/ratanon/ - Rationalists Anonymous

>>11163

>What do you choose to believe?

That I'm not intrinsically unattractive and there are girls that want to date me. That my friends don't just pretend to like me because they feel sorry. That my bizarre doubts about my own identity and the world aren't true. etc.

I know that this post activates the hilarious imageboard social script where you reply "but Anon, all those bad things are actually true" but I do have real evidence against them. It's just that, in my dark moments, the evidence isn't persuasive, while a performative leap of faith is. The conclusion is the same, of course.

>>11166

If you have valid reasons to believe something on an intellectual level then it's fine if you need a leap of faith to believe it on a gut level. The important thing is that you try to only believe things that are true, and that's what you're doing.

>>11167

>The important thing is that you try to only believe things that are true

What complicates things in OP's case is that girls seem to find irrational self-confidence (i.e., self-confidence at a level that would be unjustified in nearly all people) inherently attractive.

>>11162

I've been struggling with intrusive thoughts ever since I had a bad LSD trip (thought loops, paranoia, dissociation) a few months ago, and as a result of seeing this post I looked up "pure O" OCD, which seems to be exactly what I'm suffering from, though there is a bit of compulsive stuff: picking scabs, hand washing, tic-ish behavior.

I already kind of knew I was OCD, since everyone in my nuclear family seems to have it to some degree, but I never connected the issues with anxiety and intrusive thoughts that cropped up after that bad trip to my OCD (I had basically forgotten that the O in OCD meant "intrusive thoughts").

Most of the anxiety was about my inability to pin down whether or not my mental health was deteriorating (and if so, what the cause was), and that became an obsession. I think the thing that scared me the most was that I had no idea _what_ was wrong, which means that if something was seriously wrong I wouldn't know in what direction I should be working to fix it.

AFAICT, once someone with OCD realizes that they are just obsessing over something, the obsession loses a lot of power, though it remains to be seen whether or not my situation will improve.

thanks anon!

>>11196

Would you still recommend LSD?

https://youtube.com/watch?v=9CO6M2HsoIA

>>11194

I wonder if one could build some of those with a 3D printer, RC toys, bullets, smartphones…

>>11169

Like an upload isn't going to go full Skynet within five minutes of starting to self-modify.

>>11170

At least it is still human in some sense.

>>11170

Self modifying entities are still value preserving. You'd end up with some kind of super intelligence taking over the world, sure. But it would be an entity with *human values*, which is the best we can hope for.

>>11177

Have you seen what people with human values do to other people?

>>11177

Humans do not have well-defined utility functions, and are predictably irrational. A human given free rein to self-modify would quickly fuck it up and fail to preserve their values, and if they actually go FOOM then what comes out the other side would be an inhuman uFAI, guaranteed.

Also, what >>11180 said. Homo homini lupus est.

LOL. AA is idiotic.

You could just say you are 1/16th black and complain about them assuming your race which is a social construct.

I'm not even joking. There are whites that identify as being black. And have historically been discriminated against by other whites. Because they had a few black ancestors. A lot of "African Americans" are upwards of 75% European ancestry anyway.

>>9844

>Same question applies. Why would they want to exterminate the humans?

Because they are robots that don't value human life.

>Sure it can go on the list of ideologies to fix, after Stalinism and communism and Nazism and theocracy and anarcho-primitivism and so on.

Please, enlighten me on how to fix any or all of the problems with communism and make it actually work. That would be completely amazing and great if you could do that.

But you can't do that. You can fix utilitarianism though. At it's core it's an optimal system that solves tons of issues every other system has. It just has some weird edge cases, that can be easily fixed with methods like I proposed.

>>9845

>Because they are robots that don't value human life.

Why wouldn't they?

>But you can't do that.

That's the point.

>that can be easily fixed with methods like I proposed.

lolno

Using your >>9838 "You can make new agents if you want, but they split your share of the total utility." we can end up with all a tiny minority of the world having the vast majority of the utility. For example, if half the starting agents have children at replacement rate and the other half have above replacement rate, you can end up with an infinitesimal percentage of the total population having 50% of utility. Your fix is no fix.

But attempting fixes is irrelevant: "Utility" is impossible to properly define and even if you could define it, you run into the problem of knowledge, since no one can know what actions have the most utility. You are in the situation communism is in, the need to be omniscient and to be able to communicate that omniscience to everyone instantly. And we've already heard your view of communism.

Fundamentally flawed. Even more so than communism, which at least has a logically possible goal of redistribution, no matter how impractical and wrongheaded.

>>9846

>For example, if half the starting agents have children at replacement rate and the other half have above replacement rate, you can end up with an infinitesimal percentage of the total population having 50% of utility.

I'm completely ok with that. If you choose to not have children, you shouldn't be forced to subsidize breeders.

But if you prefer you can distribute utility among all living people.

>"Utility" is impossible to properly define

It has a precise mathematical definition. And for practical purposes we can approximate it well enough.

>you run into the problem of knowledge, since no one can know what actions have the most utility.

Hence expected utility. You take the actions with the highest predicted utility. This is really basic stuff.

>>9847

> for practical purposes we can approximate it well enough.

>>9825

He even made a music video about it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CcgrdFF6ik

>>10998

Good link, I love Greg Egan's worldbuilding. Haven't read the book. I read the story excerpt and didn't like any of the characters. Felt like young adult fiction.

>>11001

Haven't read it yet, but Egan is usually worth it for the interesting physics alone. I really enjoyed the Orthogonal trilogy, about a universe in a Riemannian instead of Lorentzian manifold.

Someone in a different thread once requested the source of an image that was from LiarTownUSA. I can't find that thread, so I'm putting the source link here, on the off chance this brings someone, somewhere, closure. http://liartownusa.tumblr.com/post/123830445900/ice-t-law-order-svu-part-iii

>>11070

I enjoy reading nostalgebraist, but that post is BS. It should be "dril or uncharitable characterizations of yudkowsky by liberals".

Except the last yudkowsky quote, but that is a bet he actually won? It feels like ridiculing JFK's "we're going to the moon" speech if you don't know that people actually went to the moon.

>>11071

He's comparing them because it's funny. "Donate all your X to Y or face torture forever" is a pattern dril's tweet and Roko's basilisk both fit in, and that's surprising.

The second one is weak, but that still leaves two good ones.

He did put actual Yudkowsky criticism in other posts, but this post is just a joke, it's not trying to be an argument.

>>11073

>"Donate all your X to Y or face torture forever"

You do realize that literally no one made this argument, right? Roko's original comment was an argument against "friendly ai" (i.e. it would be morally abhorrent to donate to something that may end up torturing people).

>>11075

It's a description of the blackmail.

>>10238

I can't believe the posters here were able to afford 5 IP addresses each!

>>11135

Fine, retard. I know C, C++ and Java. I even have programs on Github.

>>11132

Sorry.

Yeah, I need to calm down. That fucking retard (pun intended, he is a retard and he has sex) is a fucking sociopath and sadist. The only way to deal with suck fuckers is to fight back, otherwise we will sound like pushovers.

>>11137

No, he's trolling. If you hadn't "fought back" it would have stopped right away and looked less embarassing.

Are you still neurotypical if you have ADHD? What about OCD? Both seem to be overrepresented in programmers.

What's her IQ?

I don't want to be mean but there's something strangely unnatractive about that girl. Do you have any other pictures maybe it's just that one ?

>>11103

Is it the schnozz? If there was a cute gentile girl with a big honker I'd definitely like to kiss her there

>>11114

Do you find Mediterranean girls cute, anon? The Roman nose is a thing.

>>11117

Yeah. In fact, my oneitis was a Turkish girl, back when I had those.

nigga how the fuck is a teenage girl with superpowers, who exercises regularly and takes down literally indestructible china man, having problems with bullying ?

it's like she's two different characters.

>>10983

>What is a character arc

>>10991

It's obvious you don't work out or practice any kind of sport.

>>10917

Recommend skipping Games People Play. You can roughly understand the book's thesis (and transactional analysis generally) as part Freud, part Hansonian "X is not about Y", and part "people frequently have self-sabotaging habits with ego-syntonic results".

From the Wikipedia summary:

> The second half of the book catalogues a series of "mind games" in which people interact through a patterned and predictable series of "transactions" which are superficially plausible (that is, they may appear normal to bystanders or even to the people involved), but which actually conceal motivations, include private significance to the parties involved, and lead to a well-defined predictable outcome, usually counterproductive. … In reality, the "winner" of a mind game is the person that returns to the Adult ego-state first.

IMO, if you're happy with the gist, it's not really worth reading the book for the examples. They take up most of the book and are the least convincing part, after the Freud.

>>11068

I see. Well I didn't read Freud and I generally drop things if I don't get my payload in terms of knowledge/perspective fast. I know I will be judged for this but that's how it is. Thanks for the info.

What are you getting at, OP? Do you perceive that article as anti-Trump?

>>11000

>>11009

Not op, but is there really a reason for including Trump in that article ?

>became the opioid epidemic until the Trump phenomenon sent journalists out to the hinterland looking for an explanation

Just look at this fuckinng expression. He's basically equivalating being at the lower end of the misery spectrum with being a suporter of trump.

Scott's post didn't even touch politics as far as I remember.

I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm not American. I don't see that article as anit-trump, but that passage is a nod towards all those who were blown the fuck up by Trump winning and started looking for reasons. (deplorable, uneducated, racist, sexist, lower end of the misery spectrum)

What he could have done is actually write a personal extension to Scott's post, not just a reflection.

>>11010

>Not op, but is there really a reason for including Trump in that article ?

It wouldn't surprise me if as a New York Times columnist he was required, contractually or informally, to tie his writing to current politics. It could also be that this genuinely is how the man thinks and writes of his own volition, perhaps because being a columnist for the New York Times selects for it, rewires you for it, or both. I mean, the guy read Moldbug and posted https://twitter.com/douthatnyt/status/753593110882574336.

>>11014

I agree with what you said but I'm having a hard time with the last part regarding that tweet. You don't need to read Moldbug for that.

>simplicio: Or maybe it would just give stupid voters a louder voice. I don’t like the evil conspiracy of the press and political elites that governs my country from the shadows, but I am willing to consider the proposition that the alternative is Donald Trump. I mean, I intend to go on fighting the Conspiracy about many specific issues. But if you’re proposing a reform that puts more power into the hands of sheep not yet awakened, the results could be even worse.

OP you should read Elizier's new book

no it's not a legitimate concern

fuck normie nucoder shit

I'm fucking tired of all the electron bullshit and cybersecurity experts with 10 PHDs that have no idea what they are talking about

AI can't come soon enough.

>>11019

>no it's not a legitimate concern

and

>fuck normie nucoder shit

>AI can't come soon enough.

are rather in contradiction.

>>11019

So why do you think it won't come soon?

>>11049

https://forum.wordreference.com/threads/couldnt-come-sooner-cant-come-soon-enough.1865622/

>>11050

Damn. I didn't read the post carefully.

One possible teal deer:

Competition for science funding is fierce and biases the work that gets done towards "important" (note sarcasm quotes) things.

In a better world, there would be a higher funding/researcher ratio so researchers would work on problems that would make life nicer (researching shockingly simple SAD cures) instead of focusing on projects that would get them the most prestige.

>>10970

Normtards need to go to hell.

/r/Sneerclub is really disappointing.

I first came across it just after I'd read some sensible critique of Yudkowsky, about his expectations about AI and his attitude towards pop culture vs high culture and people with degrees. It didn't convince me that he was terrible (and it didn't try to), but it did add some much-needed nuance.

So I expected to learn things that added the same kind of nuance to my opinion about SSC and SSC-adjacent activities. But then I followed a link, and I just saw people quoting things and saying how much bullshit they were, and nobody was explaining why they were bullshit, and I kept scrolling and it was just more of the same. I wasn't learning much.

It's a place for people who already dislike the rationalist community to talk about how much they dislike them, not a place that tries to change minds. I should have expected that, from the name and the description, but it was disappointing anyway.

>>10996

I understand that it's hard to comprehend that your precious ingroup "grey tribe" member is wrong, but I think you're taking important steps on the path to enlightenment. That said:

nerd voice "It's a place for people who already dislike the rationalist community to talk about how much they dislike them, not a place that tries to change minds. I should have expected that, from the name and the description, but it was disappointing anyway."

(((nerd voice)))