Comment by Vivid on Pascal's wager re-examined · 2011-10-05T17:43:41.124Z · LW · GW

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Comment by Vivid on The Bias You Didn't Expect · 2011-04-14T19:46:06.548Z · LW · GW

Beware the sometimes subtle trap of thinking that, since you have thought about a big decision/belief at seemingly random intervals for a whole week (month, year) now, you have perspective on the decision/belief from a representative variety of your states of mind. State-dependent memory, habits, priming &c. make this unlikely unless you were deliberately making an effort.

Comment by Vivid on What are you working on? April 2011 · 2011-04-14T00:06:38.301Z · LW · GW

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Comment by Vivid on When is it ever rational to enter a sweepstakes where you may have a 1/10,000 chance of winning? · 2011-04-13T10:43:46.142Z · LW · GW

Ignoring sweepstakes as such[1], a focused rationalist should regard all bets with odds far from a coin flip with suspicion; there are often better bets, and with more information for calibration.

[1] Perhaps justifiably, as the "may" in the title of this Discussion post implies more uncertainty than you find in a typical sweepstake scenario where the fine print and simple arithmetic are enough calculation in themselves.