Some problems I have with the post:
I am aware the links and formatting are badly screwed up. That is my fault, I'm attempting to fix it. I assumed that since LessWrong's source code was based upon Reddit's source code, formatting would be similar. This is not the case. I also realize that my poor Karma track record may not signal a remarkably high sanity waterline, and if you'd prefer, I could submit all 11 posts at once.
I admit there is some rhetoric used, with little useful information. I beg your patience, for this is the first post in 11 that I have already planned out , I just need to write them out. If you could be a little more specific, and tell me which sections are too "flowery", and should be deleted, I'll happily do so.
I am aware of the rule regarding no politics. Rest assured that I will not be talking directly about politics (I have already specified so in my post, did you read it?) , but rather about methods that we may use to discuss politics with greater sanity. I will not be violating any norm that I'm aware of. I've already proposed this thread in http://lesswrong.com/lw/cs8/open_thread_june_115_2012/6pv2
Can you give me examples of good indications of unusual sanity?
and if you'd prefer, I could submit all 11 posts at once.
Better to respond to feedback in deciding where to go thereafter.
Re: the karma, it's that you should probably try normal posts first. If those posts are well-received that would put you in a better position to assess how to go forward.
Upvoted for agreement. I was looking forward to this post until I read it. It's just an introduction with no real content. But I do agree that politics is an issue that LW should be able to tackle. Whether or not we can is a different question.
When writing a long sequence it's tempting to spend lots of time justifying it. But other people don't care about your sequence as much as you do! If the next post doesn't start the analysis proper I'm going to lose interest.
I also feel like I should mention my recent post "Focus on Rationality". You sell your sequence as training ourselves on the example of politics. This is different to just giving a rational exploration of politics, you have to say what we're learning about rationality, as well as the learning about politics. I raise this because you've explicitly sold your sequence as rationality training.
The whole first section is unnecessary -- tedious background, meta-hand-wringing, self-conscious tiptoeing in the extreme, etc.
The second section is all applause lights and/or stuff we already know. (We run on corrupted hardware -- really?)
The third section is the one part with interesting substance -- it points out that we can't agree to disagree yet LW disagrees on politics, so some group of people are probably wrong. It's also possible that people have different values. We can't agree to disagree on facts, but we can on values.
"X-rationalist" -- where does that term come from?
Last two paragraphs are platitudes and applause lights.
Thanks for trying! I hope that was gentle enough.
Thanks for the feedback.
The term x-rationalist is generally used to describe LessWrong Rationalists, in the style of Eliezer Yudkowsky. X-rationalists is used to differentiate from other "ordinary" Rationalists, such as the atheist Rationalist Community, etc.
Frankly, I have no idea where the term originated from. It seems to pop up every once in a while on LW, though.
X-Rationalist sounds pretty stupid to me, I'm glad it's not mentioned often. Just use rationalist if you need to, everyone knows what you mean.
"X-rationalist" -- where does that term come from?
Yvain gave it a stipulative definition here.
Which is the reason why our political arena is so screwed up today.
Which? American, European, worldwide?
I am not so sure about that. Maybe it is only the business as usual. I think it is likely so.
Otherwise, I like your post.
I admit this post has a North American bias to it, although I think that generally speaking, irrationality pervades all modern democracies, although with to a different extent.
Thanks for reminding me that I didn't just screw up and forever ruin my reputation at LW.
You can't count me as a typical LW poster, since I am not. The majority might react less friendly on political themes, much more in accordance with the official "politics is a mind-killer" mantra of this site.
I think, the politics is an important aspect, too much missunderestimated and neglected here. Please, do speak about it, if you dare!
Which? American, European, worldwide?
The flaws of politics are mostly human, not national.
I'll certainly agree that governments can be better or worse, but the actual political process(infighting for power) seems to be screwed up at a roughly constant level everywhere. The only major difference is the violence level - it's an important difference in practice, of course, but not one that's really at the core of the problems.
I'll certainly agree that governments can be better or worse, but the actual political process(infighting for power) seems to be screwed up at a roughly constant level everywhere.
No, it most certainly isn't "a roughly constant level everywhere". It covers the entire range from occasional shouting to daily mass murder, depending where and when you look, and violence is certainly not the only problem; there's also strategic misinformation, bribery and election fraud, all occurring at much higher rates than are commonly believed.
But giving examples would require naming specific people and groups, and that would bring undesirables out of the woodwork and into the conversation. Those sorts of conversations are held offline, where everyone's rationality level is known and Google Alerts can't summon the shills.
I'm going to fix your links. One moment please.
ETA: Done.
ETA2: Now it's different. Perhaps we were both editing at the same time. Oh well.
The anti-politics norm is one of the ones that's always really wierded me out about LW. I can understand if it's a polite aversion to controversial topics of all sorts, but that quite clearly is not LW's way. If anything, it seems like a topic that people are afraid of. Kudos for trying to raise the sanity waterline of this site - though that said, if you're going to do this, you'd better pull it off effectively, because a bad job is worse than nothing.
I can understand if it's a polite aversion to controversial topics of all sorts, but that quite clearly is not LW's way.
Can you name another topic that has the same level of potential for bringing people to this site who aren't generally interested in the common purposes of the site (such as they are) but merely interested in starting arguments about that topic, and which is discussed here regularly? Religion comes to mind, but LW's collective position on religion makes that rather non-representative.
Religion is the most obvious - the usual rule for family Thanksgiving is "no politics or religion", because the two are broadly equal in effects on social interactions. LW picks an absolutist position on one to enshrine as dogma(or as close to dogma as we come) and makes the other a complete taboo. That is very odd behaviour. And simply picking the best comparison and declaring it "non-representative" is hardly reasonable argumentation. After that, most of the common topics are niche issues, but I'm sure you've had plenty of discussions caused by, say, conventional AI researchers mocking the friendliness obsession without any particular regard for rationalism or transhumanism.
Also, I admit to being an occasional, so I should probably ask - is the "drawing the wrong crowd" effect an observed outcome of political debate on LW, or a feared hypothetical?
Sorry, I thought the non-representativeness of religion as a topic of conversation here was obvious (for exactly the reasons you lay out in your comment) and so didn't bother explicating them. Thanks for doing it for me.
It's a feared hypothetical as far as I know.
I apparently don't follow the argument I'm making, then.
How does this possibly make any sense? There seems to be no "one thing at a time" doctrine, no censoring of controversial topics, and an active encouragement of making any sort of weird niche argument about absolutely anything that isn't politics. The only explanation I can see is that this community has elevated a line mocking the standards of debate in politics into a social law, despite the general acceptance of "raising the waterline" on any of a hundred other topics, for no reason that I can see. Yes, politics is messy, and any sensible political debate between Bayesians needs to draw a very sharp line between what the probable outcomes of a given set of policies are and the utility of those outcomes, but that seems like something that the community will adapt to easily.
So where exactly is the stumbling block here? Or is this just a shibboleth? I am genuinely confused.
My concern is not about what a sensible political debate between Bayesians looks like, but about what political debate on a public Internet forum that anyone can join looks like.
I gather you think that has a high positive expected value here. (Is that right? It's also possible that you think we have some obligation to engage in it, perhaps out of some sense of internal consistency or signaling considerations or something else, regardless of its expected value. But you seem to mostly be talking about likely consequences here.)
I think it has a low to moderate negative expected value.
That said, I might of course be wrong. Do you have any evidence for your evaluation that might be new to me?
I don't think this forum is greatly appealing to the sort of people who usually bugger up political debate on the internet.
And frankly, my primary goal is to find some group where I can have a political debate that doesn't make me want to rip my hair out in frustration. My secondary goal is understanding why this taboo exists, because I'm curious now. Not immensely valuable goals, but unless there's a negative that would counteract the positive, still ones worth pursuing.
I don't think this forum is greatly appealing to the sort of people who usually bugger up political debate on the internet.
In general, I agree with you. It's one of the reasons I like this forum. I expect it to become more appealing to them if political debate becomes a staple here. I consider that sufficient negative, though I understand that you either don't share the expectation or don't agree with my valuation of it.
I'm curious, though: why is having a political debate such a high-priority goal for you?
I like political debate. Always have, really. Getting one that isn't built on cheap shots, anecdote-as-data, and other such cheese is very difficult, and I've usually found it to be greatly rewarding when it does happen. I want to investigate my political beliefs with actual data, and that's amazingly hard to do normally. On top of that, I expect it'll be great fun to watch "Bayesians cannot disagree" run into that particular brick wall, instead of the universal stuff like "There's no evidence that God exists".
It's not the highest priority around, just happens to be one that I'd like to see, and one that seemed worth a few comments.
I think it would be interesting and productive to discuss politics in this group.
But I'm not so enamoured of the technical set up for serious discussion. Even a mailing list seems superior. Can anyone point to productive discussions on difficult topics that used the current site/format?
For whatever reason, after a few nested levels, I feel an aversion to taking the discussion deeper in ways that I didn't on mailing lists or even usenet. And maybe I've missed them, but I haven't seen extended productive conversations here.
I'm actually a fan of nested comments for debate, because it allows side arguments to take place without ruining the main arguments.
I like nested too. I'm saying I don't see the conversations get nested enough, and think some of the reason is the list format.
For serious conceptual differences it takes multiple go arounds for people to even begin to identify the issue between them. I haven't seen that happen much here. I think some of the reason is the list format.
I don't find myself following any discussion or article past a couple of weeks. I don't see others doing it either. Again, how many sustained discussions have you seen that have made any real progress on a serious difference of opinion?
I thought you were saying that nested was the problem. What sort of list format are you referring to?
As for debate causing an actual change of opinion, it's happened once to me on a very high level, and a few other times for single issues. I've changed people's mind on single issues before as well(usually by introducing new evidence), though not generally ones where they've held strong opinions and a decent knowledge base going in. That's still not a lot given how much time I've spent on it, but it's nonzero.
I think the sustained level of effort is important. Some things can be solved with 3 go arounds. Some things take a dozen. If the list just isn't conducive to a dozen, you just don't solve those issues.
As for an alternative, it seems that the fancy new web still hasn't risen to the level of Usenet, where you could sort and filter by both thread and time. Here, you have to manually search by both, except for the direct replies to your posts (which is an admitted improvement over most web sites).
Usenet also had contextual regexp searches, targeting searches by field of the message, and then ranking posts to view based on those results. Wouldn't it be nice to at least be able to follow the posts of particular people?
Anyway, I've griped about the de evolution of online discussion technology with the advent of browsing technology before.
I've been advocating for trn, but making a version of it for the web would apparently involve a large quantity of boring programming that no one wants to do.
Sounds better to me too. Hard to imagine that no web weenie has gotten around to it yet.
If not, it brings up another related topic - how to collaborate more effectively to actually produce things.
Is the current code available? Tweaking the current system could probably go far. Looking at the current stuff, I see a lot of infrastructure must already be there. There's Friends, which provides the infrastructure for Ignore. There's personal settings. There are article ratings. Adding at least personalized discussion level sorting and filtering. Personalized watch list would be nice too.
lesswrong.com's code is on GitHub.
Here's the "Hacking" document.
Edit: atucker apparently made a VirtualBox VM image to simplify getting LW running on your own machine.
That would be nice, yes. Hell, I'd be happy if they just got a lot less fixed-width, so comments could nest deeper without breaking.
Confronting the Mindkiller
Hi LessWrong.
I will be attempting a series of 11 posts on how to defeat the mindkiller -- Politics.
This is a bit of an exaggeration -- "defeating" it is a seriously difficult task, and it's something I cannot possibly hope to do alone. However, I hope to be able to raise the Sanity Waterline, as well as actually contribute something to this Community that I've begun to regard myself as part of.
I also beg patience from you, the reader. Lesswrong is far more critical than most other Communities, and frankly, even writing this post has begun to give me second thoughts, in fear of being downvoted into oblivion.
However, one who attempts nothing in the fear of consequences will live a life of regret - only by attempting to do the "impossible", and hacking away at the edges, can one succeed. This post was written with something to protect in mind. I hope you be patient with me, at least until the last posts have been written. This might take a week or two to complete.
I prefer to post one post at a time, Eliezer Yudkowsky style, in order to better adjust my writing style to suit your tastes, to receive continuous feedback, and to break up this task into smaller chunks to better avoid Akrasia, but if you'd rather I post this in one long essay, I can begrudgingly do that too.
Since my idea of these series of posts in the Open Thread seems to have been relatively well-received, I'll proceed to courageously embarrass myself in front of everyone.
This is my first serious post on this site, and I really welcome constructive criticism and any attempts to help me improve my writing skills. Likewise, if you don't think I should continue writing this series of posts, let me know, although please be gentle. I assure you that I will not fall trapping to partisan arguments or argue one side over another in an irrational fashion.
The purpose of these posts is to improve the way we think about politics, and help you find the "right side" in politics, rather than directly tell you which side is right or wrong. This post, I hope, does not break LessWrong's rules regarding no politics.
I also won't mess up too badly. I promise.
Confronting the Mindkiller - Why the Mindkiller?
Why am I trying to actively confront the mind-killer? Because Rationalists should win. Because as Rationalists, we ought to be able to go out into the real world and use our skills for awesomeness.
A Martial Arts Grandmaster cannot become stronger by only fighting amateurs and beginners. He can only do so by fighting the strongest, by pushing himself beyond his limits. Even doing so, however, can be unsatisfactory. How can the Sensei know that his skills are truly useful, not something that fails when applied in real life? By simply testing himself in difficult real-world situations. Nothing else can suffice, no tournament or medal may be adequate in proving that he truly is the best fighter.
Likewise, the true test of Rationality is not one that we can easily overcome, but the one that is the most difficult to overcome. In order to learn to fight better, our "Sensei" has taught us to kick and punch dummies. But dummies are not a measure of your ability to fight. Dummies cannot fight back, they cannot actively test you, and they certainly cannot plan confrontations and strike when you least expect it. Dummies are useful, but only as a stepping stone towards fighting more difficult opponents.
The more advanced and experienced of us have gone out into the real world and fought with sparring partners. This is a step higher from punching dummies, but this is not the best we can do. I want to become stronger. In the words of Eliezer, the epitome of Intelligence is not those of the past, nor those in the present, but that of the future.
Rationality is similar. We run on corrupted hardware, and even the most rational of us is still comparatively irrational to the mindspace of possible Rationalists. That is why me must aspire to do better, even if we already are proficient in our art.
The best test of Rationality is to confront that which makes us the most irrational. We cannot become a master in martial arts without sparring and getting hurt, and we cannot become masters in Rationality by simply refusing to engage in politics. It makes sense to avoid certain spheres of politics until we have learned the basics of Rationality. However, such avoidance cannot be permanent.
We should not agree to Disagree.
Furthermore, I want to confront Politics simply because it is so mind-boggling. Aumann's agreement theorem states than any two Perfect Bayesians with similar priors cannot agree to disagree. And yet the fact that we have people from all political spectrums means that politics has become so infectious, so divisive, that even X-Rationalists are split by it.
The most popular political view, at least according to the much-maligned categories on the survey, was liberalism, with 376 adherents and 34.5% of the vote. Libertarianism followed at 352 (32.3%), then socialism at 290 (26.6%), conservativism at 30 (2.8%) and communism at 5 (.5%).Funnily enough, although many outsiders have accused us of agreeing far too much, political ideologies are one aspect where it is not clear cut at all. About one-third of this site are Liberals, one-third of this site are Libertarians, followed by a quarter of us being Socialism, and the rest being divided into Conservatives and Communists.
Compare this with issues commonly touted as Controversial, such as religion, where 92% of us are either Atheistic or Agnostic - a clearly cut issue.
Politics is the mind-killer on a scale where nothing else can compare, especially to x-rationalists. And yet since we cannot avoid its confrontation entirely I would argue we should not avoid confronting it at all. The arena of political debates are packed with the most subtle and devious dark arts and irrationality, leaving it to rot would be a bad decision; after all, politics is already playing a hand in every aspect of our lives. It would benefit from a healthy dose of Rationality, even if it cannot be made completely sane.
If the step to begin raising the sanity waterline does not begin here, where does it? If we, aspiring Rationalists who have studied probability theory, psychology, Bayesian inference, neuroscience, philosophy, epistemology, and as much information as possible on the science of decision making under uncertainty cannot even engage in politics without bickering and divisiveness, who can?
The answer is nobody. Which is the reason why our political arena is so screwed up today.
And finally...
We all dream of a better world to live in. I hope it will not drive you away to suggest that many a life has been lost over disagreements between which better world is the best. Many more lives have been lost because of people who refused to engage in political endeavors.
Rationality is not an abstract Art, to be appreciated in itself -- it's a tool that you use to mold the world to your desires, to win. I have this mad hope that someday political spheres will be sane, rather than hopelessly filled with the dark arts. Perhaps by attempting this sequence of posts, the world will be one small step closer towards a saner future.