The Less Wrong Mock Thread: The Big Yudkowsky

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atelier morgan: Mar 11, 2003; super-scientific, ultra-gay; Lipstick Apathy

The Vosgian Beast posted:

Lemme put it this way: Less Wrong is not Jonas Salk. Less Wrong is a guy claiming we should build giant space guns to shoot diseases out of people's bodies, and anyone saying that all our resources into this is a "sickist"

This, or basically if you read anything on there and think 'hmm this strikes me as reasonable' then:

1) It was an idea somebody else came up with being republished there with or without attribution
2) You'll find another article on the same subject that will make it entirely unreasonable again

# ? May 15, 2014 23:35

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# ? May 22, 2024 20:40

Chamale: Jul 11, 2010; I'm helping!

More to the point, Less Wrong thinks it's better to blow everything on a chance at immortality rather than saving a bunch of people only to have them die eventually anyway.

# ? May 15, 2014 23:42

DStecks: Feb 6, 2012

Fenrisulfr posted:

I dunno, the idea that we should prevent death if we can (and maintain a desirable standard of living while doing so) doesn't strike me as unreasonable?

It's unreasonable because we cannot, in fact, end death.

# ? May 15, 2014 23:58

Lottery of Babylon: Apr 25, 2012; STRAIGHT TROPIN'

Patter Song posted:

When Harry sees ghosts, he rants that they're just memory imprints of the dead on a location and not actually sentient.

I agree, just because they walk around and talk and act just like the person and have all that person's memories doesn't mean they're actually sentient.

But a subroutine in an AI's memory is obviously sentient, and you might be one and might be about to be tortured right now unless you help the AI!

Patter Song posted:

Harry sees the dementors as the living embodiment of Death itself and has pledged a campaign to destroy every last one of them.

But Dementors don't even kill you. They separate your soul from your body and leave your body catatonic. They aren't death; if anything, they're closer to cryonics.

How is it ~rational~ to decide that something is "the living embodiment of Death itself" just because it's dangerous and looks creepy, and vow to destroy it not because of what it does but because of what it symbolizes?

Fenrisulfr posted:

I dunno, the idea that we should prevent death if we can (and maintain a desirable standard of living while doing so) doesn't strike me as unreasonable?

Sure, preventing death if we can sounds cool. The problem is that "if we can" bit. What's your plan for bringing about immortality? Because Yudkowsky's is literally to hope the laws of physics magically change. Resources are better spent on successfully helping people than on daydreaming.

Of course, the question is a bit different if you ask it in the Harry Potter universe, where the first book alone establishes that immortality is possible even without doing anything morally reprehensible and doesn't seem to have any negative side-effects other than "bad guys might get to live longer too". That's fantasy for you.

# ? May 16, 2014 00:01

kvx687: Dec 29, 2009; Soiled Meat

AATREK CURES KIDS posted:

Hot drat. Did Yudkowski read the seventh book? The whole point of the series isn't good vs. evil, it's that Harry and Voldemort both try to become the Master Of Death; Voldemort fails because he tries to live forever, Harry succeeds because he learns to accept that death is part of life. Actually, Eliezer probably read that far into the book and angrily condemned Rowling as a deathist.

Yudkowsky hasn't read the first book. He's been pretty clear that he never read the books and has no interest in doing so, and all his knowledge of the series comes from Wikipedia and other fanfiction.

# ? May 16, 2014 00:03

Mors Rattus: Oct 25, 2007; FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

How do you write fanfic of a thing you don't like and haven't even read?

Why would you do that?

# ? May 16, 2014 00:36

The Vosgian Beast: Aug 13, 2011; Business is slow

Lottery of Babylon posted:

But Dementors don't even kill you. They separate your soul from your body and leave your body catatonic. They aren't death; if anything, they're closer to cryonics.

How is it ~rational~ to decide that something is "the living embodiment of Death itself" just because it's dangerous and looks creepy, and vow to destroy it not because of what it does but because of what it symbolizes?

Dementors are a metaphor for depression. Rowling has always been quite clear on that.

# ? May 16, 2014 00:59

Patter Song: Mar 26, 2010; Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.; Fun Shoe

Lottery of Babylon posted:

But Dementors don't even kill you. They separate your soul from your body and leave your body catatonic. They aren't death; if anything, they're closer to cryonics.

How is it ~rational~ to decide that something is "the living embodiment of Death itself" just because it's dangerous and looks creepy, and vow to destroy it not because of what it does but because of what it symbolizes?

So everyone can be clear on what we're discussing (long quote ahead, sorry, but it's necessary):

Harry Potter Methods of Rationality Chapter 45 posted:

His wand rose into the starting position for the Patronus Charm.

Harry thought of the stars, the image that had almost held off the Dementor even without a Patronus. Only this time, Harry added the missing ingredient, he'd never truly seen it but he'd seen the pictures and the video. The Earth, blazing blue and white with reflected sunlight as it hung in space, amid the black void and the brilliant points of light. It belonged there, within that image, because it was what gave everything else its meaning. The Earth was what made the stars significant, made them more than uncontrolled fusion reactions, because it was Earth that would someday colonize the galaxy, and fulfill the promise of the night sky.

Would they still be plagued by Dementors, the children's children's children, the distant descendants of humankind as they strode from star to star? No. Of course not. The Dementors were only little nuisances, paling into nothingness in the light of that promise; not unkillable, not invincible, not even close. You had to put up with little nuisances, if you were one of the lucky and unlucky few to be born on Earth; on Ancient Earth, as it would be remembered someday. That too was part of what it meant to be alive, if you were one of the tiny handful of sentient beings born into the beginning of all things, before intelligent life had come fully into its power. That the much vaster future depended on what you did here, now, in the earliest days of dawn, when there was still so much darkness to be fought, and temporary nuisances like Dementors.

Mum and Dad, Hermione's friendship and Draco's journey, Neville and Seamus and Lavender and Dean, the blue sky and brilliant Sun and all bright things, the Earth, the stars, the promise, everything humanity was and everything it would become...

On the wand, Harry's fingers moved into their starting positions; he was ready, now, to think the right sort of warm and happy thought.

And Harry's eyes stared directly at that which lay beneath the tattered cloak, looked straight at that which had been named Dementor. The void, the emptiness, the hole in the universe, the absence of color and space, the open drain through which warmth poured out of the world.

The fear it exuded stole away all happy thoughts, its closeness drained your power and strength, its kiss would destroy everything that you were.

I know you now, Harry thought as his wand twitched once, twice, thrice and four times, as his fingers slid exactly the right distances, I comprehend your nature, you symbolize Death, through some law of magic you are a shadow that Death casts into the world.

And Death is not something I will ever embrace.

It is only a childish thing, that the human species has not yet outgrown.

And someday...

We'll get over it...

And people won't have to say goodbye any more...

The wand rose up and leveled straight at the Dementor.

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!"

The thought exploded from him like a breaking dam, surged down his arm into his wand, burst from it as blazing white light. Light that became corporeal, took on shape and substance.

A figure with two arms, two legs, and a head, standing upright; the animal Homo sapiens, the shape of a human being.

Glowing brighter and brighter as Harry poured all his strength into his spell, blazing with incandescent light brighter than the fading sunset, the Aurors and Professor Quirrell shielding their eyes in shock -

And someday when the descendants of humanity have spread from star to star, they won't tell the children about the history of Ancient Earth until they're old enough to bear it; and when they learn they'll weep to hear that such a thing as Death had ever once existed!

The figure of a human shone more brilliant now than the noonday Sun, so radiant that Harry could feel the warmth of it on his skin; and Harry sent out all his defiance at the shadow of Death, opening all the floodgates inside him to make that bright shape blaze even brighter and yet brighter.

You are not invincible, and someday the human species will end you.

I will end you if I can, by the power of mind and magic and science.

I won't cower in fear of Death, not while I have a chance of winning.

I won't let Death touch me, I won't let Death touch the ones I love.

And even if you do end me before I end you,

Another will take my place, and another,

Until the wound in the world is healed at last...

Harry lowered his wand, and the bright figure of a human faded away.

Slowly, he exhaled.

Like waking up from a dream, like opening his eyes after sleep, Harry's gaze moved away from the cage, he looked around and saw that everyone was staring at him.

Albus Dumbledore was staring at him.

Professor Quirrell was staring at him.

The Auror trio was staring at him.

They were all looking at him like they'd just seen him destroy a Dementor.

The tattered cloak lay empty within the cage.

This manages to read like a religious parable for the world's shittiest religion, where spaceships and interstellar colonization have made death obsolete(?). More specifically, Harry defeating Death (TM) itself and leaving only its tattered cloak behind is early Christian (or just flat-out Christian) as possible: "O Death, where is thy victory," indeed. Christianity's entire theme is the open tomb, the empty cross, death cheated of that which it has always expected, and the promise that the rest of mankind will someday follow suit. This appears to also be Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality's theme, as bizarre as that seems given that Rowling's original series was all about coming to terms with and accepting death, not triumphing over it.

# ? May 16, 2014 01:07

Asgerd: May 6, 2012; I worked up a powerful loneliness in my massive bed, in the massive dark.; Grimey Drawer

Lottery of Babylon posted:

But Dementors don't even kill you. They separate your soul from your body and leave your body catatonic. They aren't death; if anything, they're closer to cryonics.

How is it ~rational~ to decide that something is "the living embodiment of Death itself" just because it's dangerous and looks creepy, and vow to destroy it not because of what it does but because of what it symbolizes?

JK Rowling posted:

"You do not seek to kill me, Dumbledore?" called Voldemort, his scarlet eyes narrowed over the top of the shield. "Above such brutality, are you?"
"We both know there are other ways of destroying a man, Tom." Dumbledore said calmly. "Merely taking your life would not satisfy me, I admit � "
"There is nothing worse than death, Dumbledore!" snarled Voldemort.
"You are quite wrong," said Dumbledore, still closing in upon Voldemort and speaking as lightly as though they were discussing the matter over drinks. Harry felt scared to see him walking along, undefended, shieldless. He wanted to cry out a warning, but his headless guard kept shunting him backward toward the wall, blocking his every attempt to get out from behind it. "Indeed your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has always been your greatest weakness �"

I wonder which character he relates to the most...

# ? May 16, 2014 01:47

Patter Song: Mar 26, 2010; Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.; Fun Shoe

Asgerd posted:

I wonder which character he relates to the most...

You have no idea how right you are.

HPMOR Chapter 100 posted:

Harry replied evenly. Professor Quirrell was still a major suspect, and it was good for him not to know the details. "Now why are you eating unicorns?"

"Ah," Professor Quirrell said. "As to that�" The man hesitated. "I was drinking the blood of unicorns, not eating them. The missing flesh, the ragged marks upon the body - those were to obscure the case, to make it seem like some other predator. The use of unicorn's blood is too well-known."

"I don't know it," Harry said.

"I know you do not," the Defense Professor said sharply. "Or you would not be pestering me about it. The power of unicorn's blood is to preserve your life for a time, even if you are on the very verge of death."

There was a stretch of time when Harry's brain claimed to be refusing to process the words, which was of course a lie, because you couldn't know the meaning you weren't allowed to process, without having already processed it.

A strange sense of blankness overtook Harry, an absence of reaction, maybe this was what other people felt like when someone went off-script, and they couldn't say or think of anything to do.

Of course Professor Quirrell was dying, not just occasionally ill.

Professor Quirrell had known he was dying. He'd volunteered to take the Defense Professor position at Hogwarts, after all.

Of course he'd been getting worse the whole school year. Of course illnesses which kept getting worse had a predictable destination at their end.

Harry's brain had surely known already, somewhere in the safe back of his mind where he could refuse to process things he'd already processed.

Of course that was why Professor Quirrell wouldn't be able to teach Battle Magic next year. Professor McGonagall wouldn't even have to fire him. He would just be -

- dead.

"No," Harry said, his voice a little shaky. "There has to be a way -"

"I am not stupid nor particularly eager to die. I have already looked. I had to go this far simply to last out my lesson plans, having less time than I had thought, and -" The head of the dark moonlit figure turned away. "I think I do not want to hear about it, Mr. Potter."

Harry's breath hitched. Too many emotions were bubbling up in him at once. After denial came anger, according to a ritual someone had just made up. And yet it seemed surprisingly appropriate.

"And why -" Harry's breath hitched again. "Why isn't unicorn's blood standard in healer's kits, then? To keep someone alive, even if they're on the very verge of dying from their legs being eaten?"

"Because there are permanent side effects," Professor Quirrell said quietly.

"Side effects? Side effects? What kind of side effect is medically worse than DEATH? " Harry's voice rose on the last word until he was shouting.

"Not everyone thinks the same way we do, Mr. Potter. Though, to be fair, the blood must come from a live unicorn and the unicorn must die in the drinking. Would I be here otherwise?"

Harry turned, stared at the surrounding trees. "Have a herd of unicorns at St. Mungos. Floo the patients there, or use portkeys."

"Yes, that would work."

Harry's face tightened, the only outward sign behind his trembling hands of everything that was welling up inside him.

Remember that Quirrell is...well...Voldemort. At pretty much every turn Harry has accepted Quirrell as this omniscient sage despite Quirrell's obvious wrongness. Harry is basically Quirrell/Voldemort's protege/sidekick throughout the story and the story seems to be setting up Quirrell/Voldemort as a wise Obi-Wan Kenobi figure to guide Harry.

# ? May 16, 2014 01:55

Lottery of Babylon: Apr 25, 2012; STRAIGHT TROPIN'

Patter Song posted:

"Side effects? Side effects? What kind of side effect is medically worse than DEATH? " Harry's voice rose on the last word until he was shouting.

I will describe myself as I see myself: I am a great soft jelly thing. Smoothly rounded, with no mouth, with pulsing white holes filled by fog where my eyes used to be. Rubbery appendages that were once my arms; bulks rounding down into legless humps of soft slippery matter. I leave a moist trail when I move. Blotches of diseased, evil gray come and go on my surface, as though light is being beamed from within. Outwardly: dumbly, I shamble about, a thing that could never have been known as human, a thing whose shape is so alien a travesty that humanity becomes more obscene for the vague resemblance. Inwardly: alone.

Still better off than those four suckers though :smug:

gently caress you the rest of humanity I survived the longest so I win!!

It really shouldn't need refuting, but to point out the obvious problems (other than "you're murdering unicorns what's wrong with you") with his unicorn scheme:

a) Unicorns might be sentient. Magical creatures in Harry Potter frequently are, and I don't think the tiny glimpse we get of them in the books shows they're not. In that case, killing multiple sentients to save one can't be justified because something something utilitarianism something something Bayes' rule.

b) The doctors who need to spill the unicorn blood for you to drink (most patients on death's door won't be able to hunt and slay them singlehandedly), or perhaps even everyone involved in setting up the unicorn abattoir, might be subject to the curse too. Who's going to volunteer to test the exact mechanics of who gets cursed?

c) The other magical creatures won't be amused by your unicorn slaughter factory. Hope you're ready for a war with the centaurs.

d) Seriously, you spend most of your time writing about evil AI's torturing people for eternity, how can you be unable to imagine a curse worse than death? By this logic, you want to anger the evil AI so that it will simulate and torture you as much as possible, because an extra life in a horrible torture simulation is still better than not having an extra life at all.

Lottery of Babylon fucked around with this message at 04:23 on May 16, 2014

# ? May 16, 2014 04:05

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Lottery of Babylon posted:

d) Seriously, you spend most of your time writing about evil AI's torturing people for eternity, how can you be unable to imagine a curse worse than death? By this logic, you want to anger the evil AI so that it will simulate and torture you as much as possible, because an extra life in a horrible torture simulation is still better than not having an extra life at all.

I can think of three hypotheses here, although there are probably more:

a) Yes, Yudkowsky legitimately believes that more life period is better; if we're going with the "recapitulating ancient philosophy he hasn't bothered to read" idea, we can assume that he's decided that even a miserable eternal life is superior to death, because death represents oblivion of the self and even a terrible life represents continuity of the self. (One can even argue that, if Roko's Basilisk is correct, there's even a "redemption from Hell" analogue -- via Timeless Decision Theory, once your past self pays up, your future sim selves are released from Robot Hell, presumably to some sort of transcendent Robot Heaven, because the AI wants what's best and wouldn't just delete them out of hand. That would be deathist!)

b) Yudkowsky, having by all appearances lived a privileged first-world life to date, lacks both the experience and the empathy that might let him understand what torture (or, really, any form of suffering beyond minor illnesses and inconveniences) really means. The concept of a "fate worse than death" is so abstract to him, and he's so fundamentally unimaginative and unconcerned about most human suffering, that he can't or won't meaningfully process it.

c) As demonstrated by his OKCupid profile, Yudkowsky has a sadism fetish and is thus perfectly okay with the concept of deep, unending suffering, as long as it's happening to other people. (It obviously won't happen to him, because he's the elite dom and above it all, and his entire set of goals is based on gaining himself more protection and privilege.) Honestly, the fact that HPMOR apparently involves an ugly snuff scene ("apparently" because Hell if I'm reading that poo poo) makes me lean towards hypotheses that involve frenzied masturbation.

Antivehicular fucked around with this message at 05:20 on May 16, 2014

# ? May 16, 2014 05:17

kvx687: Dec 29, 2009; Soiled Meat

Mors Rattus posted:

How do you write fanfic of a thing you don't like and haven't even read?

Why would you do that?

Because his lovely original fiction wasn't giving him enough attention. Because he heard someone say that Harry Potter is pro-death and blew a gasket. Because his planet-sized ego told him he could do it better. All of the above. This isn't a particularly uncommon thing in the fanfic world, it just stands out more because Yudkowsky is such a weird guy to begin with.

# ? May 16, 2014 06:09

DEKH: Jan 4, 2014

kvx687 posted:

Yudkowsky hasn't read the first book. He's been pretty clear that he never read the books and has no interest in doing so, and all his knowledge of the series comes from Wikipedia and other fanfiction.

This is hilarious. Even when the work is easy, pathetically easy, children's literature easy, he doesn't bother to do the work. As above so below I guess.

# ? May 16, 2014 07:53

Ratoslov: Feb 15, 2012; Now prepare yourselves! You're the guests of honor at the Greatest Kung Fu Cannibal BBQ Ever!

DEKH posted:

This is hilarious. Even when the work is easy, pathetically easy, children's literature easy, he doesn't bother to do the work. As above so below I guess.

This reminds me of Eripsa. I guess it's just not uncommon to want to be a luminary of the academy and have brilliant ideas but deciding that it's too much work to do all the necessary steps and try to skip to the good part cargo-cult style.

# ? May 16, 2014 08:10

Swan Oat: Oct 9, 2012; I was selected for my skill.

Patter Song posted:

HPMOR Chapter 100

Is Harry's Brain a regular character?

# ? May 16, 2014 11:30

One Swell Foop: Aug 5, 2010; I'm afraid we have no time for codes and manners.

Patter Song posted:

There was a stretch of time when Harry's brain claimed to be refusing to process the words, which was of course a lie, because you couldn't know the meaning you weren't allowed to process, without having already processed it.

This stupid line, along with his claim to be able to reprogram his own brain, makes me think that Yud actually believes he is smarter than his own brain.

"Can't process that, eh? How do you know unless you've already processed it? Huh? Dumb brain." :smug:

# ? May 16, 2014 11:30

ol qwerty bastard: Dec 13, 2005; If you want something done, do it yourself!

Swan Oat posted:

Is Harry's Brain a regular character?

Oh boy, is it ever

Harry Potter and the Methods of Irrationality, Chapter 87 posted:

"My own approach is usually to identify the different desires, give them names, conceive of them as separate individuals, and let them argue it out inside my head. So far the main persistent ones are my Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, Gryffindor, and Slytherin sides, my Inner Critic, and my simulated copies of you, Neville, Draco, Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Professor Quirrell, Dad, Mum, Richard Feynman, and Douglas Hofstadter."

And yes, quite a bit of the text is Harry's various sides having arguments in his head.

# ? May 16, 2014 11:41

potatocubed: Jul 26, 2012; *rathian noises*

And a toddler and a flying dog.

# ? May 16, 2014 11:46

ArchangeI: Jul 15, 2010

I'm willing to accept that Harry is able to simulate copies of several people in his head, on account that he is literally a wizard.

# ? May 16, 2014 11:51

Anticheese: Feb 13, 2008; $60,000,000 sexbot

But does he torture them for a quadrillion years so that the original is forced to give him good marks in class?

# ? May 16, 2014 12:13

Olanphonia: Jul 27, 2006; I'm open to suggestions~

I'm probably going to regret asking this but who defeated Voldemort the first time in his fanfic? Harry's parents are both alive, right? I assume he also got rid of Ron as a major character?

# ? May 16, 2014 12:25

Zore: Sep 21, 2010; willfully illiterate, aggressively miserable sourpuss whose sole raison d�etre is to put other people down for liking the wrong things

Olanphonia posted:

I'm probably going to regret asking this but who defeated Voldemort the first time in his fanfic? Harry's parents are both alive, right? I assume he also got rid of Ron as a major character?

I think the big difference is that his Aunt marries a ridiculous !Science! Caricature instead of Vernon. So his life with them is better and he calls them mom and dad.

Oh and Ron gets to be one of the first people Harry decides is below him.

# ? May 16, 2014 12:32

Tiggum: Oct 24, 2007; Your life and your quest end here.

ArchangeI posted:

I'm willing to accept that Harry is able to simulate copies of several people in his head, on account that he is literally a wizard.

I'm pretty sure that's just him doing the perfectly ordinary thing that (I assume) everyone does where you mentally weight up options, only he's doing it in a more "rational" way by specifically assigning consistent sides to different "voices" and imagining what people he knows would think about stuff.

# ? May 16, 2014 13:25

DStecks: Feb 6, 2012

Tiggum posted:

I'm pretty sure that's just him doing the perfectly ordinary thing that (I assume) everyone does where you mentally weight up options, only he's doing it in a more "rational" way by specifically assigning consistent sides to different "voices" and imagining what people he knows would think about stuff.

Aaaaaaand now I'm imagining Daniel Radcliff doing Wesley Willis covers.

# ? May 16, 2014 14:28

ArchangeI: Jul 15, 2010

Tiggum posted:

I'm pretty sure that's just him doing the perfectly ordinary thing that (I assume) everyone does where you mentally weight up options, only he's doing it in a more "rational" way by specifically assigning consistent sides to different "voices" and imagining what people he knows would think about stuff.

Oh certainly, but he worded it in a way that seems eerily similar to what Yudkowsky's magical AI would do.

# ? May 16, 2014 14:31

Skellybones: May 31, 2011; Fun Shoe

So in the same way that Bitcoiners are painfully and rapidly re-inventing basic economics (or rather, the mistakes long forgotten), this gang of try-hards are re-creating philosophy in their glorious technocratic vision?

# ? May 16, 2014 16:22

Mors Rattus: Oct 25, 2007; FATAL & Friends
Walls of Text
#1 Builder
2014-2018

Yeah, except Plato was a much, much better writer, and Aristotle was a much more thoughtful one.

# ? May 16, 2014 16:25

A Shitty Reporter: Oct 29, 2012; Dinosaur Gum

Hell, even bitcoiners actually go through the effort to test their ideas. They might ignore the results, but at least they do something.

# ? May 16, 2014 16:45

NewMars: Mar 10, 2013

On the other hand, Yudkowsky has actually managed to make money using his computer. (And the gullibility of others of course, but that's par for the course with bitcoin too.)

# ? May 17, 2014 05:31

Dr Pepper: Feb 4, 2012; Don't like it? well...

Sunshine89 posted:

Perhaps I was a bit incomplete with my coin toss example:

Wait does he really do things like this? Is this really how debating with him goes?

Somebody has to have some links showing this

# ? May 17, 2014 22:32

Saint Drogo: Dec 26, 2011

quote:

"Side effects? Side effects? What kind of side effect is medically worse than DEATH?" Harry's voice rose on the last word until he was shouting.

He's got a point guys, when was the last time you heard of anyone turning down an extension on their life just because it lacked quality? :colbert:

Also this whole unicorn blood thing is hilarious because it's the most on-the-nose metaphor for Voldemort's mentality you can imagine and he's still missed the point. He's murdering UNICORNS, dude. loving UNICORNS.

Fenrisulfr posted:

If you consider this a good thing, why would it not be a good thing to extend and save lives into infinity, ie. immortality? Assuming of course that the resources needed to do so did not grow in proportion.

Even if we all lived to be 1000, eliminating death wouldn't be anything like a logical next step because that removes one of the key features of all life, impermanence. It changes how we define life in a way an extra year or decade or century doesn't. We all have times when we feel like Lizzy Y seems to all the time, depressed or scared by death, but there's also times when the same impermanence is comforting and even if we don't accept death as a good thing I think coming to terms with it anyway can make us better people. Dying before your time or dying badly is a tragedy, but just the fact that death happens? Nah.

# ? May 17, 2014 23:58

Egregious Offences: Jun 15, 2013

Yudkowsky's AI induced personal hell/torture sequence is having Kansas' "Dust in the Wind" playing constantly in his head while he goes about his normal life.

Egregious Offences fucked around with this message at 03:12 on May 18, 2014

# ? May 18, 2014 03:10

Patter Song: Mar 26, 2010; Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.; Fun Shoe

http://www.reddit.com/r/HPMOR/comments/23wmr4/repost_from_askreddit_because_i_figure_the/

So, on the subreddit discussing Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, someone posed the question asking if you were to wake up and find it June 1st, 1942 and that you'd taken the place of Adolf Hitler, what would you do.

I have never seen people fail a morality test so loving hard before. A good two thirds/three quarters of the responses are attempts to minmax Nazi Germany into an unstoppable juggernaut fueled by 21st century science, and the people who say things about trying to sabotage the war effort are laughed off.

# ? May 18, 2014 07:33

Strategic Tea: Sep 1, 2012

Hell, immortality doesn't even fit with LessWrong's beep boop idea of suffering. Infinite life = infinite specks of dust in the eye = Literally Worse Than Torture.

# ? May 18, 2014 10:02

Skellybones: May 31, 2011; Fun Shoe

Strategic Tea posted:

Hell, immortality doesn't even fit with LessWrong's beep boop idea of suffering. Infinite life = infinite specks of dust in the eye = Literally Worse Than Torture.

Whoa.

# ? May 18, 2014 10:53

SolTerrasa: Sep 2, 2011

Strategic Tea posted:

Hell, immortality doesn't even fit with LessWrong's beep boop idea of suffering. Infinite life = infinite specks of dust in the eye = Literally Worse Than Torture.

Oh well of course you would think that you deathist

# ? May 18, 2014 13:35

Jazu: Jan 1, 2006; Looking for some URANIUM? CLICK HERE

Saint Drogo posted:

Even if we all lived to be 1000, eliminating death wouldn't be anything like a logical next step because that removes one of the key features of all life, impermanence. It changes how we define life in a way an extra year or decade or century doesn't. We all have times when we feel like Lizzy Y seems to all the time, depressed or scared by death, but there's also times when the same impermanence is comforting and even if we don't accept death as a good thing I think coming to terms with it anyway can make us better people. Dying before your time or dying badly is a tragedy, but just the fact that death happens? Nah.

If the only way out of life is to decide to die, anyone with a truly difficult mental block on suicide is in a very dangerous position. That's a much more basic problem, from this thread's perspective: if you conquer death, you have to be more accepting of it, not less. These guys are the last thing you need when it comes to immortality.

Do you think these guys would accept a loved one deciding to die after a thousand years, or would they try to guilt them horribly? Or start all but gaslighting them well in advance to try to convince them that any unhappiness is by definition insanity? It's unsurprising that he hosed with dementors in his thing, because he'd probably have unbelievable contempt for a depressed person.

# ? May 18, 2014 14:49

Somfin: Oct 25, 2010; In my🦚 experience🛠️ the big things🌑 don't teach you anything🤷‍♀️.; Nap Ghost

Strategic Tea posted:

Hell, immortality doesn't even fit with LessWrong's beep boop idea of suffering. Infinite life = infinite specks of dust in the eye = Literally Worse Than Torture.

Could we... post this to him?

# ? May 19, 2014 02:07

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# ? May 22, 2024 20:40

Peel: Dec 3, 2007

Not much point, it doesn't work pretty straightforwardly since the dust specks are outweighed by positive experiences in your life.

# ? May 19, 2014 02:12

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > General Bullshit > The Less Wrong Mock Thread: The Big Yudkowsky

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