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2f3143af-567f-4f37-b757-cc80f061ca97 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | 2012 Winter Fundraiser for the Singularity Institute
Cross-posted here.
(The Singularity Institute maintains Less Wrong, with generous help from Trike Apps, and much of the core content is written by salaried SI staff members.)
Thanks to the generosity of several major donors,† every donation to the Singularity Inst... |
1f6d23fd-6c1b-4ab9-b83c-0982feb6047e | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/youtube | Youtube Transcripts | 156. Synthesising Utility QA
hello and welcome to session 156 in the
ashd reading group tonight Stuart
Armstrong will present his research
agenda please take it away Stuart hello
there thanks for inviting me to talk
here I'm actually going to take get to
the research agenda in a very roundabout
way presenting a few re... |
899c46a1-27a5-4a72-9277-d6e1892bd7b4 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Rigging is a form of wireheading
I've now posted my major posts on rigging and influence, with what I feel are clear and illustrative examples. But, in all the excitement of writing out maths, I haven't made it clear to everyone why they should care about rigging a learning process in the first place.
And that reason... |
131396f5-0dc6-4c96-9d1a-112348b02940 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Be Happier
----------------------------------------
This started as an assignment to find out about the science of ‘buying happiness’ (using money to become happier) — hence the emphasis on money-and-happiness. I learned a great deal more than how to buy happiness, however, and the project became somewhat more genera... |
4b9e44cb-9879-488a-a41a-cf1da63afd90 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Does anyone else find ROT13 spoilers as annoying as I do?
Every time I come across one, it annoys me. I have to copy the text, open a new tab to the ROT13 site, paste the text, and click the translate button.
Compare this to something like a collapsable spoiler button-box where you press a button and it expands and e... |
fb47bfec-8325-4ad8-8216-2e874583d4fa | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong | LessWrong | AI Safety Arguments: An Interactive Guide
Crossposted to the [EA Forum](https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/zSLjLvAHmEXJWaAZi/ai-safety-arguments-an-interactive-guide).
**TL/DR:** We developed an interactive guide to AI safety arguments, based on researcher interviews. [Go check it out!](https://ai-risk-discus... |
f7c518af-af1b-4359-9f50-c27b48e46768 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | An Observation of Vavilov Day
Content note: this post contains discussion of starvation.
I aspire to be a person who does good things, and who is capable of doing hard things in service of that. This is a plan to test that capacity.
I haven’t been in a battle, but if you gave me the choice between dying in battle an... |
16574dca-88f1-454e-96be-c0d2b5ecfb2d | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | H5N1
The big development this week is a sudden rise in concern over bird flu, or H5N1.
I say rise in concern rather than rise in risk.
Risk from H5N1 has been around for a long time. We have known for a while that human-to-human transmission, while it is not happening right now, could evolve at any time from not tha... |
dd5a1139-40e3-434c-a0ee-b697b10fc1a5 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [Conversation Log] Compartmentalization
(7:40:37 PM) handoflixue: Had an odd thought recently, and am trying to see if I understand the idea of compartmentalization.
(7:41:08 PM) handoflixue: I've always acted in a way, whereupon if I'm playing WOW, I roleplay an elf. If I'm at church, I roleplay a unitarian. If I'm o... |
15586704-c1f0-448a-b69c-86790126fd2d | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs | Blogs | Nik Weaver on Paradoxes of Rational Agency
[Nik Weaver](http://www.math.wustl.edu/~nweaver/) is a professor of mathematics at Washington University in St. Louis. He did his graduate work at Harvard and Berkeley and received his ... |
b506933d-2d9b-4f7f-a1b2-922d99fb3fd7 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Covid Christmas
Every year, my extended family gets together for Christmas. Several days of lots of people in the same place, eating, playing games, making music, and generally spending time together. We skipped last year, because of covid, and are thinking about what makes sense to do this year.
If rates had stayed ... |
eee64b49-09de-486f-aabb-a7ec6a03747d | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Certainty estimates in areas outside one's expertise
One issue that I've noticed in discussions on Less Wrong is that I'm much less certain about the likely answers to specific questions than some other people on Less Wrong. But the questions where this seems to be most pronounced are mathematical questions that are c... |
b862f755-fc36-45ea-9b94-fcc04143b8af | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv | Arxiv | A Decision Model for Decentralized Autonomous Organization Platform Selection: Three Industry Case Studies
1 Introduction
---------------
First Bitcoin in 2008 [nakamoto2008peer](#bib.bib47) , and later Ethereum in 2014 [wood2014ethereum](#bib.bib60) , held a powerful promise: decentralized governance, without thir... |
554cc8ed-ee37-4150-989b-ae86ba274659 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Mechanistic Interpretability Workshop Happening at ICML 2024!
Announcing the first academic Mechanistic Interpretability workshop, held at ICML 2024! I think this is an exciting development that's a lagging indicator of mech interp gaining legitimacy as an academic field, and a good chance for field building and shari... |
2d2bffc8-a59a-4db7-b8dd-13da6bae5076 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Do fetching models stave off shallowness?
Prevalent advertising portraying an inaccurate proportion of humanity as too attractive is blamed for misinforming people on the value of attractiveness.
Unattractive females, both self rated and judged externally, find features of male physical attractiveness, such as facial... |
f04909cc-4368-4829-9aa3-1e130a3f296e | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | instruction tuning and autoregressive distribution shift
[Note: this began life as a "Quick Takes" comment, but it got pretty long, so I figured I might as well convert it to a regular post.]
In LM training, every token provides new information about "the world beyond the LM" that can be used/"learned" in-context to ... |
e931760f-736b-44aa-8b25-01dbac8cf306 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Identity map
“Identity” here refers to the question “will my copy be me, and if yes, on which conditions?” It results in several paradoxes which I will not repeat here, hoping that they are known to the reader.
Identity is one of the most complex problems, like safe AI or aging. It only appears be simple. It is compl... |
24dcb7c8-c5c2-467b-b47b-018d3f85c44f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Training the YouTube Algorithm
Listening to music and watching dance lessons on YouTube makes me happy. Everything else on YouTube makes me unhappy. It doesn't matter what the video is, watching YouTube makes me unhappy.
If all of YouTube made me unhappy then I should just not use YouTube. But I like listening to mus... |
1ad14506-fd0b-41c3-b0b8-dda2820263c3 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Problem of Induction: What if Instants Were Independent
> What if each instant were independent from the last?
At first sight, this situation, which from now on I will call BLEAK, might seem hopelessly bleak in an epistemological sense. For example: in the real world, a stock quote is probably going to be just a litt... |
650a3cbf-c63c-4e57-844d-0b0cc875da02 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Native Russian speakers wanted (for proofreading LW texts, again)
This is a repeat from May, 20 post. If you are a native Russian speaker, could volunteer an hour or two to read the sequence and share your opinion on it, and haven't contacted me before (here, by email or on lesswrong.ru)
As part of an effort to fami... |
1fc8f37e-f22d-4b3b-95c5-c137f043cb6e | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Murphy’s Quest Ch 6: Perverse Incentives
How did I end up in this position?
Let’s review the facts.
First.
From Class Choice to ROT13, from Harry Potter villains to this chastity cult, from XP sharing to judgy old men, this world is out to get me.
Second.
I have despaired of living the Good Life and decided to ta... |
56094a72-36f1-4369-b655-2639e1926544 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Top 9+2 myths about AI risk
Following some somewhat misleading articles quoting me, I thought I’d present the top 9 myths about the AI risk thesis:
1. That we’re certain AI will doom us. Certainly not. It’s very hard to be certain of anything involving a technology that doesn’t exist; we’re just claiming that the pr... |
c6919ee1-72d6-4c9e-8d3d-0c09322af037 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | How can I most effectively improve my writing abilities?
To create influential writing it's not only necessary to have good ideas but also to be good at writing them up. What's the best way to improve writing skills? |
bd0a5432-d195-4868-a5aa-80a6cabd95aa | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/eaforum | Effective Altruism Forum | Delegated agents in practice: How companies might end up selling AI services that act on behalf of consumers and coalitions, and what this implies for safety research
*Epistemic status: speculative. I’m no expert in delegation nor in CAIS. I think I have good intuitions on entrepreneurship and user design. I started... |
3a286b30-3013-4a4a-88f7-d6e12d61e686 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [SEQ RERUN] The Pascal's Wager Fallacy Fallacy
Today's post, The Pascal's Wager Fallacy Fallacy was originally published on 18 March 2009. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
> People hear about a gamble involving a big payoff, and dismiss it as a form of Pascal's Wager. But the size of the payoff is not the flaw ... |
5186800f-18c9-4ed6-84bd-f1830c71f08c | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | The tails coming apart as a strategy for success
[Epistemic status: A proposed causal mechanism for something I’ve been using for a while which seems to work empirically (n=1!)]
So, the tails come apart. I really like the elegance of this theory and how it seems to touch every part of life. It seems highly applicable... |
3151d449-027b-4707-93cf-585aee86cd3f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Yamaha P-Series Overview
Yamaha has made many p-series ("portable") keyboards over the years, and it's pretty confusing. I play a p-85 at home, which I'm unreasonably fond of, but when I travel I'm often playing other people's keyboards. When someone says they have a p-NNN available what does that mean?
Within the p-... |
b6e494e1-f8ce-4d6e-a44b-bef12620e004 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [SEQ RERUN] Say Not "Complexity"
Today's post, Say Not "Complexity" was originally published on 29 August 2007. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
> The concept of complexity isn't meaningless, but too often people assume that adding complexity to a system they don't understand will improve it. If you don't know ... |
72d15474-a1d3-4f6a-89c5-396cee866fe3 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/eaforum | Effective Altruism Forum | On AI Weapons
In this post I comprehensively review the risks and upsides of lethal autonomous weapons (LAWs). I incorporate and expand upon the ideas in [this previous post](https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/rFSy5ir5wxFhHNTHe/nothing-wrong-with-ai-weapons) of mine and the comments, plus other recent debates a... |
bc8f6872-6aa5-42a2-a108-e80925fd14bf | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | How to Compliment
As part of a social skills sequence I'm writing, I did a deep dive on how compliments, covering areas like — what topics are most often complimented — in what situations are they most often exchanged — how are they amplified or diminished — what are the purposes behind complimenting behavior
The res... |
0efe43e5-6861-49b9-8d25-9a9e83c229ad | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | HPMOR Anniversary Guide
[1]
Intro
To everyone running an anniversary party, thank you. Someone had to overcome the bystander effect, and today it seems like that’s you. I’m glad you did, and I expect your guests will be too. This guide aims to give you some advice and inspiration as well as coordinate.
The Basic... |
52798423-c83f-4cb3-8720-84caed1805c9 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv | Arxiv | The Ethics of AI Ethics -- An Evaluation of Guidelines
1
The Ethics of AI Ethics
An Evaluation of Guidelines
Dr. Thilo Hagendorff
University of Tuebingen
International Center for Ethics in the Sciences and Humanities
thilo.hagendorff@uni -tuebingen.de
Abstract - Current advances in resear... |
9f6c2c7a-e9b1-4f58-817e-2633a6ad13e2 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong | LessWrong | Agentized LLMs will change the alignment landscape
Epistemic status: head spinning, suddenly unsure of everything in alignment. And unsure of these predictions.
I'm following the suggestions in [10 reasons why lists of 10 reasons might be a winning strategy](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/8gbfvGhSnEJ9hHGew/10-reason... |
4c9f82ca-159f-4cc0-9928-e9eff5f8ad9b | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Could humanity accomplish everything which nature has? Why might this not be the case?
Examples include atomically precise manufacturing and creating intelligence. |
f1da2f4e-beea-47b1-85a4-702ef521b3f2 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Book Review: Why Are The Prices So Damn High?
Economist Alex Tabarrok has recently come out with a short book, “Why are the prices so Damn High”, available in full PDF here.
Since the 1950’s, the inflation-adjusted cost of physical goods has fallen since the 1950’s, and the cost of food has stayed about the same. Bu... |
b824f60a-cc97-4b5d-a949-3d7cf1000cde | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Maximise Expected Utility, not Expected Perception of Utility
Suppose we are building an agent, and we have a particular utility function U over states of the universe that we want the agent to optimize for. So we program into this agent a function CalculateUtility that computes the value of U given its current knowle... |
b3eb16e6-f2a1-4d15-b3cb-70b8aeeb06d1 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [LINK] Fraud Case Seen as a Red Flag for Psychology Research
An article in the NYT's about everyone's favourite messy science, you know the one we sometimes rely on to provide a throwaway line as we pontificate wisely about biases? ;)
> A well-known psychologist in the Netherlands whose work has been published widely... |
6e684cfd-2a1d-4cf2-8be3-7c71230f7ddd | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong | LessWrong | Choice := Anthropics uncertainty? And potential implications for agency
Epistemic status: half-baked thought
When an embedded agent - let's say [Emmy](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/p7x32SEt43ZMC9r7r/embedded-agents) - is faced with a choice from a set of actions (Ai)i∈1..n.mjx-chtml {display: inline-block; line-he... |
5ca16873-25d2-4bbe-baee-8dc3cdcb5f50 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | AI #88: Thanks for the Memos
Following up on the Biden Executive Order on AI, the White House has now issued an extensive memo outlining its AI strategy. The main focus is on government adaptation and encouraging innovation and competitiveness, but there’s also sections on safety and international governance. Who know... |
1275f960-e901-43f8-be29-f7d0048f18da | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arbital | Arbital | Fallacies
A "fallacy" is a mode of thought that is asserted (by calling it a "fallacy") to lead us easily into error, or to not usefully contribute to the project of distinguishing truth from falsehood. For example, Argumentum Ad Hitlerum is a 'fallacy' because while Hitler did a number of bad things, he also ate veg... |
4b1f9185-ced4-4817-8ea1-7430a4a162af | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Where in the world is the SIAI house?
I am under the impression that there used to be a place called the SIAI house in Santa Clara, which housed the SIAI Visiting Fellows Program. However, this post suggests that it has moved\is moving to an unspecified location in Berkeley. My efforts to find additional information w... |
8587055c-ee72-4afe-8666-d8805795f01f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | An Opinionated Guide to P-Values
This is a crosspost of a post from my blog, Metal Ivy. The original is here: An Opinionated Guide to Statistical Significance.
I think for the general audience the value of this post is the first half, which tries to give a practical intuition for p-values.
But for LessWrong the valu... |
8165e14e-48da-4fa4-9050-d58a603cd6e8 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | GWWC's Handling of Conflicting Funding Bars
When recommending charities, Giving What We Can (GWWC) mirrors the recommendations of their trusted evaluators. For example, they list the Against Malaria Foundation because GiveWell considers it a top charity and the Humane League because Animal Charity Evaluators does. Thi... |
6abc7bce-e2d1-4eae-87a6-b5d6362f86ef | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [post redacted]
[Post redacted 'cuz I unfairly and carelessly misrepresented someone's views (Eliezer's). The messages of this post was: disbelief that aliens visit Earth in spaceships is a bad reason not to look into ufology. My apologies for this ugly post.] |
46880fc0-ebb6-47cf-b418-8f553fe6f4a5 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv | Arxiv | Improving Model Understanding and Trust with Counterfactual Explanations of Model Confidence
1 Introduction
---------------
Explaining why the AI model gives a certain prediction can promote trust and understanding for users, especially for non-expert users. While recent research [[36](#bib.bib26 "Effect of confide... |
8b20256a-e477-4a82-ab27-d5001c811391 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Meetup : First Meetup in Jacksonville, FL
Discussion article for the meetup : First Meetup in Jacksonville, FL
WHEN: 24 November 2013 04:00:00PM (-0500)
WHERE: 869 Stockton St, Jacksonville, FL 32204 (Bold Bean Coffee Roasters)
Jacksonville's a pretty big town, but not much represented in LessWrong land. I'm lookin... |
5174f2a2-d341-49f0-a658-65ede9615c22 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Update: Predicted AI alignment event/meeting calendar
If you found the Predicted AI alignment event/meeting calendar useful, check it out again. Much new event information came out over the last month. |
fe7f385a-de44-4607-bf07-73d8617e81d9 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs | Blogs | Josef Urban on Machine Learning and Automated Reasoning
 [Josef Urban](http://cs.ru.nl/~urban/) is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Computing and Information Sciences of the Radboud University in Nijmegen, the Neth... |
d7a26573-8503-433f-83f4-0e2e5c6dcdf2 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Building Communities Beyond the Bay
During DunCon 2025, I run a community building strategy workshop with @Screwtape. Going through the workshop gave me great insights into what I actually wanted out of my community and how to get there, so I figured sharing the session plan could be useful. If you end up following th... |
f9e4df09-b4da-4a38-907e-86d24c272539 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Can we rescue Effective Altruism?
Last year Timothy Telleen-Lawton and I recorded a podcast episode talking about why I quit Effective Altruism and thought he should too. This week we have a new episode, talking about what he sees in Effective Altruism and the start of a road map for rescuing it.
Audio recording
Tr... |
2373e90d-e843-46fd-90e2-d61f4140d9a7 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Omicron Post #12
It involved a backlog, but the USA reported over 1 million cases yesterday. That’s a lot of cases, and we’re missing a ton more of them. Schools, hospitals and all businesses face massive disruptions from people unable to work, even with the new CDC isolation guidelines.
So far, we’re holding up well... |
9801a44b-33e6-47fd-9d41-47ab6eb0149f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | What are brains?
I see a self-reference problem with reductionism. I wonder if this has already been solved. So I'm asking.
Best as I can tell, there aren't actually things in reality. That's a human interpretation. It collapses upon almost any inspection, like the Ship of Theseus or the paradox of the heap. We also ... |
5cfa6670-5b92-4aee-8213-302c2a553ae6 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Video essay: How Will We Know When AI is Conscious?
I recently came across this engaging video essay by exurb1a and felt it would be of interest to this community. Contrary to its title, it avoids the common pitfall of asserting that only conscious AI can be dangerous, and it effectively addresses several of the main... |
187a0a81-e401-4aa2-8498-ed3d9332dc0b | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv | Arxiv | LESS is More: Rethinking Probabilistic Models of Human Behavior.
1. Introduction
----------------
![(Top) Contrary to Boltzmann, when adding more options to the right, LESS (right) does not drastically reduce the probability of selecting the left option. (Bottom) We test LESS on learning from user demonstrations for... |
c4044ba6-824d-45ed-a868-f9044538bd21 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Weighting Attachment in Relationship Decisions
Background
tl;dr - skip to Weighting Attachment
My Dating Models
When I first set up an online dating profile, I remember noting that the experience of browsing matches felt a lot like shopping on Amazon. You compare the specs of the different products and try to figure... |
a1a32070-94c6-46ab-b6dc-dd79e8814897 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Cryonics and the importance of body to cognition
Many approaches to cryonics assume that a detailed map of the neural patterns in a brain (via brain scanning technology) may be sufficient, using future technology, to bring that person "back to life." But cognition is greatly shaped by more than just the neural pattern... |
68d17b97-9ba6-4151-978a-aa60c3563fa4 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | So You Want To Colonize The Universe Part 3: Dust
(1, 2, 4, 5)
Part 3a: Dust and Explosions
To a first approximation, there's exactly one thing that sets the speed limit on going fast in space.
Dust.
----------------------------------------
In the future, dust will be a Very Big Deal, as it's the dominant constra... |
cf214fc1-b8f2-4aa4-9b5b-f3e5e551d031 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Violating the EMH - Prediction Markets
I am quite confident of the information in my post on the Efficient Market Hypothesis. I am happy to bet on the perp-future trade I described there since it is very safe. I will even give people betting against me a big advantage (1). However today I want to share some thoughts o... |
8ad2b1b0-4912-4e31-aa7d-395997174713 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Meetup : Melbourne June Rationality Dojo: Memory
Discussion article for the meetup : Melbourne June Rationality Dojo: Memory
WHEN: 01 June 2014 03:00:00PM (+1000)
WHERE: 491 King Street, West Melbourne, VIC
The Less Wrong Sunday Rationality Dojos are crafted to be serious self-improvement sessions for those committ... |
45c53e21-f6ea-4d18-8d77-0d4d4b0c758f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | How much was creating Google worth?
I would greatly appreciate feedback on whether the assumptions in this post, as well as the conceptual framework, are reasonable. I recognize that I don't address positive externalities explicitly. I think that they may be picked up implicitly, but am unsure about this.
Sergey Br... |
d2faab57-0f2c-49f7-9b5e-66adc6cfb85d | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Meetup : [Moscow] Weekday meet up
Discussion article for the meetup : [Moscow] Weekday meet up
WHEN: 11 July 2013 07:00:00PM (+0400)
WHERE: Russia, Moscow, naberezhnaya Luzhnetskaya 2/4 строение 17
This is another meet up on weekdays. If you are going for the first time, please fill this one minute form (in Russian... |
c71501d3-6258-44dc-adb6-18aa899df197 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | What's the most "stuck" you've been with an argument, that eventually got resolved?
I was trying to write up a post about getting stuck in arguments, where you thought something was obvious, and said something like "A, therefore, B." And your partner says "but, X, therefore Y!"
And from you perspective, A is obviousl... |
7226ed02-c9b6-4fbc-83f7-9e6e8bb162f2 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Why would panic during this coronavirus pandemic be a bad thing?
It seems like it's mostly being taken as a given that we want to avoid panic. I'm sure avoiding panic is in fact desirable, but I don't quite understand why that's the case, so please interpret this post and my follow up comments as Socratic grilling.
I... |
dcef22c7-bf66-4572-b869-11dcbaa02740 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | How to Teach Your Brain to Hate Procrastination
> The Human Brain is hard-wired to survive. So much so, that in fact, it does more harm than good.
The Human Brain is inherently lazy. This laziness allowed them to survive some hundreds of thousands of years. It was this primal laziness that made ancient humans real... |
20a3f97b-11bb-4bd8-8f35-93e89a20341e | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Where do you find people who actually do things?
Lesswrongers are typically bad at actually doing things. Given how we're pulled towards the average of the people we spend the most time with, what are good ways/places to find people who actually do things?
Edit: By "actually do things" I mean agentic, don't theorize ... |
b4a19a58-6db3-4d8e-98bd-bd896fbd3c18 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Have you felt exiert yet?
Pre-adolescent children haven't felt strong lust yet. Those of us who've avoided strong pain are also missing an experience of that affect. Nostalgia can come up very early, but does require a bit of living first. Depression can strike at any age.
So, in general, there are emotions and feeli... |
05e949e2-747c-4200-8d83-3e2ee3ca40ad | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [SEQ RERUN] (Moral) Truth in Fiction?
Today's post, (Moral) Truth in Fiction? was originally published on 09 February 2009. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
> It is possible to convey moral ideas in a clearer way through fiction than through abstract argument. Stories may also help us get closer to thinking abo... |
1a28f5ee-b68a-4413-ba54-b06ac0be9dcf | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Is the ethics of interaction with primitive peoples already solved?
The interactions between a misaligned AI and mankind have often been compared to the interactions of Spanish conquerors and Native Americans or of European colonizers and local peoples. Fortunately, most civilised peoples have apparently stopped the d... |
24e1a389-4137-4cb5-836a-8071fed780e9 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv | Arxiv | A Logic of Agent Organizations
1 Introduction
---------------
The growing complexity of (information) systems, characterized by distribution,
heterogeneity, openness and dynamicity has lead to an increasing interest in
organizational concepts by MAS researchers. As in human organizations, the
specification of an ex... |
0ded0b19-fb97-4468-9fd8-bc73978b97d0 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | The Bellman equation does not apply to bounded rationality
Quick quiz: which of the following is the definition of a rational agent?
1. An agent who follows the policy with the highest expected utility
2. An agent who follows the policy of choosing the action with the highest expected utility
Are those even differ... |
fa5e4100-5e08-4dfa-84b1-7f71379d5025 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Averting suffering with sentience throttlers (proposal)
Status: Originally written as the round two interview task for Center on Long-Term Risk's Summer Research Fellowship, but before it was finished I trashed it in favor of something under the Cooperative AI agenda. At this point it's a free idea, do whatever you w... |
9f898168-8210-4613-9096-a3155d846310 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Prototype of Using GPT-3 to Generate Textbook-length Content
The code is all open source (see the Github). As an example for how this performs, here is The Art of Better Thinking: Overcoming Cognitive Biases and Unlocking Rationality. To read the full book (and have slightly improved formatting), you can view it direc... |
2f27825a-8cd7-40ad-9cab-beee74109363 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong | LessWrong | Three reasons to cooperate
In this post I’ll discuss three reasons to cooperate in a [truly one-shot](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/HFyWNBnDNEDsDNLrZ/the-true-prisoner-s-dilemma#) prisoner’s dilemma:
* **Kindness**: You care about the other player.
* **Correlation**. Your decision is correlated with the other play... |
ab792d82-b21a-4865-88a8-8c5a9459012b | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Pretending not to Notice
Sometimes parents will pretend not to notice kids doing things they shouldn't: why might you do this and when is it a good idea?
My experience has been that things go much better when parents set clear boundaries. If it's sometimes ok to pick the flowers and other times you get told to stop, ... |
86534ea0-324f-4fa1-9bce-380b6cfae728 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Does the AGPL Work?
It might be important to you that users of software you write are able to modify it, in which case you might release it with a copyleft license like the GPL. For example, imagine someone's making a device that will run Linux. They need to tweak Linux so it will work on this particular device, and t... |
a6a8a61b-55bc-4b3e-9582-8ce739755a92 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | The omnizoid - Heighn FDT Debate #5
A reaction to omnizoid's latest post in this debate.
omnizoid proposed a problem in an earlier post, which I steelmanned as follows:
> * there's an agent who can (almost) perfectly predict whether people will cut off their legs once they exist
> * this agent only creates people ... |
0af4a570-d3f0-410a-a21f-89be8bc5d732 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/eaforum | Effective Altruism Forum | [Link and commentary] Beyond Near- and Long-Term: Towards a Clearer Account of Research Priorities in AI Ethics and Society
Earlier this year, Carina Prunkl (FHI) and Jess Whittlestone (Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence) put out a paper called [Beyond Near- and Long-Term: Towards a Clearer Account of Re... |
e5fb60b2-cdc6-481e-a62d-f0c4a819c0fd | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Less wrong economic policy
Yesterday I heard an interesting story on the radio about US President Obama's pick to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Cass Sunstein. I recommend checking out the story, but here are a few key excerpts.
> Cass Sunstein, President Obama's pick to head the Office of In... |
0c8af029-25e2-4d4f-9675-68425f9a1b66 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Noodling on a cloud : how to converse constructively
Noodling on a cloud
SUMMARY:
By teaching others, we also learn ourselves. How can we best use conversation as a tool to facilitate that?
Sensemaking
How do people make sense out of raw input?
Marvin Cohen suggests that it is usually a two-way process. Not on... |
6ad6638d-8820-4b03-84ed-e5b0b24f6d6c | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [SEQ RERUN] Traditional Capitalist Values
Today's post, Traditional Capitalist Values was originally published on 17 October 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
> Before you start talking about a system of values, try to actually understand the values of that system as believed by its practitioners.
Discus... |
4dd2c8f2-82ad-4631-8cee-fe005f4df04b | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Halloween costume: Paperclipperer
Original post: http://bearlamp.com.au/halloween-costume-paperclipperer/
Guidelines for becoming a paperclipperer for halloween.
Supplies
* Paperclips (some as a prop, make your life easier by buying some, but show effort by making your own)
* pliers (extra pairs for extra effect)... |
8324b0f8-3f1a-4c82-aaa4-f78d183b284a | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Call to the technical support of reality
- Hello, what is your question?
- Good afternoon, I have some interference in reality. It looks like it's broken.
- Ok, I understand. Let's check... (hums a popular tune for thirty seconds, tapping his fingers on the keyboard). Everything is checked, nothing unusual has happene... |
0aee3717-361a-4918-bb4d-689c83cc8901 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | The Russell Conjugation Illuminator
Bertrand Russell noted how people often describe the same factual behavior using emotionally opposite language depending on perspective — e.g. I am firm, you are obstinate, he is pigheaded. This framing tactic is now called a Russell Conjugation, and once you start noticing them, th... |
2eda17d9-b1ba-4608-ab1c-686130b348c5 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | [Link] Review of "Doing Good Better"
The article is here.
The book is by William MacAskill, founder of 80000 Hours and Giving What We Can. Excerpt:
> Effective altruism takes up the spirit of Singer’s argument but shields us from the full blast of its conclusion; moral indictment is transformed into an empowering in... |
8ae80c85-19bc-4782-a137-0a62422ceffd | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Meetup : Bangalore: August Meetup
Discussion article for the meetup : Bangalore: August Meetup
WHEN: 21 August 2011 04:00:00PM (+0530)
WHERE: Koshy's Parade Cafe, St Marks Rd, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
During our previous meetup we decided that the August meetup would be more structured and that the members atten... |
22e64f9c-f5f1-490c-a995-88f1dbbbd4c2 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Why are clinical trials so expensive?
While I know that clinical trials such as the trials for vaccines cost hundreds of millions of dollar, I have a hard time understanding why they are so expensive. I read about clinical trials for a vaccine costing 10,000/study participant. Given that the trials are so expensive th... |
5272e797-f9d0-436f-8775-bb69a55dec6e | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Understanding AI World Models w/ Chris Canal
On our latest episode of muckrAIkers we are joined by our first ever guest, Chris Canal!
You can find the show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever else you listen.
----------------------------------------
Chris is the co-founder of EquiStamp, a third-party e... |
f856b905-58a4-4d3d-b10b-faaca77bbff2 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Speaking Truth to Power Is a Schelling Point
Consider a coalition that wants to build accurate shared world-models (maps that reflect the territory), and then use those models to inform decisions that achieve the coalition's goals.
However, suppose that some ways of improving models are punished by the surrounding So... |
b224078b-5423-437d-ac1e-863f81ae1550 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Signaling importance
I posted it on my website as I wanted to use colors, and this isn't supported on LessWrong: https://matiroy.com/writings/Signaling-importance.html Comment here. |
33e45c5f-df89-4c67-8866-a9b2c769822b | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum | Alignment Forum | Value extrapolation partially resolves symbol grounding
Take the following AI, trained on videos of happy humans:
Since we know about [AI wireheading](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/vXzM5L6njDZSf4Ftk/defining-ai-wireheading), we k... |
3539e091-fdea-440a-b595-8744f38a7925 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | How promising are legal avenues to restrict AI training data?
Hello - I'm EA-adjacent and have a cursory understanding of AI alignment issues. Thought I'd toss out a naive question!
AI systems rely on huge amounts of training data. Many people seem reluctant to share their data with these systems. How promising are e... |
00dab35a-a525-4ee3-b6c8-e964b1617b10 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Book review: The Checklist Manifesto
Atul Gawande’s The Checklist Manifesto was originally published in 2009. By the time I read it a few years ago, the hard-earned lessons explained in this book had already trickled into hospitals across North America. It’s easy to look at the core concept and think of it as trivial.... |
10d4bd41-f4ac-4579-94e5-43b8e16fb835 | LDJnr/LessWrong-Amplify-Instruct | LessWrong | "My most complicated cookie recipe has four layers. Two of these require stovetop cooking, and the other two require the use of the oven separately before the nearly-complete cookies are baked in yet a third oven use, for a total of three different oven temperatures. I have to separate eggs. I have to remember to put b... |
0422bf81-a0e6-4c0d-b22e-d4ca3d336b95 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Consider a robot vacuum.
My wife and I recently acquired a robot vacuum. It has turned out to be a really great time-saving and life-improving investment. Some simple math suggests it may be worth you also considering buying one.
Let's say you spend 20 minutes a week vacuuming. That's about 17 hours of vacuuming per ... |
6c7c2023-b76e-4135-b4f5-ec52228d3635 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | What are all the AI Alignment and AI Safety Communication Hubs?
For effective work on complex topics, multiple people need to work together[citation needed].
For AI Alignment, LessWrong and its sister site, the Alignment Forum, are arguably the Shelling points. But there are other platforms that, for one reason or ot... |
d985f230-771a-4249-b14f-b9c0273fe3f1 | StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong | LessWrong | The Ground Truth Problem (Or, Why Evaluating Interpretability Methods Is Hard)
Work done @ [SERI-MATS](https://www.serimats.org/).
Evaluating interpretability methods (and so, developing good ones) is really hard because we have no ground truth. Or at least, no ground truth that we can compare our interpretations dir... |
cfbd2222-dc1f-4cb7-965b-e28eb1ce9545 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Ethics in Many Worlds
There seems to be a strong case for the Everett or 'many-worlds' interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics. The world as revealed by MWI is so grotesquely superfluous — so offensively alien — that it's natural to imagine similarly bizarre ethical implications. If MWI is true, I am constantly 'spl... |
088a5844-c615-4441-ae66-57a98012173e | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Weekly LW Meetups
This summary was posted to LW Main on September 11th. The following week's summary is here.
New meetups (or meetups with a hiatus of more than a year) are happening in:
* Rochester LessWrong and Transhumanists: 12 September 2015 01:00PM
Irregularly scheduled Less Wrong meetups are taking place in... |
6f170a86-853f-4f15-96f0-058c3e62efe0 | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | May 2021 Gwern.net newsletter
None |
96893ad5-3dbf-4e8a-b1f7-d0c74922fc4f | trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k | LessWrong | Information hazards: Why you should care and what you can do
This post was written for Convergence Analysis.
Overview
We argue that many people should consider the risk that they could cause harm by developing or sharing (true) information. We think that harm from such information hazards may sometimes be very subst... |
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