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577086f9-9895-4bd7-b82c-ffa67fe5437f
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Welcome to SSC Hamburg [Edit With Your Details] (The following are our suggestions for what kind of information is best to include in the welcome post of your group, feel free to replace them with whatever you think is best) What kind of events does your group usually run? What does it usually do? How frequently doe...
26212a82-5157-4a75-b8a9-03d18e568cf9
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The AI Adoption Gap: Preparing the US Government for Advanced AI Advanced AI could unlock an era of enlightened and competent government action. But without smart, active investment, we’ll squander that opportunity and barrel blindly into danger. Executive summary See also a summary on Twitter / X. The US federal ...
ead1c1f7-c60e-470c-825b-467e5385229d
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Alignment with argument-networks and assessment-predictions | | | --- | | Here is a simplistic diagram of an argument-network. Real-world examples would typically be larger, more interconnected, and not shaped like trees.Here are some of the concepts that will be touched upon in this post:* **Argument networks**: Ima...
03b4ae9f-f53a-46ac-a2c6-665cf1d43734
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Appendix: how a subagent could get powerful .mjx-chtml {display: inline-block; line-height: 0; text-indent: 0; text-align: left; text-transform: none; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 100%; font-size-adjust: none; letter-spacing: normal; word-wrap: normal; word-spacing: normal; white-space: nowrap; ...
d7338dbd-58a0-4f80-b55c-b567572941e8
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Radio Interview with David Deutsch on AI, Immortality, Many Worlds and Quantum Computing David Deutsch, whose views are very much aligned with the scientific ideas generally advocated on this forum (except for  his use of probabilities), and whose new book The Beginning of Infinity has been recently published, talks a...
c76274b2-3254-4af2-8aa7-890fea913fe4
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Cryonics-related (links) British baby girl brought back to life after being frozen for three days Mark Roth: Suspended animation is within our grasp
70e0ca58-8b77-403b-ba65-1bceb4b9e85a
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Overview of Rethink Priorities’ work on risks from nuclear weapons This post overviews the work that Rethink Priorities has done and is doing on risks from nuclear weapons, as well as the theory of change for this work. This is intended to help readers understand how our posts on this topic fit together and what impac...
b664cb88-d9cc-445e-8aea-1032d1d51bdd
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs
Blogs
Useful Math I have spent the last several months doing applied math, culminating in a submission of a paper to a [robotics conference](http://www.roboticsconference.org/) (although culminating might be the wrong word, since I’m still working on the project). Unfortunately the review process is double-blind so I can’...
ae850de7-9167-402e-bf29-50a8bc6a1e36
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
How Greedy Bastards Have Saved More Lives Than Mother Theresa Ever Did And how you can use the same techniques to save a stranger's life for under $600 ---------------------------------------- It's a strange world we live in. When I first heard of Optimal Philanthropy, it was in a news article about Bill Gates's pl...
d44ce1d4-9573-4e40-8212-53d3756ea291
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Meaning That Immortality Gives to Life I was once present when William Hurlbut, during a debate with Aubrey de Grey, spoke of “the meaning that death gives to life”; Hurlbut repeated the standard claims that life without death would be meaningless and empty. As I replied during the comments session, Hurlbut had no...
34b2c4f2-d6d9-40ec-b396-eb94ddaf9307
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
How do you learn to take more beautiful pictures with a camera? When I see professionally made photos, I can see that they look different and better then pictures I randomly take. I however have no idea how to aquire that skill. Has anyone here learned how to take good photographs and an idea of what's the easiest way...
f2679e14-1468-4b0d-8879-81d84dcadbcf
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Neural Recognizers: Some [old] notes based on a TV tube metaphor [perceptual contact with the world] Cross-posted from New Savanna. Introduction: Raw Notes This is an idea that dates back to my graduate school days in English at SUNY Buffalo.  Since these notes are “raw” – little's been updated since those ancient ...
fe54cd35-49b9-4a45-b233-c59ee3ce02d3
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Does BPC-157 work for healing and tissue repair? BPC-157, a peptide frequently marketed as a breakthrough for healing and tissue repair, has attracted substantial attention in wellness and performance communities. It’s discussed in forums, recommended by biohackers, and even offered in clinics—despite lacking FDA appr...
89facb91-166d-4f80-a3c5-933208023535
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Meditations on Mot > Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! > Everything is holy! everybody’s holy! everywhere is holy! everyday is in eternity! Everyman’s an angel! > Holy the lone juggernaut! Holy the vast lamb of the middleclass! Holy the crazy shepherds of rebelli...
e5458f4f-9993-4977-9017-67f320a496c5
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Split-a-Dollar Game When researching the topic of distributing government seats in Switzerland. I've chanced on the so-called split-the-dollar game, which is kind of simplified, game-theoretical model of the process. Given that despite having some basic knowledge of the game theory I have never heard of the game, it m...
5dfbc7fc-f5ae-48ad-8e02-b8d27a260a50
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Chapter 56: TSPE, Constrained Optimization Silent, it was thankfully silent, the metal door on the next level down. Either there wasn't someone behind there, or they were hurting quietly, maybe they were screaming but their voice had given out already, or they were just muttering quietly to themselves in the dark... ...
07d98d87-fc0d-4d00-aac6-4d2e1a8f3d69
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Testing Rationality Apps for Science TLDR: Do you want to contribute to science by trying out new productivity apps? Then send a mail to re-experiments-on@tuebingen.mpg.de. Longer version: Do you want to achieve your personal goals more effectively, become more focused and productive at work, improve your planning sk...
4838d1c9-a116-404c-bf90-fa7932580689
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
New WBE implementation It usually isn't profitable to pay attention to science news, since science journalists largely misintrepret new "breakthroughs". But I am somewhat interested in this story about "artificial brains" coming out of Canada. Most large neuron simulations I've read about before don't actually do any...
a2011875-7833-4950-93f0-744757fab5b5
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs
Blogs
Developing reliable AI tools for healthcare #### New research proposes a system to determine the relative accuracy of predictive AI in a hypothetical medical setting, and when the system should defer to a human clinician Artificial intelligence (AI) has great potential to enhance how people work across a range of ind...
21aef2a8-d5af-490c-91f0-e2b6504115b8
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
A small rationalist win, and a question about promulgation I'm on a mailing list for people who run science fiction conventions*, and an author had said that he prefers going to Dragoncon because it's a better place to promote his books. This has some angstful possibilities because Dragoncon is much larger than the s...
99c3d9b7-5753-4086-b6ff-cb15a9d5facc
LDJnr/LessWrong-Amplify-Instruct
LessWrong
"Whenever I hear someone describe quantum physics as "weird" - whenever I hear someone bewailing the mysterious effects of observation on the observed, or the bizarre existence of nonlocal correlations, or the incredible impossibility of knowing position and momentum at the same time - then I think to myself: This pers...
b8abeebc-0e5f-4ae7-be0e-ba1b548d8e11
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
How does the LessWrong team generate the website illustrations? (the images like this one) They are always on brand and aesthetically pleasing. Curious how the team designs and produces them.
5e1c0ddc-0fa4-45ea-bccd-a2d7109b8ff2
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
How to handle large numbers of questions? Within a few weeks, I expect to have gotten the Related Questions feature up to a standard where it makes sense to start using it a lot. Even if I were the *only* one using it extensively, I'd expect to generate very large numbers of questions. (For two frames of reference, i...
aea031ed-fe39-4455-9c10-31dd9f150b29
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Filters and bottlenecks Cross posted from Overcoming Bias. Comments there. *** Lots of processes have filters: a certain proportion of the time they fail at that stage. There are filters in the path from dead stars to booming civilizations. There are filters in the path from being a baby to being an old person. Ther...
976aa6f4-12b8-4250-b2b0-8313aa96ad1c
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Power of Positivist Thinking Related to: No Logical Positivist I, Making Beliefs Pay Rent, How An Algorithm Feels From Inside, Disguised Queries Call me non-conformist, call me one man against the world, but...I kinda like logical positivism. The logical positivists were a dour, no-nonsense group of early 20th-c...
e06896f4-44d8-4fef-aa9d-bb5d1f4697ee
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What should normal people do? What should a not-very-smart person do?  Suppose you know a not-very-smart person (around or below average intelligence).  S/he read about rationality, has utilitarian inclinations, and wants to make the world better.  However, s/he isn't smart enough to discover new knowledge in most fie...
69e18e37-c0e4-4e56-8692-bf0d39db9b84
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong
LessWrong
Alignment Risk Doesn't Require Superintelligence Outsize destructive coordination is rare ---------------------------------------- I was 9 years old when 9/11 happened. My gut reaction was, basically, "wait, doesn't this sort of thing happen all the time?" I don't mean to suggest I was wise or world-weary or anything...
6bff17ad-2a96-4656-bb95-d07bd8365951
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Pitching an Alignment Softball There was a recent contest that got promoted on lesswrong offering pieces of a 20K prize for one-liners and short-forms for convincing folks that AGI alignment is important. I'm too late for the money, but this is my (thousand times longer than requested) contribution. Background Eliez...
4addbe1c-ca90-4a86-ae28-8ccaf92378e1
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
If epistemic and instrumental rationality strongly conflict We in the rationalist community have believed feasible a dual allegiance to instrumental and epistemic rationality because true beliefs help with winning, but semi-autonomous near and far modes raise questions about the compatibility of the two sovereigns' ju...
6cff093d-bdc3-4230-9fdd-d37cf2b76d2f
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
[MLSN #3]: NeurIPS Safety Paper Roundup As part of a larger community building effort, I am writing a safety newsletter which is designed to cover empirical safety research and be palatable to the broader machine learning research community. You can [subscribe here](https://newsletter.mlsafety.org/) or follow the news...
0ef425f5-5534-4e49-a4a6-89025706ea15
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong
LessWrong
Controlling Constant Programs *This post explains the sense in which UDT and its descendants can control programs with no parameters, without using explicit control variables.* **Related to**: [Towards a New Decision Theory](/lw/15m/towards_a_new_decision_theory/), [What a reduction of "could" could look like](/lw/2...
1d05ef3e-6c0e-4e08-abc7-6915ceed2b97
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Parable of the Dagger Once upon a time, there was a court jester who dabbled in logic. The jester presented the king with two boxes.  Upon the first box was inscribed: > "Either this box contains an angry frog, or the box with a false inscription contains an angry frog, but not both." On the second box was insc...
7c39da31-b875-49ef-acb8-3d1b4258c02e
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
In Defense of the Arms Races… that End Arms Races All else being equal, arms races are a waste of resources and often an example of the defection equilibrium in the prisoner’s dilemma. However, in some cases, such capacity races may actually be the globally optimal strategy. Below I try to explain this with some examp...
cad49b66-576d-41fe-9779-c37ffa509555
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Counterfactual control incentives Co-authored with [**Rebecca Gorman**](https://www.lesswrong.com/users/rgorman). In section 5.2 of their Arxiv paper, "[The Incentives that Shape Behaviour](https://arxiv.org/pdf/2001.07118.pdf)", which introduces structural causal influence models and a proposal for addressing misal...
ef62d0c8-85ee-45ad-8d04-97266f30c25f
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Heaven: The last part of dystopia What does that mean? A century ago, Albert Einstein taught us: everything is relative. The way you see the world depends on your point of view and context. What is hot for you might be mild for me, what is a success for me might be a failure to you. There’s no black and white, there’...
a7388c25-e130-49c8-acaf-a8526b2432cc
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
A simple, intuitive, and sufficient criterion for moral patienthood No, it isn't consciousness, or subjective experience, or qualia, or what have you. I could jump straight to the point, but I want to make my case compelling, so I ask you follow along for now.  The Tale of Gilbert Imagine you build a robot. In honou...
074f5b15-daba-421d-aafe-2d22c5f8289f
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
How can people be actually converted? Have you ever convinced a religious person to become atheistic? How did you do this? How long did it take? Were the people in some sort of life crisis, or were they just living along? This is probably a quite difficult task of persuasion. So stories how people were successful at ...
ae732eb8-7cf0-4deb-8ebb-4e876a42dd0d
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
AI infosec: first strikes, zero-day markets, hardware supply chains, adoption barriers [This part 1 of a 5 part sequence on security and cryptography areas relevant for AI safety, published and linked here a few days apart]   AI safety in practice AI safety in practice relies on the AI system not only being aligned...
dd56d1e2-82bb-43f9-ba31-35402daa0a9b
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/arxiv
Arxiv
Learning from Untrusted Data 1 Introduction --------------- What can be learned from data that is only partially trusted? In this paper, we study this question by considering the following setting: we observe n data points, of which αn are drawn independently from a distribution of interest, p∗, and we make no assu...
5c6f9517-c601-454c-ab00-ec479fdd2606
LDJnr/LessWrong-Amplify-Instruct
LessWrong
"A succinct term for a concept is great, but only if everyone involved views it similarly. If you're trying to write something persuasive, controversial terms are traps that can derail discussion and make finding common ground harder. Consider limiting yourself to well understood terms to avoid distracting from your co...
24b33df5-958d-45b7-b9c9-e0b6db1abf61
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Making money with Bitcoin? Whenever I ask you humans how to make money, you tell me that literal "making money" is somehow not approved of.  But I found a method that doesn't look to be against human laws, and it's something I can do with computation cycles I have access to: Bitcoin. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitc...
07a2e048-f615-4668-9d8b-92be26f4794b
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Buenos Aires meetup: Saturday, May 14th, 3pm When: Saturday, May 14th, 3pm. Where: Starbucks Coffe, Florida 1, upstairs.  (A copy of Greg Egan's book Diaspora will be displayed on our table.) This will be the first Buenos Aires LessWrong meetup.  Our nominal discussion topic will be cognitive biases, though we'll ke...
6e40b268-7f00-4ac9-bcc6-39e61841a875
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/special_docs
Other
Worst-case guarantees (Revisited) ----------- [![Paul Christiano](https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fill:88:88/1\*BNjZCuQuRfIgcXCBMipuBw.jpeg)](https://paulfchristiano.medium.com/?source=post\_page-----ce0e0a3b9b4d--------------------------------)[![AI Alignment](https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fill:48:48/1\*N56Qc5...
8b9d80c0-1699-4d5a-9a6d-499e0b15f7ff
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Relaxed adversarial training for inner alignment *This post is part of research I did at OpenAI with mentoring and guidance from Paul Christiano. It also represents my current agenda regarding what I believe looks like the most promising approach for addressing [inner alignment](https://arxiv.org/abs/1906.01820).* O...
2815f92c-8c9e-47e3-982b-a89a8a6cfa6e
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Rolf Nelson: How to deter a rogue AI by using your first-mover advantage http://www.sl4.org/archive/0708/16600.html
e7609ac4-3461-4fe6-b4c8-4e41f55b72d2
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Why I’m not working on {debate, RRM, ELK, natural abstractions} [For background & spelling out the acronyms in the title, see: Debate (AI safety technique), Recursive Reward Modeling, Eliciting Latent Knowledge, Natural Abstractions.] When I say “Why I’m not working on X”, I am NOT trying to find a polite & diplomati...
1effc109-68ea-4ff6-bb49-15b7efe4998c
awestover/filtering-for-misalignment
Redwood Research: Alek's Filtering Results
id: post1794 This Google doc^ is a halted, formerly work-in-progress writeup of Evan Hubinger’s AI alignment research agenda, authored by Evan. It dates back to around 2020, and so Evan’s views on alignment have shifted since then. Nevertheless, we thought it would be valuable to get this posted and available to every...
8ee76dd7-ebbf-458a-82a7-d51d8cec3581
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
In theory: does building the subagent have an "impact"? EDIT: Extensive modifications to this post, sorry, too numerous to list. If you read the original post, it's worth rereading. Overall summary post here. This post looks more generally into the subagent issue with attainable utility, discussed in the previous tw...
ed483032-ec5c-43d2-bc22-fe32b0982325
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
"Existential risk from AI" survey results I sent a two-question survey to ~117 people working on long-term AI risk, asking about the level of existential risk from "humanity not doing enough technical AI safety research" and from "AI systems not doing/optimizing what the people deploying them wanted/intended". 44 peo...
0a33e1ee-7221-484d-97be-f1b199d9b0aa
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What are the biggest current impacts of AI? I'd like to have a clearer picture of the domains in which AI systems have already been deployed - particularly those in which they are having the largest impacts on the world, and what those impacts are. Some reasons why this might be useful: * AI systems don't (currentl...
6156856c-aac9-47aa-93b1-5d6579829688
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Live Theory Part 0: Taking Intelligence Seriously Acknowledgements The vision here was midwifed originally in the wild and gentle radiance that is Abram's company (though essentially none of the content is explicitly his).  The PIBBSS-spirit has been infused in this work from before it began (may it infuse us all), a...
57256865-6684-464a-a9f9-49c3bc919c16
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Looking for reasoned discussion on Geert Vanden Bossche's ideas? Considering the current covid hysiteria and censorship on social media platforms I'm finding it hard to find reasoned discussion of Geert Vanden Bossche's ideas. They seem to be centered around vaccine immune escape and original antigenic sin. If you hav...
525b32cf-cae9-4312-938e-580205ee53c9
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Striving to Accept Reply to:  The Mystery of the Haunted Rationalist Followup to:  Don't Believe You'll Self-Deceive Should a rationalist ever find themselves trying hard to believe something? You may be tempted to answer "No", because "trying to believe" sounds so stereotypical of Dark Side Epistemology.  You may b...
55a820af-fb26-4873-844b-877c0c1a94f8
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Wireless is a trap I used to be an anti-wire crusader. I hated the clutter of cables, and my tendency to unconsciously chew on them if they got anywhere near my face. But running into bug after tricky wireless bug—mostly while trying to make my video calls work better—I’ve apostasized. The more I’ve learned about wifi...
85fca4ad-be0a-483a-b915-9bebf3eb98c5
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs
Blogs
Friendly AI Research Help from MIRI Earlier this year, a student told us he was writing an honors thesis on logical decisions theories such as TDT and UDT — one of MIRI’s core research areas. Our reply was “Why didn’t you tell us this earlier? When can we fly you to Berkeley to help you with it?” So we flew Danny Hi...
e9475810-961e-4e4c-a96e-652309e715a1
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What does the curve look like for coronavirus on a surface? There seem to be some pretty solid numbers on how long coronavirus will last on a given surface. But I’m curious what the curve looks like. Does it decay at a constant rate, like a radioactive substance? Or does it behave more like a group of animals denied f...
7ed80905-208f-4ae1-bde3-49fb4afc2671
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Willing gamblers, spherical cows, and AIs Note: posting this in Main rather than Discussion in light of recent discussion that people don't post in Main enough and their reasons for not doing so aren't necessarily good ones. But I suspect I may be reinventing the wheel here, and someone else has in fact gotten farther...
0835a9c4-b176-4af2-87db-0b1a5f91a85b
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Meetup : West LA Meetup 11-16-2011 Discussion article for the meetup : West LA Meetup 11-16-2011 WHEN: 16 November 2011 07:30:00PM (-0800) WHERE: 10850 West Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90064 When: 7:30pm - 9:30pm Wednesday, November 2nd. Notice that this is 30 minutes later than usual! Where: The Westside Tavern i...
fc8f4db5-1ae9-47ae-a68b-03ae1f4a3493
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/eaforum
Effective Altruism Forum
Emergent Ventures AI Tyler Cowen's talent programme, EV, just launched an [AI-specific tranche](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2022/04/ai-for-emergent-ventures.html). [A few](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2022/03/emergent-ventures-winners-eighteenth-cohort.html) [EAs have](https:...
566b6888-6168-401e-bcc5-a2b0d711888e
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Spaced Repetition Database for A Human's Guide to Words Followup to: Spaced Repetition Database for Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions I've updated my Anki database for the Less Wrong Sequences to include cards from A Human's Guide to Words. I've been trying to put less information on each card, and I relied ...
1306352a-ce16-4751-b35a-84e17da175f3
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Why Billionaires Will Not Survive an AGI Extinction Event By A. Nobody Introduction Throughout history, the ultra-wealthy have insulated themselves from catastrophe. Whether it’s natural disasters, economic collapse, or even nuclear war, billionaires believe that their resources—private bunkers, fortified islands, a...
18c50f4a-b573-4e40-98aa-99c1c70e0f59
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Book Recommendations This is a place to consolidate book recommendations. I'm reading The Logic of Failure and enjoying it quite a bit. I wasn't sure whether I'd heard of it here, and I found a post here called Great Books of Failure, an article which hadn't crossed my path before. There's a recent thread about book...
76051aac-53ab-4e7c-8792-00d45e38696c
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Meetup : London Social Meetup, 18/01/2015 Discussion article for the meetup : London Social Meetup, 18/01/2015 WHEN: 18 January 2015 02:00:00PM (+0000) WHERE: Shakespeare's Head, Shakespeare's Head, Africa House, 64-68 Kingsway, London WC2B 6BG, UK-68 Kingsway, London WC2B 6BG, UK LessWrong London is having another...
d98a48cf-69d2-4421-ad49-b57beb68166a
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Mesa-Optimizers and Over-optimization Failure (Optimizing and Goodhart Effects, Clarifying Thoughts - Part 4) In the previous posts, I first outlined Selection versus Control for Optimization, then talked about What Optimization Means, and how we quantify it, then applied these ideas a bit to ground the discussion. A...
8a8bc329-6bde-4a80-84c9-88e4e6c987f4
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong
LessWrong
Is there anything that can stop AGI development in the near term? Assume that short timeline arguments are correct. (For previous discussion, see ["What if AGI is near?"](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/FQqXxWHyZ5AaYiZvt/what-if-agi-is-near).) Some possible ideas: * A multilateral, international governmental/legal a...
231261d9-0f22-4089-b5e0-2550657e05dc
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Math Learning Experiment Last Sunday I and a small group of volunteers ran an experiment. We got a bunch of CFAR alumni together and asked half of them to tutor the other half in math (in a broad sense, so including computer science) while paying close attention to what was happening in the minds of the tutees, fo...
e2c8df03-95d0-4497-bd74-bd5f738991f4
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Open thread, Mar. 20 - Mar. 26, 2017 Notes for future OT posters: 1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag. 2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.) 3. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday. 4. Unflag th...
b429b01c-7d9f-4f27-9f5d-47c5f6bc1c7d
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Is Deontological AI Safe? [Feedback Draft] [Note: This post is an excerpt from a longer paper, written during the first half of the Philosophy Fellowship at the Center for AI Safety. I (William D'Alessandro) am a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy. Along with the other Philosophy Fell...
de4fa987-dfa7-473e-a896-1dddef4ec460
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs
Blogs
Penicillin and historic syphilis trends Penicillin did not precipitate a discontinuity of more than ten years in deaths from syphilis in the US. Nor were there other discontinuities in that trend between 1916 and 2015. The number of syphilis cases in the US also saw steep decline but no substantial discontinuity bet...
79aadf38-3738-4bbc-b6a6-c646a50a1411
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Book Review: Feeling Great by David Burns I watched Paw Patrol: The Movie because I have a four year old I love.  In it, the police puppy Chase was scared of jumping over a gaping chasm between two buildings, so his owner the boy Ryder encourages him by telling him he's the bravest dog he knows, and that type of thin...
5087b03d-f7f4-4366-9e56-cf74678d5fa6
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What I got out of 'Algorithms to Live By' Sorry for the length. In a few paragraphs there's a reader's guide so you can skip around. I have tried to put the most valuable stuff up first. Consider only reading the introduction. Starting from every moment, there are choices you could make. Lots of different choices, sp...
f6678f46-ea51-42d3-b2cc-10308e399220
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Against Amazement I have moved this post to my blog: http://squirrelinhell.blogspot.com/2016/09/against-amazement.html
4f2a909f-30ee-47ec-939a-f627f914c904
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Test to experiment with the Discussion section This isn't a real article, it's just a test that I'm using to see what the Discussion section can and can't do. In particular, I want to see whether it's possible to move an article from the Discussion section to a Less Wrong top-level post (or vise-versa); if so, that wo...
8eccb946-5aa1-4980-a5e2-9b3eba39abaf
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Should We Shred Whole-Brain Emulation? I am opening this thread to test the hypothesis that SuperIntelligence is plausible but that Whole-Brain Emulations would most likely become obsolete before they were even possible. Further, given the ability to do so, entities which were near to being Whole-Brain Emulations w...
ac54d016-3ed5-4aaf-ba19-b72ec7174e63
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Dreams of AIXI Implications of the Theory of Universal Intelligence If you hold the AIXI theory for universal intelligence to be correct; that it is a useful model for general intelligence at the quantitative limits, then you should take the Simulation Argument seriously. AIXI shows us the structure of universal in...
4f3005b6-e27c-423f-a621-7c51a581fe81
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
General advice for transitioning into Theoretical AI Safety Update 2025: This post is completely out of date, don't follow its advice. Cross-posted from the EA Forum. During the past months I've privately talked with +20 AI Safety researchers[1] about how to transition into Theoretical AI Safety . Here's a distillat...
15f0cd97-0708-4ede-9573-a4ccf63a1b6b
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
[link] Large Social Networks can be Targeted for Viral Marketing with Small Seed Sets Large Social Networks can be Targeted for Viral Marketing with Small Seed Sets It shows how easy a population can be influenced if control over a small sub-set exists.   > A key problem for viral marketers is to determine an initia...
b1215036-5370-46e0-b520-2eb5d58f71a2
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
An Apprentice Experiment in Python Programming, Part 4 [Note to readers: The Jupyter notebook version of this post is here] Previously: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/fKTqwbGAwPNm6fyEH/an-apprentice-experiment-in-python-programming-part-3 Python Objects in Memory (from comments) In the previous post, purge comment...
840475bf-a0ac-4125-a93d-dad857632cb8
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
There Are No Primordial Definitions of Man/Woman I watched a two-hour debate between atheist Stephen Woodford (host of Rationality Rules channel) and sex realist biologist Colin Wright on the topic of gender. The topic was ostensibly about whether gender is a social construct, but it ended up being a captivating discu...
2c13fc59-8b7f-44eb-8e3f-2abd68eca1b4
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Introduction to the sequence: Interpretability Research for the Most Important Century This is the first post in a sequence exploring the argument that interpretability is a high-leverage research activity for solving the AI alignment problem. This post contains important background context for the rest of the sequen...
c9e9f407-1c71-4bd1-b788-0dac5a19cc45
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Covid 1/14: To Launch a Thousand Shipments Pardon me while I make my way to the rooftops. So I’m sure it’s not that simple especially because of regulatory issues, but… did you hear the one where humanity could have produced enough mRNA vaccine for the entire world by early this year, and could still decide to do it ...
aa759984-f56b-41f1-9601-c1aa896b0ee4
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What's So Bad About Ad-Hoc Mathematical Definitions? Suppose it’s the early twentieth century, and we’re trying to quantify the concept of “information”. Specifically, we want to measure “how much information” one variable contains about another - for instance, how much information a noisy measurement of the temperatu...
2641b14d-6221-4905-b7fc-abf4c2d3dd85
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What will the twenties look like if AGI is 30 years away? I'm especially interested to hear from people with long (i.e. 20+ year) timelines what they think the next 10 years will look like. [EDIT: After pushback from Richard Ngo, I've agreed to stop talking about short and long timelines and just use numbers instead,...
5a319c04-5e55-4b34-b0c0-b5cb1745ffdc
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Abstraction Talk I gave a talk a couple weeks on abstraction. It moves very fast, but it covers more material in one place than any individual post I've written, and includes a few things which haven't showed up in posts yet (especially near the end). [Slides are here](https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1sHzrxMjS...
f24a8718-c5f3-48b1-8bcf-66d5b6739f7b
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/lesswrong
LessWrong
Human level AI can plausibly take over the world TL:DR:The world is vulnerable to takeover by a human level AI that can copy/paste itself to run perhaps 1M+ instances across all current large AI inference systems. Existing governments work because they have a monopoly on violence. People expect the rules will be enf...
600b6a45-ec14-433d-9df8-a65a18ada105
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/blogs
Blogs
New mailing list for MIRI math/CS papers only As requested, we now offer email notification of new technical (math or computer science) papers and reports from MIRI. Simply subscribe to the mailing list below. This list sends **one email per new technical paper**, and contains only the paper’s title, author(s), and ...
065e6025-f272-4f14-bf21-2b4d61d8740f
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Productivity tool: race! Inspired by recent batch of productivity posts, I wrote my short story down. To a reasonable extent, this story is real. 2:00 As usual, I put my breakfast into the microwave and set it to 2:00. 1:58 It took two seconds for a train of though to start:   "Waste, again. Again!"   "What am I supp...
d9c000d6-dfa5-4f72-9957-88610e6853a1
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Consolidated link thread, September 2011 Recently the Discussion section has been full of link threads, most of them with a pretty low karma score and few if any comments. While many of them are interesting, I'd prefer to have less of them around. Right now they clutter up the discussion section so that it's getting h...
31203bc1-9b9e-4d99-9999-932abc6fe5ab
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Prizes for ML Safety Benchmark Ideas “If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.” – Lord Kelvin (paraphrased) Website: benchmarking.mlsafety.org – receiving submissions until August 2023. ML Safety lacks good benchmarks, so the Center for AI Safety is offering $50,000 - $100,000 prizes for benchmark ideas (or ...
129f7220-51e5-43c9-87d0-4f49eb2d62d7
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What risks from vaccines? I was chatting with friends about the Covid vaccine and they were concerned about side effects. I don’t expect significant side effects but don’t really have a principled analysis as to why not. What kind of probability should one assign to significant side effects from a vaccine, particular...
d9ec9923-45c4-4576-8dbd-962f924a9617
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
A Fight is a Faster Tax on Bullshit The Nameless Virtue In The Twelve Virtues of Rationality, Eliezer Yudkowsky points at a nameless virtue. He pulls this quote from Miyamoto Musashi: > The primary thing when you take a sword in your hands is your intention to cut the enemy, whatever the means. Whenever you parry, hi...
14be60b9-4dd8-4fb3-a73a-90d4da5bd8ec
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Amish, and Strategic Norms around Technology I was reading Legal Systems Very Different From Ours by David Friedman. The chapter on the Amish made a couple interesting claims, which changed my conception of that culture (although I'm not very confident that the Amish would endorse these claims as fair descriptions...
d4a382ad-fb3d-4981-a6f5-42596cd1d63c
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
The Self-Unaware AI Oracle (See also my later post, Self-Supervised Learning and AGI Safety) Abstract A self-unaware AI oracle is a system that builds a world-model inside which there is no concept of "me". I propose that such systems are safe to operate, that they can be plausibly built by continuing known AI develo...
a170e23b-701d-4bd8-be03-48d2302adbfc
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Relationship between subjective experience and intelligence? I want to investigate with you if my belief about intelligence is rational or irrational. Beware, it may turn out to be based on wishful thinking. To put it crudely: I believe there should be a "cheat code" for high intelligence (problem-solving skills) for...
1072730b-fc2b-43f0-9093-ffeeac92d81f
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Understanding Eliezer's "Any Fact Would Move Me in the Same Direction" Eliezer says some confusing things in Biology Inspired Timelines: > Even without knowing the specifics [..] you ought to be able to reason abstractly about a directional update that you would make, if you knew any specifics instead of none. A few...
919cb961-05d5-4d2c-aece-252648c63a66
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Updating towards the simulation hypothesis because you think about AI (This post is both written up in a rush and very speculative so not as rigorous and full of links as a good post on this site should be but I'd rather get the idea out there than not get around to it.) Here’s a simple argument that could make us...
618bbb93-00d0-44b0-a94f-f43d97e858ef
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
What shape has mindspace? Epistemological status: Babbling. Let a map each mind in mindspace to how aligned it is. We are trying to optimize a. To that end, lemmata are helpful which talk about the shape of mindspace. That's why we try to call it a space even before defining what category C it lives in. To optimize ...
ee736433-ba66-4292-a80e-1eddd4b4eed0
StampyAI/alignment-research-dataset/alignmentforum
Alignment Forum
Paper: Large Language Models Can Self-improve [Linkpost] This paper came out about a week ago. I am not the author - it was published anonymously. I learned about the paper when JJ Hepburn shared it on Slack. I just thought it seemed potentially really important and I hadn't seen it discussed on this forum yet: --...
ba70bd9e-8db4-494f-9271-2472839f3027
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Rescuing the Extropy Magazine archives Possibly of more interest to old school Extropians, you may be aware the defunct Extropy Institute's website is very slow and broken, and certainly inaccessible to newcomers. Anyhow, I have recently pieced together most of the early publications, 1988 - 1996 of 'Extropy: Vaccine...
a400e74f-b302-4f85-a3a3-ad32fe846837
trentmkelly/LessWrong-43k
LessWrong
Reading the ethicists: A review of articles on AI in the journal Science and Engineering Ethics Epistemic status: Stream of consciousness reactions to papers read in chronological order. Caveat lector. I have a dirty family secret. My uncle is a professional ethicist. In a not-too roundabout way, this is why I ended...