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Comment by QuicklyStarfish on How To Actually Change Your Mind eBook (In Order) · 2012-10-12T13:47:25.856Z · LW · GW

Sorry for the late reply but the question just occurred to me: is this publication likely to include the current sequence, "Highly Advanced Epistemology 101 for Beginners"? (I don't know how long the sequence will be, so I'm not sure if there's time.)

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on How To Actually Change Your Mind eBook (In Order) · 2012-09-04T15:38:09.544Z · LW · GW

Is there any public timeframe for when these will be released, even an approximate one?

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on [META] Alternatives to rot13 and karma sinks · 2012-04-21T00:49:04.299Z · LW · GW

I also thought linked rot13 would be nice, and put up a page, at rot13.ca, to do so conveniently:

V cerfrag sbe lbhe pbafvqrengvba (naq'"f ubcshyyl [fvp] nccebiny), gur fvzcyr cntr V qrpvqrq V jnagrq nsgre ernqvat frireny fcbvyrerq qvfphffvbaf.

Gurer'f n pbclnoyr znexqbja yvax orybj. Rnpu cnentencu'f nyg-grkg vf vgf qrpbqrq inyhr. Zhygvcyr yvarf be fcrpvny punenpgref fubhyq or unaqyrq cebcreyl.

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on Identity Isn't In Specific Atoms · 2012-04-03T19:48:55.082Z · LW · GW

Before when I was still contemplating whether consciousness had a non-physical component, well before I discovered coherent philosophy or rationalism, I had a similar "soul swap world" idea. It eventually let me discard the idea of a soul, but I still favoured some kind of non-personal consciousness. This idea eventually became that there was a "consciousness field" permeating space which produced the phenomenon, through interaction with our brains through a physical yet unknown mechanism. I thought it some very subtle physical effect we hadn't noticed yet, not really supernatural.

It was progress.

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 13, chapter 81 · 2012-03-30T06:48:17.455Z · LW · GW

That's an interesting possibility, but I favour the interpretation that this is the source of dementors:

Even so, the most terrible ritual known to me demands only a rope which has hanged a man and a sword which has slain a woman; and that for a ritual which promised to summon Death itself - though what is truly meant by that I do not know and do not care to discover, since it was also said that the counterspell to dismiss Death had been lost.

It fits very nicely. Dementors (Death) were unkillable (undismissable) because the "true" patronus charm (counterspell) had been lost.

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 13, chapter 81 · 2012-03-29T23:12:10.813Z · LW · GW

Urg... you now have me imagining what happens if polyjuice wears off someone eight-months pregnant.

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 11 · 2012-03-24T22:52:05.342Z · LW · GW

Regarding the Cloak, one possibility is that Harry could duplicate it using the Time Turner. (Harry[1] goes back in time, equips himself with Cloak[1], sneaks up to Harry[2] and take Cloak[2] from his pouch. He could use both cloaks to perform an impossible rescue, then return Cloak[2] to Harry[2]'s pouch.)

Comment by QuicklyStarfish on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 10 · 2012-03-17T10:13:29.208Z · LW · GW

Can somebody dereference "Heaven's Feel arc" for those of us who aren't familiar with it?