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Comment by notriddle on Less Wrong’s political bias · 2013-10-27T15:18:38.491Z · LW · GW

Yes, I realize that reality has no bias and that the quote I was paraphrasing is an applause light. I'm not as witty as I thought I was. Here's a less "witty" version:

that this bias originates from lack of bias

If believing things such as "humans need to stop pumping CO2 into the air before we destroy the environment" looks like a sign of bias, then you're as bad as a left-wing parody of right-wingers.

Comment by notriddle on Less Wrong’s political bias · 2013-10-27T03:28:34.025Z · LW · GW

that this bias originates from lack of bias

To be exact, it stems from ignoring reality's well-known liberal bias.

Comment by notriddle on Three Dialogues on Identity · 2013-10-08T03:47:49.787Z · LW · GW

Real in the same way that a real banana is real.

Comment by notriddle on Another way our brains betray us · 2013-09-19T04:31:31.169Z · LW · GW

If preconceived notions make it impossible to do math, then how can we possibly get a result that contradicts with our preconceived notions?

Comment by notriddle on Thought experiment: The transhuman pedophile · 2013-09-19T04:12:55.092Z · LW · GW

Why wouldn't you expect terminal values to charge? Does your agent have some motivation (which leads it to choose to change) other than its terminal values. Or is it choosing to change its terminal values in pursuit of those values? Or are the terminal value changing involuntarily?

In the first case, the things doing the changing are not the real terminal values.

In the second case, that doesn't seem to make sense.

In the third case, what we're discussing is no longer a perfect rational agent.

Comment by notriddle on Post ridiculous munchkin ideas! · 2013-05-27T23:44:28.379Z · LW · GW

Similar to B_For_Bandana's idea, use the refund system to convert gift cards into cash.

Comment by notriddle on Post ridiculous munchkin ideas! · 2013-05-27T22:49:30.702Z · LW · GW

See also: voluntary homelessness.

Comment by notriddle on Rationality Quotes May 2013 · 2013-05-14T02:13:36.040Z · LW · GW

Absolute non-contradiction? Since anything else (that is, any contradictory statement) is absolutely horrible, if absolute non-contradiction is also horrible then nothing good exists.

edit: s/than nothing/then nothing/

Comment by notriddle on Words as Mental Paintbrush Handles · 2013-05-13T04:05:24.640Z · LW · GW

In my visualization, a man (don't remember what he looked like) was walking along a line with a 90 degree turn away from me (think of how GPS navigators represent roads, only the only thing I visualized was the road that was actually used). When he turned, the camera panned along with him, keeping his back to me, and we were facing a double-door entryway.

My visualizations seem to lack every detail they can possibly lack...

Comment by notriddle on Feeling Rational · 2013-04-30T02:35:40.343Z · LW · GW

I may be somewhat more radical than a lot of people here, but I don't think the fat man should be deluded. It will hurt him more in the long run, because, believing himself to be agile, he'll sign up for physically strenuous jobs and may injure himself, or try to compete in sports and be let down hard, instead of lightly like a controlled reveal could be.

Comment by notriddle on Feeling Rational · 2013-04-30T02:27:55.285Z · LW · GW

Starts out right; being pointlessly angry at all those crazy drivers is a waste of energy, and often the result of various fallacies (fundamental fallacy? if you drove like that, you'd have a reason to).

But then you mention "why not even find some reason to be happy about it?" That's a bias; cut it out. Also, you want the kid to realize that spitting juice onto the carpet is unacceptable.

Comment by notriddle on Feeling Rational · 2013-04-30T02:15:56.787Z · LW · GW

Isn't "by the truth" an extremely important qualifier?! I'm really curious how the two quotes are the same.

Comment by notriddle on Feeling Rational · 2013-04-30T02:12:18.002Z · LW · GW

Correct me if I read it wrong, but did you just say that induction doesn't work? I admit I don't know how to even begin arguing for induction, so you've got a great opportunity; give an actual argument, rather than just saying we live in "a world where counter-induction holds."

Also, while any phenomenon can be described by an infinite number of math equations, the more complicated ones are less likely to be true. See also, Occam's Razor. Obviously, this relies on probability theory, which was formulated by induction, but you did say "even if you believe that there are some magic objective facts" which I assumed to be induction, probability theory, etc.

Comment by notriddle on Why Our Kind Can't Cooperate · 2013-04-30T01:24:37.534Z · LW · GW

I like the idea, but they seem kind of gimmicky. (thinking of LW's comments section, it would be hard to give another icon the kind of prominence we want, without making it too big). How about a green/red bar, like the one on YouTube?