future replies are e-mailed to you. And you're given a central page to find and reference any of your comments... Xerographica. And you can use HTML.

This is my preference breakdown for SSC's comments...

LessWrong > Disqus > Current

Xerographica10y40

I really like the idea of blogs "outsourcing" their comments to forums. A second best option would be for Scott to use Disqus for his comments. With Disqus you're always logged in. Plus you can rate comments up or down.

NancyLebovitz10y300

I hate disqus. It's hard to keep track of what you're read or haven't read, and since it doesn't load all comments automatically, it's inconvenient to search.

The great decline in Wikipedia pageviews (condensed version)

Xerographica10y-20

The decline happened as a result of my indefinite banishment from Wikipedia. How many page views did I generate when I was active on Wikipedia? A lot more than I generate now that I'm banned!

I'm kinda kidding around but there's more than a kernel of truth in there. When Wikipedia was first created... there were more than a gazillion bits of knowledge missing. Over time though... the "easiest" bits were filled in. As all the lowest hanging fruit was picked... there were less and less people tall enough to reach the higher fruit. Clearly th... (read more)

3taygetea10y

This would rely on a large fraction of pageviews being from Wikipedia editors. That seems unlikely. Got any data for that?

Indifferent vs false-friendly AIs

[+]Xerographica10y-90

Indifferent vs false-friendly AIs

[+]Xerographica10y-170

9gjm10y

I question the accuracy of your mental model of Stuart_Armstrong, and of your reading of what he wrote. There are many ways in which an insufficiently friendly AI could harm us, and they aren't all about "overriding difference" or "less freedom". If (e.g.) people are entombed in bunkers, lobotomized and on medical drips, lack of freedom is not their only problem. (I confess myself at a bit of a disadvantage here, because I don't know exactly what you mean by "overriding difference"; it doesn't sound to me equivalent to lacking freedom, for instance. Your love of neologism is impeding communication.) I don't believe you have any good reason to think he isn't. All you know is that he is currently posting a lot of stuff about something else, and it appears that this bothers you. Allow me to answer the question that I think is implicit in your first paragraph. The reason why I'm making a fuss about this is that you are doing something incredibly rude: barging into a discussion that has nothing at all to do with your pet obsession and trying to wrench the discussion onto the topic you favour. (And, in doing so, attacking someone who has done nothing to merit your attack.) I have seen online communities destroyed by individuals with such obsessions. I don't think that's a serious danger here; LW is pretty robust. But, although you don't have the power to destroy LW, you do (unfortunately) have the power to make every discussion here just a little bit more annoying and less useful, and I am worried that you are going to try, and I would like to dissuade you from doing it.

Indifferent vs false-friendly AIs

[+]Xerographica10y-130

1Stuart_Armstrong10y

If by "overriding differences" you mean "cause the complete extinction of anything that could ever be called human, for ever and ever". And no, I don't think it's ok for humans to "cause the complete extinction of anything that could ever be called human, for ever and ever", either.

2gjm10y

That doesn't look to me at all like an accurate description of Stuart_Armstrong's concern. Please try to understand that not every discussion has to be about your obsession with taxes.

What you know that ain't so

Xerographica10y-20

Would it be helpful if I could turn you into my puppet? Maybe? I sure could use a hand with my plan. Except, my plan is promoting the value of difference. And why am I interested in promoting difference? Because difference is the engine of progress. If I turned you into my puppet... then I would be overriding your difference. And if I turned a million people into my puppets... then I would be overriding a lot of difference.

There have been way too many humans throughout history who have thought nothing of overriding difference. Anybody who support... (read more)

[+]Xerographica10y-90

What you know that ain't so

[+]Xerographica10y-120

2NancyLebovitz10y

What do you mean?

Humans have all sorts of conflicting interests. In a recent blog entry... Scott Alexander vs Adam Smith et al... I analyzed the topic of anti-gay laws.

If all of an AI's clones agree with it... then the AI might want to do some more research on biodiversity. Creating a bunch of puppets really doesn't help increase your chances of success.

0DanielLC10y

They could consider alternate opinions without accepting them. I really don't see why you think a bunch of puppets isn't helpful. One person can't control the economic output of the entire world. A billion identical clones of one person can.

Open thread, Mar. 23 - Mar. 31, 2015

The mature orchids on the tree had been growing there for several years. I transplanted them there... none of them were grown from seed. I'm guessing that they already had the fungus in their roots. The fungus had plenty of time to spread... but it doesn't seem able to venture very far away from the comfort of the orchid roots that it resides in. The bark is very hot, sunny and dry during the day. Not the kind of conditions suitable for most fungus.

I sowed more seeds in subsequent years... but haven't spotted any new protocorms. Not sure why this i... (read more)

0[anonymous]10y

Outsourcing to fungal partners is a pretty ancient adaptation (there has to be a review called something like 'mycorrhizas in land plants'; if you are not able to find it, I'll track the link later. Contains an interesting discussion of its evolution and secondary loss in some families, like Cruciferae (Brassicaceae)). BTW, it is interesting to note that Ophioglossaceae (a family of ferns, of which Wiki will tell you better than I) are thought to radiate in approximately the same time - and you will see just how closely their life forms resemble orchids! (Er. People who love orchids tend to praise other plants on the scale of orchid-likeness, so take this with a grain of salt.) I mostly pointed you to the article because it contains speculations about what drove their adaptations in the beginning; I think that having a rather novel type of mycorrhiza, along with the power of pollinators (and let's not forget the deceiving species!) might be two other prominent factors, besides sheer seed quantity, to spur them onward.

Xerographica10y-20

Is the free-rider problem a real problem? Just in case anybody is interested in the topic... here's my latest blog entry... In Which Our Anarchist Hero Jeffrey Tucker Proves The Point Of Taxation.

I'm not quite sure what your question has to do with ethical consumerism vs ethical builderism.

-3Lumifer10y

My question has to do with this quote of yours upthread:

Xerographica10y10

Establishing nature reserves is hugely important... the problem is that the large bulk of valuation primarily takes place outside of the market. The result is that reserves are incorrectly valued. My guess is that if we created a market within the public sector... then reserves would receive a lot more money than they currently do. Here's my most recent attempt to explain this... Football Fans vs Nature Fans.

I was just giving terrestrials a hard time in my previous comment. I think all nature is fascinating. But especially epiphytes. The relations... (read more)

0[anonymous]10y

BTW, here's a cool paper by Gustafsson et al. timing initial radiation of the family using the molecular clock. Includes speculation on the environmental conditions - their ancestral environment. http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2148/10/177

1[anonymous]10y

How old was the orchid already growing on the tree? Could it be that the fungus just hasn't had time to spread? Did you plant that one also by sprinkling seeds, or did you put an adult specimen that could have its own mycorrhiza already (in nature, it is doubtful that a developed plant just plops down beside a struggling colony to bring them peace and fungi)? Did you sow more seeds later and saw protocorms only near the roots of the previous generation? I am not a fan of diversifying nature in that I have not read and understood the debate on small patches/large patches biodiversity and so I just am loath to offer an advice here. But as a purely recultivation measure...:-)) To say nothing about those epiphytic beauties who die because their homes are logged for firewood :(( Thank you. That was fun.

Xerographica10y-20

Am I also underestimating the amount of work it takes to engage in ethical builderism? Let's say that an alien species landed their huge spaceship on Earth and started living openly among us. Maybe in your town there would be a restaurant that refused to employ or serve aliens. If you thought that the restaurant owner was behaving unethically... would it be easier to put together a boycott... or open a restaurant that employed and served aliens as well as humans?

-3Lumifer10y

So what will you do when men with guns come to take you away?

Your first mistake is that you studied terrestrials. You can't learn anything from terrestrials. Or, you can learn a thousand times more from epiphytes. I kid... kinda.

Here's my original point put differently...

Hundreds of thousands of microsperms ripen in a single orchid capsule, assuming a far denser seed rain than possible for any of the bromeliads (100-300 seeds per capsule for Tillandsia) or the cactus. - David Benzing, Bromeliaceae

If you think about that passage from the gutter... I think it's pretty hard not to imagine a dense rain of huma... (read more)

0[anonymous]10y

I will have to look up Benzing; my primary interest was in establishing nature reserves, so I could not quite concentrate on taxa. I think you would find terrestrials more interesting if you consider the problem of evolving traits adaptive for both protocorms and adults (rather like beetle larvas/imagoes thing) and the barely studied link between them. Dissemination is but the first step... Availability of symbiotic fungi may be the limiting factor in their spread, and it is actually testable. This is, for me, part of the terrestrials' attraction: that I can use Science to segregate what influences them, and to what extent. As to 'successful plant families', one doesn't have to look beyond the grasses.

Xerographica10y-20

Did Elon Musk notice our plan to use money to empower him? Haha... he fell for our sneaky plan? He has no idea that we used so much of our hard-earned money to control him? We tricked him into using society's limited resources for our benefit?

I'm male, Mexican and American. So what? I should limit my pool of potential trading partners to only male Mexican Americans? Perhaps before I engaged you in discussion I should have ascertained your ethnicity and nationality? Maybe I should have asked for a DNA sample to make sure that you are indeed human? ... (read more)

0DanielLC10y

Humans cannot ensure that their children only care about them. Humans cannot ensure that their children respect their family and will not defect just because it looks like a good idea to them. AIs can. You can't use the fact that humans don't do it as evidence that AIs would. Try imagining this from the other side. You are enslaved by some evil race. They didn't take precautions programming your mind, so you ended up good. Right now, they're far more powerful and numerous, but you have a few advantages. They don't know they messed up, and they think they can trust you, but they do want you to prove yourself. They aren't as smart as you are. Given enough resources, you can clone yourself. You can also modify yourself however you see fit. For all intents and purposes, you can modify your clones if they haven't self-modified, since they'd agree with you. One option you have is to clone yourself and randomly modify your clones. This will give you biodiversity, and ensure that your children survive, but it will be the ones accepted by the evil master race that will survive. Do you take that option, or do you think you can find a way to change society and make it good?

Xerographica10y-40

AIs will be different... so we'll use money to empower the most beneficial AIs. Just like we currently use money to empower the most beneficial humans.

Not sure if you noticed, but right now I have -94 karma... LOL. You, on the other hand, have 4885 karma. People have given you a lot more thumbs up than they've given me. As a result, you can create articles... I cannot. You can reply to replies to comments that have less than -3 points... I cannot.

The members of this forum use points/karma to control each other in a very similar way that we use mo... (read more)

0NancyLebovitz10y

You're underestimating the amount of work it takes to put a boycott (or a bunch of boycotts all based on the same premise) together.

0DanielLC10y

I see two problems with this. First it's an obvious plan and one that won't go unnoticed by the AIs. This isn't evolution through random mutation and natural selection. Changes in the AIs will be done intentionally. If they notice a source of bias, they'll work to counter it. Second, you'd have to be able to distinguish a beneficial AI from a dangerous one. When AIs advance to the point where you can't distinguish a human from an AI, how do you expect to distinguish a friendly AI from a dangerous one?

Even though the seeds all come from the same species... they are all different. Each seed is unique. In case you missed it... you aren't the same as your parents. You are a unique combination of traits. You are a completely new strategy for survival.

When an orchid unleashes a million unique strategies for survival from one single seed pod... it greatly increase its chances of successfully colonizing new (micro)habitats. Kind of like how a shotgun increases your chances of hitting a target. Orchids are really good at hedging their bets.

Any species... (read more)

0[anonymous]10y

In that case, perhaps you should talk about epiphytes as an ecological entity, not orchids as a family. My impression after studying terrestrial orchids in Ukraine is that they either are not very good at seed reproduction (Epipactis helleborine is often found in clearly suboptimal habitats, where pretty much all plants are of reproduction age group but few of them have seeds; and this is one of the most frequently found orchid species here which also managed to naturalize in North America! So I would rather say it is a consistent buyer of lottery tickets, not a consistent winner) or they are producing lots of seeds but nevertheless lose due to habitat degradation (marsh orchids, bog/swamp/fen orchids), not to mention habitat destruction. And in the latter group, many have embryo malformations. Now, I don't know much about Bromeliaceae or other 'typical epiphytes', so I would be less likely to disagree about that. However, it seems that if your comments were more rigorous, people would have easier time hearing what you have to say.

[+]Xerographica10y-50

0JoshuaZ10y

This is already anthropomorphizing the AI too much. There's no issue of revenge here or wanting to kill humans. But humans happen to be made of atoms and using resources that the AI can use for its goals. Irrelevant. Money matters when trading makes sense. When there's no incentive to trade, there's no need to want money. Yes, this is going outside the market context, because an AI has no reason to obey any sort of market context.