Harry Potter and methods of rationality alternative ending.

Yes, it was something Yudkowsky added. But the text doesn't imply ghosts aren't "really people"; it just states that they're read-only human simulations of unknown fidelity, and the characters are chauvinistic about that.

No problem, you can always try one more time, taking into account that moving around the world or even city is kinda restricted now. I live by myself in remote location, yet it doesn’t stop me from keeping in touch with friends, not due to activity but because they understand and accept me. Not sure i understand what do you mean by "strong shared activity", we do share activity by deeply discussing lots of subjects here. Anyways, it's up to you, imposing myself is not on my list of preferences.

By strong shared activity, I meant something like an MMO or a real-life activity. Being subscribed to the same website doesn't seem quite the same, although I could be wrong about that.

After thinking a bit more about why I initially said no, I think it's best for me to state the shape of my object level.

• I'm fine with continuing to talk. This conversation is interesting.

• I'm also fine with having more conversations, with no definite end in sight.

• If that develops into a friendship, I'm also fine with that.

• If it doesn't, then that's alright with me too.

• My prior against you actually being able to understand and accept me is extremely low. Please don't take this an accusation or an insult or anything.

What I don't think will work is declaring myself to be your friend and vice versa, which is essentially what I've tried to do before. Yes, I can try again, but I have no reason to expect that anything will be different if I simply repeat the same course of actions as last time.

What do you think about simply continuing as we are and seeing what happens?

imho it is only from the perspective of the one who wants more energy and thinks that he's alone and only, subjective, not objective perspective. Who knows how sun's "wasteful" radiation and gravity affects everything around.

Sure, there's no way to know with absolute certainty. But if I had to live in a world where the sun gets ripped apart to create a bunch of fusion reactors and one where we leave it burning just in case there's some alien race on Neptune or something... I'm going to have to go with the former. If a problem crops up, I'm sure the hypothetical civ capable of putting out the sun can handle it, even if only by jamming all the hydrogen back together and restarting the reaction.

Removing death may well mean removing it's opposite, birth. Also, sometimes this "bug" helps people to evaluate their actions and focus on more important stuff. Even the laws of physics, or rather their interpretation, sometimes turn out to be imperfect.

This strikes me as noncentral fallacy. When you say removing birth, that sounds bad, but if the reason nobody has any more babies is because everyone is immortal... is that really so bad?

As for the bug, yes, currently it can be helpful. That doesn't mean it's the only way to nudge people into evaluating their actions or focusing on what's important. It seems extraordinarily unlikely that our current brain design is optimal for either of those actions, given how stupid a designer evolution is.

(Honestly, I find it difficult to answer who is more dangerous: Harry or his teacher).

What? Voldemort's a bored sociopath god whose grand ambition is to play Civilization with humanity as the pieces. Harry's dangerous but at least after HPMOR, he's shackled by the Vow and his values are far nicer than Voldemort's.

Wow. This is not what i said, but you might have a point. I said that structure of brain might define properties of energy it stores and this properties could mirror memory. And that destruction of brain might lead to release of this energy to the surroundings.

Ah. I didn't understand what you were saying and took a stab at it (that I got wrong). I understand now. My gut says this pattern matches as "implausible pseudoscience", but I don't know enough science to refute or justify that claim. However, afaik Yudkowsky doesn't support any view like this (he's a big cryonics proponent) and so I think it's unlikely that this is what he had in mind when he was deciding what HPMOR souls are.

As far as i know, brain of people in coma or even frogs frozen in water not "turned off" and show slight activity.

I knew the coma one, not the frozen one. That's... kind of incredible, that there can be anything happening when it's frozen. But by turned off, I meant being warm and losing oxygen flow and cells dying, or whatever exactly happens when your heart stops beating for a couple minutes.

As for human brain freezing it will likely cause cell membranes to be torn apart by asymmetrically freezing water, as it increases its volume while turning into ice.

This is true if you simply stick it into a freezer. However, "freezing" brains for cryonics is much more involved than brain + freezer. Technically speaking, the cryonics process is vitrification, which doesn't create ice crystals.

I've never managed to be friends with someone online in the absence of a strong shared activity. Sorry.

No problem, you can always try one more time, taking into account that moving around the world or even city is kinda restricted now. I live by myself in remote location, yet it doesn’t stop me from keeping in touch with friends, not due to activity but because they understand and accept me. Not sure i understand what do you mean by "strong shared activity", we do share activity by deeply discussing lots of subjects here. Anyways, it's up to you, imposing myself is not on my list of preferences.

Yeah, okay, technically the troll killed Hermione. Asides from that quibble, Voldemort killed Skeeter, a centaur, the real Quirrel, and a nameless Death Eater. He might have killed other people, but those are the deaths I can recall off the top of my head.

Thank you for pointing this out.

Ehh, kind of. Transhumanist might be the wrong word, but from an objective perspective, the sun is stupendously wasteful. Far better to stop the fusion reaction, extract all the hydrogen, and fuse it under controlled conditions to extract more value. Aka "tear apart the stars". Same idea with the earth (which would, literally, end the world). This seems to be the intended interpretation, but you could be right -- after all, Harry almost destroys the world at the very end of the book via unintended side effects.

Oh, i thought that was related to Hermione being witch-troll-unicorn mutant. I just though, that in case Voldemort had not brought her back, Harry in case of successful resurrection might had try to make her unable to die, even if she desires so. Agree, it is stupendously wasteful and it might be better to extract materials and create another one star under controlled conditions or surround sun with something that can absorb energy, but imho it is only from the perspective of the one who wants more energy and thinks that he's alone and only, subjective, not objective perspective. Who knows how sun's "wasteful" radiation and gravity affects everything around.

Also, if fear of death is the moving force for creativity, the transhumanist answer isn't to keep death around. It's to remove death, and find another way to solve creativity. Same with work expanding to fill the allotted time; that's not a law like a law of physics, it's a bug in our brains.

Removing death may well mean removing it's opposite, birth. Also, sometimes this "bug" helps people to evaluate their actions and focus on more important stuff. Even the laws of physics, or rather their interpretation, sometimes turn out to be imperfect.

True enough. Voldemort was the first time I could really relate to a character but even I would consider him evil (and, more importantly, insanely dangerous).

True, he is evil, this is a book about the struggle between good and evil after all, as controversial as the struggle itself. It seems to me that the "interaction" to a greater extent reflects the essence of what is happening then "struggle". Yet somehow he have forced "good ones" to unite and cooperate. Also by teaching several life lessons he played role of father for Harry. Probably, because Potter have lost his father and his step-father was not too good at parenting, nevertheless, was also able to pass on some important skills to his adoptive son. (Honestly, I find it difficult to answer who is more dangerous: Harry or his teacher).

What? Are you saying that once you turn a brain off, there's no way to turn it back on, because everything is stored in the equivalent of volatile memory?

Wow. This is not what i said, but you might have a point. I said that structure of brain might define properties of energy it stores and this properties could mirror memory. And that destruction of brain might lead to release of this energy to the surroundings. As for your question, what do you mean by turn a brain off"? As far as i know, brain of people in coma or even frogs frozen in water not "turned off" and show slight activity. So i would call it hibernation. As for human brain freezing it will likely cause cell membranes to be torn apart by asymmetrically freezing water, as it increases its volume while turning into ice. In case of heart failure, stopping feeding of brain cells, after exhaustion of nutrients in the capillary system and intracellular fluid, will lead to the beginning of irreversible necrotic processes, it is matter of a few minutes (speed of decay depends on temperature). So yes, in some sense, brain is equivalent of volatile memory, since the life of its constituent cells strictly depends on the ability to convert ATP into energy and use of energy to communicate and store information. Also, I must confess that i don't have official degree in medicine, physics or chemistry, it is just side effect of family traditions and my curiosity.