Sunday August 23rd, 12pm (PDT) – Double Crux with Buck Shlegeris and Oliver Habryka on Slow vs. Fast AI Takeoff

post by Ben Pace (Benito) · 2020-08-22T06:37:07.173Z · LW · GW · 9 comments

Contents

  Speakers
  Details
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9 comments

This Sunday at 12pm (PDT), we're running a double crux between two curated LessWrong authors (see here [? · GW] for transcripts of events from previous weeks).

If you're a curated author and interested in giving a 5-min talk at a future event, which will then be transcribed and edited, sign up here.

Speakers

Details

When? Sunday August 23, 12pm (PDT)

Where? https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81137654971

9 comments

Comments sorted by top scores.

comment by MikkW (mikkel-wilson) · 2020-08-24T04:27:46.798Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I just wanted to register my enjoyment with the hangout we all had in Topia post-talk, and I look forward to such hangouts in the future, and hope they continue even when things return to normal

(I'll also mention that I vastly preferred the Topia experience to Zoom hangouts I've attended in the past, though I was frustrated that Topia forced me to use my desktop computer and turn off my iPad, which I usually use for chats)

comment by Charlie Steiner · 2020-08-23T22:02:25.485Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

All of these "video chat but in 2d space" websites have had serious problems for me. My preference would just be Zoom breakout rooms with thematic names, honestly. Not sure what the average experience has been.

Replies from: Benito
comment by Ben Pace (Benito) · 2020-08-23T22:06:08.057Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yeah, you raise a good point.

I think my experience is that in every medium (Gather Town, Topia, Zoom Breakout) we have successfully hit several good long-lasting conversations. There's a convo lasting now in Topia that's still going strong, an hour later.

Overall I think it's been going acceptably, where I think like 70% of the attendees have had a good experience in most places.

The main thing with Zoom rooms is that the participants can't really change rooms. You can make everyone co-hosts, but IME it's still hard for them. So you have to randomly assign rooms, and do constant overhead work to make sure each room is going okay. It takes more overhead and is less bottom-up than the 2D spaces. But also, the level of commitment I think on average has forced conversations to get started and for people to commit to them? So it might actually be the best?

Replies from: Raemon
comment by Raemon · 2020-08-23T23:20:44.237Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think the 2d-space-video-chat thing is kinda love/hate, and one solution is just:

  1. Start the event in Zoom, do the main talks in Zoom
  2. At the end, people who prefer hanging out in Zoom stay in Zoom (maybe starting with randomized breakout rooms, which can gradually collapse back to the main Zoom Room when they get boring?)
  3. People who prefer a 2d-space app go there and mill about (able to rejoin the main Zoom room if they want). This probably also helps solve some of the load on the 2d-space-app

The last app I tried out, which I was fairly optimistic about, was called Knit, which was not a 2d-space app, just a videocall running on Jitsi that included "people and form and join their own breakout rooms willy." Unfortunately it also ran into some connection problems (I guess for similar reasons to why the 2d-space apps sometimes do), so it wasn't actually an improvement over Zoom. 

comment by Pongo · 2020-08-22T22:50:17.684Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Oh no! Would’ve loved to attend this, but too late notice for me

Replies from: Benito
comment by Ben Pace (Benito) · 2020-08-23T00:58:23.388Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Alas! We'll have more double cruxes in future, and also may do a transcript for this one.

Replies from: Pongo
comment by Pongo · 2020-09-03T20:23:01.506Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Any update on the likelihood of a transcript?

Replies from: Benito
comment by Ben Pace (Benito) · 2020-09-03T20:39:42.647Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Mm, didn't do it yet. I think it's more likely than not that it'll happen. I think I'll probably get it started next week. You are welcome to ping me again.

Replies from: strangepoop
comment by a gently pricked vein (strangepoop) · 2020-09-10T12:05:32.462Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ping!

I've read/heard a lot about double crux but never had the opportunity to witness it.

EDIT: I did find one extensive example [LW · GW], but this would still be valuable since it was a live debate.