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rain8dome9's Shortform 2023-10-30T23:52:07.719Z

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Comment by rain8dome9 on Missing forecasting tools: from catalogs to a new kind of prediction market · 2024-11-28T20:23:22.690Z · LW · GW

Then wolfram alpha?

Comment by rain8dome9 on Gears vs Behavior · 2024-11-14T00:16:35.223Z · LW · GW

I thinks its worth mentioning that there are two levels of black box models too. ML can memorize the expected value at each set of variables (at 1 rmp crank wheel rotates at 2 rpm)  or it can 'generalize' and, for this example, tell us that the wheel rotates at 2x speed of crank. To some extent 'ML generalization' provides good 'out of distribution' predictions. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on Missing forecasting tools: from catalogs to a new kind of prediction market · 2024-11-13T21:54:24.796Z · LW · GW

There is no “Wikipedia for predictive models” that I know of. No big repository to easily share and find predictive scientific models other than the relevant domain’s scientific literature, which is not optimized for these tasks: it is not organized by the variables being predicted, it is not generally available as reusable and modular software components, it is usually not focused on predictive work, some of it is paywalled, etc.

Have you tried www.openml.org?

Comment by rain8dome9 on The Median Researcher Problem · 2024-11-12T21:10:31.008Z · LW · GW

Prototypical example: imagine a scientific field in which the large majority of practitioners have a very poor understanding of statistics, p-hacking, etc. Then lots of work in that field will be highly memetic despite trash statistics, blatant p-hacking, etc. Sure, the most competent people in the field may recognize the problems, but the median researchers don’t, and in aggregate it’s mostly the median researchers who spread the memes.

Complicated analysis (like going far beyond p-values) is easy for anyone to see and it is evidence of effort. Complex analysis usually coocurs with thoroughness so fewer mistakes. Complicated analysis coocurs with many concurrent tests so less need to produce positive results so less p-hacking. Consequently, there is a fairly simple solution to researchers with mediocre statistical skills gaining too much trust: more plots! Anyway, I find correlation graphs and multiple comparison impressive. Also I am usually more skilled in data analysis than the subject of a paper so can more easily verify that. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on How should vegans think about Methionine needs? · 2024-11-12T19:49:57.098Z · LW · GW
Comment by rain8dome9 on Resolving von Neumann-Morgenstern Inconsistent Preferences · 2024-11-12T19:49:15.160Z · LW · GW

Is this a paper? Has it been published anywhere?

Comment by rain8dome9 on Toward a Broader Conception of Adverse Selection · 2024-04-10T20:31:35.296Z · LW · GW

Relevant quote from Dragonfired by J. Zachary Pike. "Brokers make money by knowing key information; they make fortunes by ensuring that other brokers remain unaware or unsure of the same information until after critical trades."

Comment by rain8dome9 on Using axis lines for good or evil · 2024-03-21T20:33:27.995Z · LW · GW

In ggplot (R statistical language) the defaults include a subtle grid and no axes. They also put in the extra random space. 

Here is some code in case someone else using R wants to try out things discussed here:

library(ggplot2)
qplot(wt, mpg, data = mtcars, colour = factor(cyl)) +
theme(axis.line.x = element_line(color="black", size = 0),
axis.line.y = element_line(color="black", size = 1)) +
scale_x_continuous(expand = c(0, 0), limits = c(0,8)) + 
scale_y_continuous(expand = c(0, 0), limits = c(0,36))

Comment by rain8dome9 on Please Bet On My Quantified Self Decision Markets · 2023-12-17T03:03:46.449Z · LW · GW

Might be able to use Multi-Armed Bandit-like sampling for this, even? Hm…

Effects may take time and may require time to build up to detectable levels. This is why Winters increased the length of each intervention till they lasted some weeks. If the placebo causes a different self report rating then its a bad placebo and should be Blinded out but if it causes a psychological improvement then why not use it?

 

so non-X days will be more likely measured as being high in X-effect. But that'd mean that X days are more likely followed by non-X, which with random order is not the case.

Yes but it will still make the effect size much less. 

Could you elaborate on this a bit

Lag and build up is mentioned above. Training effect is when you get better at something just by doing it, so later interventions look better.  At the same time there may be drift of self report. In other words effect of slowly growing change on memory making user think there is no change. For all these reasons plot the time series with time on X results on Y and make each point the color of intervention or placebo. Do not connect the dots with lines but do make a smooth loess-like line. You will be able to see some of the issues if they occur.  Some more on all the issues.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Please Bet On My Quantified Self Decision Markets · 2023-12-14T00:06:39.891Z · LW · GW

The more important an effect is usually the stronger it is so starting many of the experiments but for a short time might yield results much faster. May be possible to overlap the non blinded experiments and run many at the same time with varying periodicity so the same interventions do not always happen on top of each other. 

Your statistical method is similar to two sample t test right? Well that does not account for several possible issues of time series and dependence between data points of one variable. Lag and training effects for example. So be sure to control all other possible independent variables and  plot the data timeline and when you do do not connect data points with lines!

Comment by rain8dome9 on Please Bet On My Quantified Self Decision Markets · 2023-12-10T05:17:03.810Z · LW · GW

In all experiments, I will be using the statistical method detailed here, code for it here, unless someone points out that I'm doing my statistics wrong.

Links lead no nowhere?

Comment by rain8dome9 on rain8dome9's Shortform · 2023-11-02T02:29:46.417Z · LW · GW

Will you try running the two notebooks on your data? I am starving for feedback and attention. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on rain8dome9's Shortform · 2023-10-30T23:52:08.153Z · LW · GW

Really thorough statistical analysis of Anki (flashcard app) data

rpubs.com/rain8/1100036 Its a work in progress with only two steps finished. Not exactly an addon because its in R not Py. So far the project does many little things like find bugs in user’s collection, describe the growth of their collection and text mining. Ultimate goal is to hopefully be able to use anki as continuous cognitive tester and allow users to learn about and optimize their memorization process. Instructions to run on your own data : github 

I am not sure data in anki could really be used as a continuous cognitive health test. Probably requires removing lots of artifacts and other influences and then finding outside influence that definitely relates to cognition.  Lit review.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Feedbackloop-first Rationality · 2023-08-26T19:42:49.962Z · LW · GW

I am willing to be a test subject. Evidence that I am serious is I have 119k reviews on Anki and am analyzing the data hoping it will be a psychometric test.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Luck based medicine: my resentful story of becoming a medical miracle · 2023-06-26T21:49:41.227Z · LW · GW

https://wiki.openhumans.org/wiki/Finding_relations_between_variables_in_time_series This is the link I meant to post. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on ACX/LW Meetup · 2023-04-17T21:34:20.194Z · LW · GW

Thank you that was enlightening. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on Luck based medicine: my resentful story of becoming a medical miracle · 2022-10-22T04:12:37.551Z · LW · GW

An analytic framework that takes multiple comparisons etc. into account and lets you see if any correlations are statistically significant.

Blinding. 

Two issues, one of which I did not think of, out of like 20.

EDIT: I suspect, including from my own experience, that many problems can be solved without resorting to advanced statistics. Often by using through experimental procedure instead. Like eliminating a food type for a month then not doing an intervention for a month. Repeat. Trying out medications sounds like it should be done safely.  This safety can only be achieved by monitoring vital signs and analyzing them using advanced statistics. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on Luck based medicine: my resentful story of becoming a medical miracle · 2022-10-22T01:10:25.010Z · LW · GW

Is there a way to help users collect and analyze the data without needing to be a statistics expert? 

Collection is really just a matter of finding the right devices and taking the time to use them. Analysis outside of immediate obvious effect can become difficult. If the effect is subtle and drowned in other effects, or hard to measure. If the intervention is not something user can easily or wants to reproduce.  If the effect take long time to build up, or is shifted in time from intervention. If the successful effect only happens under several conditions or several interventions together. If the spray and pray approach is dangerous. If the spray and pray approach only hits gold once in  a while. Multiple comparison problem (see wikipedia).  If user is bad at keeping records. There are probably more. There are many many apps that just do correlation and none that do anything more.  Here is a list of both problems and apps.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Luck based medicine: my resentful story of becoming a medical miracle · 2022-10-22T00:35:32.262Z · LW · GW

In my case it turned out to be manufactured food and gluten.  This post is very similar to Quantifed Self movement. 

Also please remember that side effects and drug interactions are a thing. Anything with a real effect can hurt you. I gave a very caveated suggestion of BosPro to someone on Twitter and it caused something akin to niacin flush in them. This is the same brand that does nothing to me but makes me better at digestion and uninterested in sugar.

What if the problem or the negative consequence of some intervention is hard to detect? I know this is not a popular opinion but anyone trying spray and pray really really should track their basics like HRV,  Mood and cognitive ability.

 

EDIT: The other way to spray and pray in one huge chunk is to move to a different country. A large number of variables change when you do. In my case moving to Mexico helped because there are many restaurants that make food from scratch and bakeries that seem to make food without gluten. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on [deleted post] 2022-09-15T18:09:12.515Z

So this will be on sept 21 right? 

Comment by rain8dome9 on My Anki patterns · 2022-08-24T18:23:04.933Z · LW · GW

Excuse me for the necro. I think saying all the synonyms is better than letter based constraining. If the word that fits the constraint is found later than most other synonyms, the act of checking for the constraint takes longer than just listing. According to the 20 rules of formatting knowledge by Wozniak, its better for the mind to follow a set path even if it is longer, and that is the act of making a list.  It is probably good to have sets of synonyms memorized for writing. Adding a constraint makes the question longer, which is something Wozniak advises against.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Beyond Blame Minimization · 2022-04-24T21:38:01.668Z · LW · GW

Someone should make a game/simulation of these things. Let the layman learn how to navigate politics and let the sociologists plan better.  This is the only way to get real answers, given the extreme political nature of the issue. Ok, so there is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_simulation but the games for laymen (like the sims) listed are mostly bad and certainly do not simulate office politics. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on The Wicked Problem Experience · 2022-03-16T17:16:28.697Z · LW · GW

The internet is filled with BS. There are a million health tracking devices. The most reliable of these are either FDA certified medical devices and therefore the company that makes them will be punished for misrepresentation, or Open Source and therefor extremely transparent. Might similar rules apply to charities? 

Comment by rain8dome9 on Chess and cheap ways to check day to day variance in cognition · 2021-08-21T04:29:31.433Z · LW · GW

Seems to test something different from 15 minute games.

Comment by rain8dome9 on Chess and cheap ways to check day to day variance in cognition · 2021-08-21T04:28:13.681Z · LW · GW

The Elo on sites depends on the player base lots and lots. 

Comment by rain8dome9 on Chess and cheap ways to check day to day variance in cognition · 2021-08-21T04:14:44.835Z · LW · GW

The AI on lichess sometimes makes clearly worse moves than the ones I made. There is also room for much more in depth analysis like drop, fork, defensiveness, etc. I switched from chess to Anki and Amphetype because, while not nearly as fun, they also taught me a skill. I will get back to chess when I find an affordable automatic board.  Cognitive tracking is often discussed on reddit or the QS forums.

 Exist a few papers on the subject of chess as a test of cognition. 

"Using  within-player  comparisons,  we  find  a  statistically  and  economically  significant  decrease  in  performance  when  competing  online  compared  to  competing  offline."  Steffen Künn 2020

DB RCT Coffee causes "more reflective decision making processes. When not under time pressure," Franke 2017

Comment by rain8dome9 on Eight Hundred Slightly Poisoned Word Games · 2021-08-21T03:49:47.046Z · LW · GW

I have something similar. Have you worked outside?

Comment by rain8dome9 on Benefits of "micro-tracking" for personal health measurements? · 2021-08-07T05:53:52.134Z · LW · GW

I use Bitesnap and MFP to avoid most of your problems with diet tracking. Measuring exact weight of each ingredient in something I cook is still a hassle. For heart rate I recommend uECG. Many tools are being developed to track exercise in great depth such as mbientlabs' wearable accelerometry and computer vision pose estimation.

Even if user gets good time saving equipment the daily time expenditure is still non trivial. The benefits could however be great! The current biggest problem is that no automated analysis software yet exists. For more see the Kialo debate:

https://www.kialo.com/everyone-should-health-track---self-quantify-49787

Comment by rain8dome9 on If there were an interactive software teaching Yudkowskian rationality, what concepts would you want to see it teach? · 2021-03-23T17:55:53.225Z · LW · GW

Less wrong deck exists now though it seems incomplete missing things like Inferential Distance.