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winstonBosan's Shortform 2022-02-13T13:47:59.482Z

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Comment by winstonBosan on "Fractal Strategy" workshop report · 2024-04-07T02:18:03.655Z · LW · GW

I am curious, what were other "visions" of this workshop that you generated in the pre-planning stage? 
And now that you have done the workshop, which part of the previous visions might you incorporate into later workshops? 

Comment by winstonBosan on Habryka's Shortform Feed · 2024-04-01T20:40:34.340Z · LW · GW

I hope the partial unveiling of a your user_id hash will not doom us all, somehow. 

Comment by winstonBosan on My Interview With Cade Metz on His Reporting About Slate Star Codex · 2024-03-29T01:17:51.388Z · LW · GW

I am not everyone else, but the reason I downvoted on the second axis is because: 

  • I still don't really understand the avoidant/non-avoidant taxonomy. I am confused when avoidant is both "introverted... and prefer to be alone" while "avoidants... being disturbing to others" when Scott never intended to disturb Metz's life? And Scott doesn't owe anyone anything - avoidant or not. And the claim about Scott being low conscientious? Gwern being low conscientious? If it "varying from person to person" so much, is it even descriptive? 
  • Making a claim of Gwern being avoidant, and Gwern said that Gwern is not. It might be the case that Gwern is lying. But that seems far stretched and not yet substantiated. But it seemed confusing enough that Gwern also couldn't tell how wide the concept applies.
Comment by winstonBosan on sudo's Shortform · 2024-03-24T22:55:53.486Z · LW · GW

There is some good stuff here! And i think it is accurate that some of these are controversial. But it also seems like a strange mix of good and “reverse-stupidity is not necessarily intelligence” ideas.

Directionally good but odd framing: It seems like great advice to offer to people that going straight for the goal (“software programming”) is a good way to approach a seemingly difficult problem. But one does not necessarily need to be mentored - this is only one of many ways. In fact, many programmers started and expanded their curiosity from typing something like ‘man systemctl’ into their shell.

Comment by winstonBosan on Benito's Shortform Feed · 2024-03-17T13:30:02.969Z · LW · GW

It seems like, instead of asking the objective lvl question, asking a probing “What can you tell me about the drive to the conference?” And expanding from there might get you closer to desired result.

Comment by winstonBosan on Attitudes about Applied Rationality · 2024-02-13T17:08:57.001Z · LW · GW

Witty, but I feel like that is not actually true?

It is likely that the rationality oft named is not the true name of the thing. Or “just be a perfect bayesian agent lol” is not practical. But that does actually mean anything legible is immediately false?

Comment by winstonBosan on The impossible problem of due process · 2024-01-16T22:16:39.168Z · LW · GW

TLDR: This is an long metaphor to draw parallels between the Hanseatic League and the broader EA/LW communities. It is OK to not be a {corporation, societas, collegium, universitus} with common/top-down/bottom-up violence-monopolizing system. The price to implement a resolution system people would find satisfactory might be too high.

The fact it is hard to resolve conflict is because it is an integral part of the bargain, not an isolated bug. I personally don't want us to become a chimera with nine heads - a chimera for the sole purpose so we can utter that "we are a state"


the [Efficax Altruismus] is not a societas: (a company) for it knows neither a common ownership of goods nor shared ownership of the good, since in the [Efficax Altruismus] there is no joint ownership; nor is it a company formed for certain commercial transactions, since in the [Efficax Altruismus] each individual makes transactions for himself, and the profit and loss falls on each individual…

It is also not a collegium (a college)….since it is formed from separate [communities]. It is also not a universitas (a corporate body), because…for it is required that it has property, a common treasure, a common seal, a common syndicus and a recognised leader.

“the [Efficax Altruismus] is … a firm alliance of many cities, towns and communities for the purpose of ensuring that enterprises on water and on land have the desired and favourable success and that effective protection is provided against pirates and highwaymen, so that the merchants are not deprived of their goods and valuables by their raids.” - The Hanse in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, I think...

Comment by winstonBosan on What good is G-factor if you're dumped in the woods? A field report from a camp counselor. · 2024-01-12T15:17:14.100Z · LW · GW

Oh my, I hope your sanity is holding. 

In a sort of morbid way, seems like things are working as intended - the "sharp" fella is winning social battles (invented or not) and keep exploiting the ever widening strategy space. Emboldened, he quickly gets to the "this is the line and no further" boundary of his current strategy. But instead of modifying it and keep his old strategy as a tool in his arsenal, he over-exploit it and disrupts the equilibrium so much he gets kicked out. 

Comment by winstonBosan on Screen-supported Portable Monitor · 2024-01-04T15:23:07.252Z · LW · GW

It is very possible that it works - though I am somewhat doubtful and I don’t have a unit to test it.

A quick way for us to learn more would be to I guess duct tape the screen to the laptop at the angle/height your want - and work with it for a bit. Might be able to get more experimental data than our theory crafting.

Comment by winstonBosan on Screen-supported Portable Monitor · 2024-01-04T14:23:37.099Z · LW · GW

Indeed! But these are side loads instead of directly above the hinges. 

Imagine this... you are a hinge. You are designed to take loads that roughly matches the motion of opening and closing of the lid + a bit of additional tolerance. But when someone mounts something heavy on the side of the laptop, you are mostly annoyed but OK with it because the side load will try to rip out the hinges out of their respective housing in different directions - the housing is usually plastic on cheaper computers, but perhaps aluminum on macs? 

The problem with have that much weight on the top of your laptop would be... that your hinges would want to close when you don't want them to - they not designed to be stable while holding onto that much weight + the leverage given to the new screen from being far away from the hinge assembly. 

Comment by winstonBosan on Screen-supported Portable Monitor · 2024-01-04T14:14:33.738Z · LW · GW

It might work, but it seems like the main difficulty would be the laptop hinge.

The hinge would be taking way more force than it is intended to take. And from my experience, it is somewhere around 3kg for macbook air 13 (your model is likely different) - so a M156 mounted 35cm above the hinge might produce quite a bit of stress. 

Comment by winstonBosan on The likely first longevity drug is based on sketchy science. This is bad for science and bad for longevity. · 2023-12-12T16:04:01.993Z · LW · GW

Just going off a hunch, mostly the asymmetry of risk and award?:

Award: Spread the gospel of probabilistic truth, personal intellectual growth potentially

Risk: retaliation (especially if the author is in the field), harassment, threats, law suits, wait… just more kinda of retaliation really. And potentially been seen as some one against the field of anti-aging despite an attempt at doing good science.

Comment by winstonBosan on I'm a Former Israeli Officer. AMA · 2023-10-10T08:59:56.034Z · LW · GW

Hiya Yovel! Q1: How have you been impacted by the recent hostilities? Q2: What do you think are the potential end goals of this newly re-escalated conflict for the Israeli government? (As an naive observer, seems like [occupying Gaza / leave a power vacuum / let the Hamas reorg after] are all rather bad outcomes)

Comment by winstonBosan on Open Call for Research Assistants in Developmental Interpretability · 2023-08-30T15:45:20.318Z · LW · GW

Always welcome more optionality in the opportunity space!

Suggestion: Potential Improvement in Narrative Signalling by lowering the range of RAs to hire (thus increasing pay): 

  • If I were applying to this, I'd feel confused and slightly underappreciated if I had the right set of ML/Software Engineering skills but to be barely paid subsistence level for my full-time work (in NY). 
  • It seems like the funding amount is well corresponded to how much the grant is. I am rather naive when it comes to how much ML/engineering talent should be paid in pursuit of alignment goals. But it seems like $70k spread across 4 people at full-time (for half year each) is only slightly above minimal wage in many places. 
  • Comparisons: At 35k a year, it seems it might be considerably lower than industry equivalent even when compared to other programs 
    • Ex: Lightcone has a general policy of paying ~70% market pay for equivalent talent. 
      • Recalling from memory of LTFF/similar grants that experienced researchers were granted 70k ~ 200k for their individual research. 
      • A quick glance at 80k job-board for RAs nets me a range of 32,332 ~ 87,000. 
  • Of course... money is tight: The grant constraint is well acknowledged here. But potentially the number of RAs expected to hire can be further down adjusted as while potentially increasing the submission rate of the candidates that truly fits the requirement of the research program. 
  • Hiring more might not work as intended: Also, it might come as a surprise that fewer people to manage will turn out to be a blessing rather than a curse - hiring one's way out of something is tempting but should usually be tempered with caution.
  • Thing I might have got wrong: 
    • The intended audiences and people of the right skill-set will not be in countries where the salary is barely above subsistence level. 
    • The Research Project has decided that people who possesses an instinct for "I'd like to work here, but please give me X because I think I am worth that much and can offer at least that much value" is generally a poor fit for the project. 
    • A misunderstanding the salary distribution and the rate of deterioration of the current financial climate within the scene. 

Overall, I am glad y'all exist! Good luck :)

Comment by winstonBosan on Apparently, of the 195 Million the DoD allocated in University Research Funding Awards in 2022, more than half of them concerned AI or compute hardware research · 2023-07-07T23:24:42.704Z · LW · GW

Viktor has a point here - the title is informative, but not well optimized (perhaps intentionally) for attracting eyeballs. 

Something akin to:
Military and AI Compute: DoD's 100 million cheque and what did it get for them?  

Might do the trick a bit better.

Comment by winstonBosan on Failing to fix a dangerous intersection · 2022-07-04T02:02:06.279Z · LW · GW

*Not actual advice
Blow the matters up in an election season, concentrate media focus with minimal cost. Contact local political activists and famous NIMBYs, mass pamphlet style mobilization. Silent protest (of even just one) outside the Berkeley Department of Transportation. 

Comment by winstonBosan on What's The Best Place to Look When You Have A Question About x? · 2022-05-25T18:31:21.526Z · LW · GW
  • Carwash Forum for repair advice, purchases and general industry gossips about carwashes. 
  • RedFlagDeals for Canadian, especially Ontario, localized advices. Think advices that an average family would ask their friends for. Ex: "How much is it to hire a plumber to install the new water meter?" 
  • OpenCorporate if you are doing the lowest effort of corporate due-diligence and KYC *NOT LEGAL ADVICE.
Comment by winstonBosan on Why does gradient descent always work on neural networks? · 2022-05-21T00:47:03.617Z · LW · GW

Agreed, there can be a optimum. But I think the intuition here is that it is exceedingly rare enough to run into a situation where it is local optima in all "directions". 

It is only an "optimum" when all 175 billion parameters are telling you to screw off and stop trying.

Comment by winstonBosan on [deleted post] 2022-05-18T15:18:03.515Z

My instinct is that, the lotteries odds were not truly random or close to truly random. Or the odds for the specific lotteries were a lot better than assumed. 

Or in other words, the prior for the lotteries being fair is low.

Comment by winstonBosan on Russia has Invaded Ukraine · 2022-02-24T15:52:22.975Z · LW · GW

Quick note on “Ukraine…has not trained its people in guerrilla warfare.” I am sure that Ukraine has not engaged in public programs to turn a significant percentage of its population into capable guerrilla fighters.

However, from my sources in the NATO deployments, the Ukrainian irregulars and volunteers have been rigorously trained in “…irregular warfare” in significant numbers - to quote my sources. Will provide more rigorous and structure info shortly.

Comment by winstonBosan on winstonBosan's Shortform · 2022-02-13T13:47:59.888Z · LW · GW

Today, there is a distinct lack of faith. 
This lack of faith has permeated all pairs of 16oz denims, event merch hoodies and smartwool socks. The lack of faith is insidious, bad, and all things molochian.

Actually, screw this manifesto writing style. I am about to meta criticize myself for a style that has NOT aged well and tends to be way too authoritarian in tone but measly in effective information communicated.

Actually, screw this meta-criticism. In all good faith, I didn't have to write the criticism. I could have simply done the internal self-criticism and just deleted what I have written to start anew. Instead, I have now left it as a slightly well-disguised monument to my apparent self-improved and evolution. But really, just to stroke my ego and fill the word count.

Actually, have I written anything of content yet? Have I put my pen to paper and allow the ink to betray my trust when my back is turned? (also known as drying)

Oh no... Better start counting the trains that leave Datong for the trail of coal crumbs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Real Content Soon™

Comment by winstonBosan on The Apprentice Thread · 2021-06-18T13:54:44.137Z · LW · GW

[APPRENTICE] I'd like to take Isusr on what is being offered. Writing directly as well.  Following in danohu's good idea in leaving a message to show that Isusr's proposal and the apprentice system is attractive.

Comment by winstonBosan on Pain is not the unit of Effort · 2020-11-25T14:30:53.189Z · LW · GW

It is likely this one: “吃得苦中苦,方为人上人”. Lit. Eat the most bitter of the bitters, become the person above the people.