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David Althaus — LessWrong

Summary

In this post, we explore different ways of understanding and measuring malevolence and explain why individuals with concerning levels of malevolence are common enough, and likely enough to become and remain powerful, that we expect them to influence the trajectory of the long-term future, including by increasing both x-risks and s-risks. For the purposes of this piece, we define malevolence as a tendency to disvalue (or to fail to value) others’ well-being (more). Such a tendency is concerning, especially when exhibited by powerful actors, because of its correlation with malevolent behaviors (i.e., behaviors that harm or fail to protect others’ well-being). But reducing the long-term societal risks posed by individuals with high levels of malevolence is not straightforward.

Individuals... (read 15518 more words →)

David Althaus's Shortform

David Althaus

This is a special post for quick takes (aka "shortform"). Only the owner can create top-level comments.

Many therapy schools work with inner multiplicity (not just IFS)

David Althaus

David Althaus, Ewelina Tur

Cross-posted to the EA Forum.

Summary

The psychotherapy school Internal Family Systems (IFS) is popular among effective altruists and rationalists. Many view IFS as the only therapy school that recognizes that our psyche has multiple ‘parts’.
As an alternative perspective, we describe comparatively evidence-based therapy approaches that work with such ‘inner multiplicity’ in skillful ways:
- Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT), which incorporates insights from many disciplines, including neuroscience and evolutionary psychology.
- Schema Therapy (ST), which integrates concepts from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and psychodynamic approaches, among others.
- Chairwork, the oldest psychotherapy technique used for working with the minds’ multiple parts and which inspired IFS.
This post may be especially relevant for people interested in ‘internal multiplicity’ and those seeking therapy but who have had

... (read 5221 more words →)

Incentivizing forecasting via social media

David Althaus

David Althaus, Daniel Kokotajlo

Daniel Kokotajlo and I published a post on Incentivizing forecasting via social media on the EA Forum, perhaps of interest to some readers here.

Summary
Most people will probably never participate on existing forecasting platforms which limits their effects on mainstream institutions and public discourse.
Changes to the user interface and recommendation algorithms of social media platforms might incentivize forecasting and lead to its more widespread adoption. Broadly, we envision i) automatically suggesting questions of likely interest to the user—e.g., questions related to the user’s current post or trending topics—and ii) rewarding users with higher than average forecasting accuracy with increased visibility.
In a best case scenario, such forecasting-incentivizing features might have various positive consequences such

David Althaus

Very comprehensive analysis by Brian Tomasik on whether (and to what extent) the simulation argument should change our altruistic priorities. He concludes that the possibility of ancestor simulations somewhat increases the comparative importance of short-term helping relative to focusing on shaping the "far future".

Another important takeaway:

[...] rather than answering the question “Do I live in a simulation or not?,” a perhaps better way to think about it (in line with Stuart Armstrong's anthropic decision theory) is “Given that I’m deciding for all subjectively indistinguishable copies of myself, what fraction of my copies lives in a simulation and how many total copies are there?"

In Praise of Maximizing – With Some Caveats

David Althaus

11y

Most of you are probably familiar with the two contrasting decision making strategies "maximizing" and "satisficing", but a short recap won't hurt (you can skip the first two paragraphs if you get bored): Satisficing means selecting the first option that is good enough, i.e. that meets or exceeds a certain threshold of acceptability. In contrast, maximizing means the tendency to search for so long until the best possible option is found.

Research indicates (Schwartz et al., 2002) that there are individual differences with regard to these two decision making strategies. That is, some individuals – so called ‘maximizers’ – tend to extensively search for the optimal solution. Other people – ‘satisficers’ – settle... (read 2705 more words →)

Meetup : First LW Meetup in Warsaw

David Althaus

12y

Discussion article for the meetup : First LW Meetup in Warsaw

WHEN: 30 March 2014 03:00:00PM (+0100)

WHERE: Cafe Kulturalna, Plac Defilad 1, 00-901 Warszawa

As far as I can tell, there never has been a Lesswrong meetup in Warsaw, although Warsaw has almost 2 million inhabitants.

I'm currently visiting my girlfriend in Warsaw and we would like to meet folks who are also interested in Lesswrong and related topics.

Regarding the content and structure of the meetup: I would suggest that at first everyone proposes some discussion topics he or she is interested in (e.g. epistemic rationality, effective altruism, far future/FAI, practical life tips, etc.) and then we choose the most popular ones. Simple socializing and

David Althaus

12y

Modafinil is probably the most popular cognitive enhancer. LessWrong seems pretty interested in it. The incredible Gwern wrote an excellent and extensive article about it.

Of all the stimulants I tried, modafinil is my favorite one. There are more powerful substances like e.g. amphetamine or methylphenidate, but modafinil has much less negative effects on physical as well as mental health and is far less addictive. All things considered, the cost-benefit-ratio of modafinil is unparalleled.

For those reasons I decided to publish my bachelor thesis on the cognitive effects of modafinil in healthy, non-sleep deprived individuals on LessWrong. Forgive me its shortcomings.

Here are some relevant quotes:

Introduction:

...the main research question of this thesis is if and to what extent

... (read 660 more words →)

Meetup : First Meetup in Cologne (Köln)

David Althaus

12y

Discussion article for the meetup : First Meetup in Cologne (Köln)

WHEN: 10 November 2013 03:00:00PM (+0100)

WHERE: Starbucks Coffee, An der Hahnepooz 8 50674 Cologne‎

ETA: The meetup is going to take place on November, 10th, 15:00. I'll be there. In case you don't find the place or something, here's my number: 0157 39606835

As far as I can tell, there never has been a Lesswrong meetup in Cologne. This is a shame, considering that Cologne has over 1 million inhabitants.

I recently moved here from Munich (where I already attended 3

... (read more)

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David Althaus

What is malevolence? On the nature, measurement, and distribution of dark traits

Many therapy schools work with inner multiplicity (not just IFS)

Literature-review on cognitive effects of modafinil (my bachelor thesis)

Get genotyped for free ( If your IQ is high enough)

David Althaus

David Althaus

What is malevolence? On the nature, measurement, and distribution of dark traits

David Althaus's Shortform

Many therapy schools work with inner multiplicity (not just IFS)

Incentivizing forecasting via social media

Decision Theory and the Irrelevance of Impossible Outcomes

[Link] How the Simulation Argument Dampens Future Fanaticism

In Praise of Maximizing – With Some Caveats

David Althaus

What is malevolence? On the nature, measurement, and distribution of dark traits

Many therapy schools work with inner multiplicity (not just IFS)

Literature-review on cognitive effects of modafinil (my bachelor thesis)

Get genotyped for free ( If your IQ is high enough)

David Althaus

David Althaus

What is malevolence? On the nature, measurement, and distribution of dark traits

David Althaus's Shortform

Many therapy schools work with inner multiplicity (not just IFS)

Incentivizing forecasting via social media

Decision Theory and the Irrelevance of Impossible Outcomes

[Link] How the Simulation Argument Dampens Future Fanaticism

In Praise of Maximizing – With Some Caveats

Summary

Summary

Summary

Discussion article for the meetup : First LW Meetup in Warsaw

Introduction:

Discussion article for the meetup : First Meetup in Cologne (Köln)