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Are you confident in your current ontology? Are you convinced that ultimately all ufos are prosaic in nature?

If so, do you want some immediate free money?

I suspect that LW's are overconfident in their views on ufos/uap. As such, I'm willing to offer what I think many will find to be very appealing terms for a bet.

The Bet

Essentially, I wish to bet on the world and rationalists eventually experiencing significant ontological shock as it relates to the nature of some ufos/uap. 

Offer me odds for a bet, and the maximum payout you are willing to commit to. I will pick 1+ from the pool and immediately pay out to you. In the event that I ultimately win the bet, then you will pay out back to me.

I'm looking to give out between $5k-10k, but depends on what kinds of offers I get, could be more or less.

The Terms

  • I Send you $X Immediately, You pay out Odds*X if I win
    • ie, You offer 200:1 odds with max payout $20,000 and I will send you $100 immediately.
  • 5 year time horizon starting from the date we confirm our bet.
  • You offer the odds and maximum payout, I will pick from the available offers to maximize my expected returns, subject to my financial constraints.

Resolution Criteria

Two Worlds: All-ufos-are-ultimately-prosaic, and Not-all-ufos-are-ultimately-prosaic. I win the bet if we come to believe we likely live in the latter world. I win the bet if the ufo story ultimately gives us LW's a significant ontological shock. I win the bet if the ufo story ultimately causes the LW community to stop, melt, and catch fire. I've found it difficult to precisely nail down how to phrase this, so I hope its clear what kind of criteria I'm trying to get at.

Examples of things where if we come to believe at least one of them likely explain >0 ufo/uap cases, then I win the bet:

  • Aliens / Extraterrestrials
    • Biological
    • Machines (Von Neumann probes, for instance)
  • Actual magic/spiritual/paranormal/psychic phenomenon
    • This explicitly does NOT include merely advanced "mentalist" type things / show magic
    • ie, things like ESP, astral projection, demons, god(s), angels, ghosts, remote viewing, fairy's (actually anomalous, not just new kind of bird), etc.
    • Basically, the kinds of things that standard atheist materialists would reject as not being real.
  • Time travel
    • ie, future human activities (or otherwise)
  • Leftovers of an ancient civilization 
  • Some other unknown non-human advanced civilization on earth
  • Matrix Glitches / The simulators have a sense of humor
  • Some other explanation I'm missing that's of a similar level of "very weird"
  • Merely advanced "normal" human tech would NOT count (+2 gens stealth aircraft/drones, advanced holograms/spoofing, etc)
    • What WOULD count is if the story is significantly weird enough to cause ontological shock.
      • example: Secret Manhattan style project with beyond next gen physics, that we had back in the 60's

Important Note: The bet resolve in my favor if we think that one of the "weird hypotheses" is likely (>50%) true, NOT that we are confident in which specific explanation is true. Essentially, the bet resolves in my favor if we agree with the statement: "Whatever these most perplexing ufo/uap cases represent, they are likely something beyond our current paradigm"

Further Details

  • I hereby forfeit any "gotcha" cases. 
    • I'm not trying to be slick or capitalize on technicalities. A world in which I win is one where the community would broadly agree that I won.
  • Determination of resolution in my favor is left up to you. 
    • I reserve the right to appeal to the LW community to adjudicate resolution if I believe I am being stiffed.
      • I hereby commit to not abusing this right. I don't expect that I would ever have to invoke it, I suspect it would be very obvious if I win or not to everyone.

 

If these terms are acceptable, please make an offer and maximum payout amount. I will select from available offers as I see fit. I would prefer to pay out in bitcoin/eth but can work with you for another method.

Cheers :D

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When it comes to solution criteria, it might be useful to have a Metaculus question. Metaculus questions have a good track record of being resolved in a fair matter. 

3Archimedes2d
This is the most similar question that I could find that already exists. https://www.metaculus.com/questions/7384/alien-tech-in-solar-system-before-2030/ [https://www.metaculus.com/questions/7384/alien-tech-in-solar-system-before-2030/]
0JoeTheUser2d
Linked question: "Will mainstream news media report that alien technology has visited our solar system before 2030?" I would say that is far from unambiguous. If one is generous in one's interpretation of "mainstream" and the certainty described one could say mainstream news has already reported this (I remember National Inquirer articles from the seventies...). 
3ChristianKl1d
Don't confuse the headline with the resolution criteria. The resolution criteria is: The fine print is:

I would give 200:1 odds for up to 50,000 of my own dollars.

My likelihood for one of the weird hypotheses you listed being true is higher than .5%. However my odds are much lower that we get any significant evidence of those hypotheses being true within the next 5 years and that UFOs + UAPs are caused by that weird hypothesis.

I think the issue is going to be disagreements about what the > 50% likelihood means. A lot of people are saying the current round of military and federal officials coming forward with their stories about the government keeping alien craft in secret facilities is significant evidence in favor of aliens. I would like a resolution criteria that is either public polling (>50% of people polled say that X hypothesis is true) or maybe a particular public figure taking a serious stance (Scott Alexander seriously claims that UFOs are shadow US government 4d vehicles extending into our visible space).

3RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
This is the best offer so far! I would love to enter into this bet with you. I would be perfectly happy with either of those methods of resolution in the event there's a disagreement. In that event I would be happy for you to more or less entirely dictate the specifics of that process. I commit to operating in good faith with you, and I obviously take as a given that you will do the same. If you have any other concerns please let me know. Otherwise please provide (either publicly or privately) a means for me to pay you. We can then both confirm here that we have begun our bet.
1frontier642d
This will be an accepted on payment kind of deal? I need probably another few days to mull it over. I've never committed to a bet where I could potentially have to spend $50,000 in the future. I would feel really dumb if I jumped into it Clarification, if we agree that the likelihood of non-prosaic UFOs is >50% 4 years into the future but then at the time horizon the likelihood is back down way <50% do I pay or no? This is really unlikely, but what came to top of mind. Also, if I do have to pay in that scenario, how immediate do you want the payment?
1RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
Correct, accepted at payment time. If you need more time to think it over, no problem.   Interesting edge case. I would ask that if you at any point became >50% within the time horizon, that you would proactively reach out in short order. 
1Groudon4662d
Respectfully, that sounds like the "catch" here, though I doubt you have any actual ill intentions. If it applies at any point within the period, then it could apply for something as simple as a brief miscommunication from the White House that gets resolved within 24 hours. Some overworked and underpaid headline-writer makes a critical typo, aliens suddenly seem confirmed to LWers, and then... it's game? I would strongly recommend that you amend that edge case interpretation to only consider the state of things at the end of the period. While there could still technically be a spike of credulity around that time, it would be quite unlikely, whereas if UFOs have actually properly been established at some point in that time period, they will remain so throughout.

A proper Bayesian currently at less 0.5% credence for a proposition P should assign a less than 1 in 100 chance that their credence in P rises above 50% at any point in the future. This isn't a catch for someone who's well-calibrated.

In the example you give, the extent to which it seems likely that critical typos would happen and trigger this mechanism by accident is exactly the extent to which an observer of a strange headline should discount their trust in it! Evidence for unlikely events cannot be both strong and probable-to-appear, or the events would not be unlikely.

2Groudon4661d
If the purpose of this betting is to reward those who bet on the truth, though, then allowing a spike in credulity to count for it works against that purpose, and turns it into more of a combined bet of “Odds that the true evidence available to the public and LW suggests >50% likelihood or that substantial false evidence comes out for a very short period within the longer time period”. In his comment reply to me, OP mentioned he would be fine with a window of a month for things to settle and considered it a reasonable concern, which suggests that he is (rightly) focused more on betting about actual UFO likelihood, rather than the hybrid likelihood that includes hypothetical instances of massive short-term misinformation. While you are correct that the probability of that misinformation should theoretically be factored in on the better’s end, that’s not what the OP is really wanting to bet on in the first place; as such, I don’t think it was a mistake to point it out.
1RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
That's a reasonable concern. My concern is that without some principal to avoid it, that would just mean that everyone waits out the full 5 years even if its clear I'm the winner.  I wouldn't mind giving a window of a month for things to settle before there's a duty to settle. I would still demand that if anyones credence ever goes >50% that they still have to register that publicly (or at least to me) 
1Groudon4661d
That sounds reasonable enough.

The thing that has me pretty confused about your confidence here is not just that there's something weird going on here, but, that you expect it to be confirmed within 5 years.

4Gerald Monroe2d
Assume the counterfactual. Actual wreckage has been recovered, and assume that analysis has revealed a smoking gun. Examples: working "antigravity" (assume it works by some unknown interaction with the mass of the planet and thus respects conservation laws) Mass Spectrometry of the materials reveals atomic weights outside the known stable elements range Currently impossible material properties Electron micrographs show obvious patterning that looks like the object was assembled of cell sized nanorobots VIN in an obvious alien language (this is weaker without other ontology breaking evidence) One single update - the analysis of ONE crashed vehicle, by credible individuals with third party confirmation, is enough for ontology breakage. Only way to win a bet like this is insider knowledge. Maybe the OP has actually observed something in the class of the above. With all that said, if such evidence exists, why wasn't it leaked or found by another government or private group and revealed? Probability seems low.
2Gunnar_Zarncke3d
That should let you update at least slightly in favor of the thing he claims being right. That's how betting and prediction markets work, right?

How come you're trusting essentially random internet strangers to pay up significant sum of money if they lose a bet in up to 5 years?

LW's with a reputation are a far cry from random internet strangers. I made the bet terms as such to be as frictionless and minimum downside for my counterparties as possible to try and eliminate as many concerns as possible, I do want to make bets afterall.

If I get stiffed I'd be pretty surprised, but I take that risk knowingly.

5Charlie Steiner2d
I think if your P(weird) is 3%, it might be hard for you to in-expectation make money even from someone whose P(weird) is 0.00001%. You should definitely worry about being stiffed to some extent, and both sides should expect small probabilities of other sorts of costly drama. This limits what bets people should actually agree on.
7Gunnar_Zarncke3d
He doesn't have to. The fact that he probably bet people and won would give him quite some impressive bragging rights. And I guess some would still pay - people are mostly trustworthy.
4rhollerith_dot_com3d
It's not random internet strangers: elsewhere he writes, "I was only ever going to engage with people with established reputations because obviously. I reserved the right to choose who to bet with." I am not willing to bet about the object-level proposition, but I am willing to bet that he gets paid at least .4 of his winnings. In other words, if it turns out that he won the bet, then I would be willing give you $1000 in exchange for $2500 ($1000 times .4) times whatever fraction he ends up collecting (over the ensuing 5 years, say).

Max bet $50k, I would be totally happy to bet at 50:1 odds.

3RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Enticing offer. Barring better odds and max payout offer that would eat up my budget, I would like I go forward with this. I will wait to see what offers come in first.
6rhollerith_dot_com3d
You've quadrupled my P(aliens or demons or such have been flying around Earth's atmosphere). Thanks for this post (and this comment in particular).
2RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Let us move forward! I commit to operating in good faith with you, and I obviously take as a given that you will do the same. If you have any other concerns please let me know. Otherwise please provide (either publicly or privately) a means for me to pay you. We can then both confirm here that we have begun our bet.
2Charlie Steiner2d
I commit to paying up if I agree there's a >0.4 probability something non-mundane happened in a UFO/UAP case, or if there's overwhelming consensus to that effect and my probability is >0.1. Though I guess I should warn you in advance that I expect that this would require either big obvious evidence or repeatable evidence. An example of big would be an alien ship hovering at the fifty yard line during superbowl, repeatable would be some way of doing science to the aliens. Government alien-existence announcements lacking any such evidence might lead to me paying on the second clause rather than the first. I'll message you details.
1RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
Good enough for me
8Charlie Steiner12h
I have recieved $1000. The bet is on!
3RatsWrongAboutUAP11h
Glad we could make this bet!

So I could get 0.5% of the committed payout right away, but would have to avoid spending the committed value for 5 years, even though the world could change significantly in a lot of non UAP-related ways in that time frame. That's not actually that attractive.

8Gunnar_Zarncke3d
That's not how I understand it literally. You don't have to put it to the side/into some savings account. You just have to accept the risk that if you have to pay out in the unlikely case, you have to go into debt.
5Linch3d
Yeah for some reason people come up with this absurd complicated mechanism for prediction bets that they don't apply to pretty much any other form of debt, don't know why this keeps happening but I've seen it elsewhere too. 
3Dagon3d
Or take the risk that you'd feel bad by just ... not paying.  This is the one which should worry your counterparty, and which leads to escrow requirements.
1M. Y. Zuo2d
Assuming the OP only accepts bets with accounts linked to a real world identity, or pseudonymous accounts with a very high reputation, such as gwern, I think it's safe enough to not require an escrow. Why would someone who's built up a reputation in the LW/rationalist/etc. community wreck it, publicly and on-the-record, over <$50k USD? They'd be sacrificing way more in future potential since no one will willingly work with a scoundrel.
3Dagon2d
A lot can happen in 5 years.  The OP could die.  The bettor could die.  And who knows, maybe the evidence of aliens is just deniable enough that it doesn't cost reputation to claim a win.
0M. Y. Zuo1d
That doesn't extinguish the record of the bet, whoever is the heir to their assets would still be responsible for settling the bet, maybe not at the full amount, but some settlement would still be necessary. That's already factored into the odds.
3Dagon21h
LOL!  If you think an executor (or worse, an heir if the estate is already settled) is going to pay $100K to a rando based on a 5-year old less-wrong post, you have a VERY different model of humanity than I do.  Even more so if the estate didn't include any mention of it or money earmarked for it.
1M. Y. Zuo12h
How do the desires of possible executors/heirs/etc. factor into this? Clearly the bet will not auto-extinguish and auto-erase itself regardless of the future desires of anyone. If you thought I implied that the bet must be settled in purely monetary terms, that wasn't my intention. It's entirely possible for the majority, or entirety, of the bet to be settled with non-monetary currencies, such as social-status, reputation, etc...  It's just not all that likely for someone, or their successors, to insist on going down that path.  
1simon3d
I made the same argument myself (lol) in response to lsusr regarding Eliezer's bet with Bryan Caplan: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/BknXGnQSfccoQTquR/the-caplan-yudkowsky-end-of-the-world-bet-scheme-doesn-t?commentId=44YGGYcx8wZZpgiof [https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/BknXGnQSfccoQTquR/the-caplan-yudkowsky-end-of-the-world-bet-scheme-doesn-t?commentId=44YGGYcx8wZZpgiof] (hit "see in context" to see the rest of my debate with lsusr) Somehow it feels different at 0.5% though, as compared to the relatively even odds in the Yudkowsky-Caplan bet. (It's not like I could earn, say, USD $200k in a few weeks before a deadline, like Eliezer could earn $100).  2% is getting closer to compensating for this issue for me though.
4simon3d
True, but you presumably have to have the ability to pay it someway or another, and that's still resources that could have been available for something else (e.g. could have gone in to debt anyway, if something happened to warrant doing so).  I did interpret it as a 0.5% thing though, and now that the OP has stated they would be ok with 2% that makes it significantly less unattractive -  Charlie Steiner's offer, which OP provisionally accepted, seems not too far off from something I might want to copy. However, the fact that OP is making this offer means, IMO, that they are likely to be convinced by evidence significantly less convincing that what I would be convinced by.  So there's a not unlikely possibility that 5 years from now if I accept we'll get into an annoying debate over whether I'm trying to shirk on payment, when I'm just not convinced by whatever the latest UFO news is that he's been convinced by. It's also possible that other LessWrongers might also be convinced by such evidence that I wouldn't be convinced by - consider how there seems to be a fair amount of belief here regarding the Nimitz incident that if Fravor wasn't lying or exaggerating it must be something unusual like, if not aliens, then at least some kind of advanced technology (whereas I've pointed out that even if Fravor is honest and reasonably reliable (for a human), the evidence still looks compatible with conventional technology and normal errors/glitches).  That might be a hard-to-resolve sticking point since I don't really consider it that unlikely that a large fraction of LessWrongers might (given Nimitz) be convinced by what I would consider to be weak evidence, and even if it was left to my discretion whether to pay, the reputational hit probably wouldn't be worth the initial money. BTW, I don't consider it super unlikely that there are discoveries out there to be made that would be pretty ontologically surprising, it's just that I mostly don't expect them either to be behind
3RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Mere government hoax/psyop with no accompanying reality to non-prosaic uap would NOT resolve in my favor, no issue from me on that. In a world where a sizeable fraction of LW becomes convinced I might win the bet, I would expect that I then wouldn't have to wait very long before it then became conclusive, so I wouldn't mind just waiting that out. If in that case, we then hit time horizon constraints before it was definitive to you, then depending on the specifics I definitely would not rule out appealing to the community (or specific 'trusted' individuals like Scott Alexander or Eliezer). I find this scenario unlikely to come to pass. I would of course in all cases commit to operating with you in good faith. If you wish to extend that offer, I indeed will accept 50:1 (max bet size?). If you have any other concerns please let me know.
1simon2d
Regarding if there is evidence convincing to you, but not to me, after the five years:  If the LW community overwhelmingly agrees (say >85%) that my refusal to accept the evidence available as of 5 years from the time of the bet as overcoming the prior against ontologically surprising things being responsible for some "UAPs" was unreasonable, then I would agree to pay. I wouldn't accept 50% of LessWrong having that view as enough, and don't trust the judgement of particular individuals even if I trust them to be intelligent and honest. Evidence that arises or becomes publicly available after the 5 years doesn't count, even if the bet was still under dispute at the time of the new evidence. I will also operate in good faith, but don't promise not to be a stickler to the terms (see for example Bryan Caplan on his successful bet that no member nation of the EU with a population over 10 million would leave before 2020 (which he won despite the UK voting to leave in 2016) (Bet 10 at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qShKedFJptpxfTHl9MBtHARAiurX-WK6ChrMgQRQz-0 [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qShKedFJptpxfTHl9MBtHARAiurX-WK6ChrMgQRQz-0]) If you agree to these, in addition to what was discussed above, then I would be willing to offer $100k USD max bet for $2k USD now.
1RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
This is more than acceptable for me. Please reach out for a way for me to pay you.

This is to publicly confirm that I have received approximately $2000 USD equivalent.

Unless you dispute what timing is appropriate for the knowledge cutoff, I will consider the knowledge cutoff for the paradigm-shattering UAP-related revelations for me to send you $100k USD to be 11:59pm, June 14, 2028 UTC time.

Glad we could make this bet!

This sounds like the opening premise of a fun TV show or film.

UFO believer makes big bet with (for the sake of TV) one very rich person. Then heads out on an epic road trip in a camper van to find the alien evidence. A reporter covers the story and she starts travelling with him sending updates back to her paper. Obviously they fall for eachother.

They have various fun adventures where they keep encountering unconvincing evidence, or occasionally super-convincing evidence (UFO flys by) that they comically fail to catch on camera. Meanwhile the rich person o... (read more)

I don't know what assumptions the OP has, but don't forget the simulation argument: If you think we are heeded for super intelligence, then the following all become more likely:

  • You are in a simulation - maybe a weird one, maybe one that messes with your brain
  • Aliens intervene to prevent the creation of the ASI.
  • An ASI creates unbelievable effects on Earth.

The whole idea conflates refusal to accept the bet for reasons that apply to bets in general, with refusing to accept the bet because you're not really confident that UFOs are mundane.

2evand3d
If there are reasons to refuse bets in general, that apply to the LessWrong community in aggregate, something has gone horribly horribly wrong. No one is requiring you personally to participate, and I doubt anyone here is going to judge you for reluctance to engage in bets with people from the Internet who you don't know. Certainly I wouldn't. But if no one took up this bet, it would have a meaningful impact on my view of the community as a whole.
4Jiro2d
It is my opinion that for the LessWrong community in aggregate, something has gone horribly horribly wrong. At a minimum, LWers should have 1) observed that normies don't bet like this and 2) applied Chesterton's Fence. It's often hard to give an exhaustive, bulletproof, explanation of why normies act in some way that does, in fact, make sense as a way to act. Rationalists have a habit of saying "well, I don't see a rational reason for X, so I can just discard X". That's what Chesterton's Fence is about avoiding.
9ChristianKl2d
It's easy to explain why people who hold beliefs for signaling purposes don't want to bet on those beliefs. It interferes with getting status points by exposing bullshit. 
6Dagon2d
I don't doubt that a lot is wrong with the LW community, both in aggregate and among many individuals. I'm not sure WHAT wrongness you're pointing out, though.   There are good reasons for exploring normie behavior and being careful of things you don't understand (Chesterton's fence).  They mostly apply strongly when talking about activities at scale, especially if they include normies in the actor or patient list.    Wagering as a way to signal belief, to elicit evidence of different beliefs, and to move resources to the individuals who are less wrong than the market (or counterparty in a 2-party wager) is pretty well-studied, and the puzzle of why most humans don't do it more is usually attributed to those illegible reasons, which include signaling, status, and other outside-of-wager considerations.   IMO, that's enough understanding to tear down the fence, at least when people who choose not to participate aren't penalized for that choice. That seems so clear to me that I'm surprised there can be any objection.  Can you restate why you think this indicates "horribly wrong", either as a community, or as the individuals choosing to offer wagers?

I can't give you an exhaustive list of the problems I have with betting, but some reasons:

  • Properly phrasing a bet is difficult, like writing a computer program that runs perfectly the first time, or phrasing a wish to a genie. I'm no good at avoiding loopholes, and there's no shortage of rationalists who'd exploit them as long as they can get a win. And just saying "I won't prey on any technicalities" isn't enough without being able to read your mind and know what you consider a technicality.

  • Betting has social overhead. This is the "explain to your parents/wife/children why you bet this money" scenario.

  • Some people value money differently than I do. Some people just have glitchy HumanOS 1.0 which leads them to spend money irrationally. Some people are just overconfident. If I bet against such a person I may win money in X years, but until the X years are up, I'll have essentially lost the argument, because my opponent was willing to spend money--there must be some substance behind his argument or he wouldn't do that, right?

  • As others have pointed out, it's a bad idea to trust random people on the Internet to pay me money in X years. "I have a reputation" is not eno

... (read more)
2Dagon1d
Thanks for the detail - it makes me realize I responded unclearly.  I don't understand your claim (presumably based on this offer of a wager) that "the LessWrong community in aggregate, something has gone horribly horribly wrong." I don't disagree with most of your points - betting is a bit unusual (in some groups; in some it's trivially common), there are high transaction costs, and practical considerations outweigh the information value in most cases.   I don't intend to say (and I don't THINK anyone is saying) you should undertake bets that make you uncomfortable.  I do believe (but tend not to proselytize) that aspiring rationalists benefit a lot by using a betting mindset in considering their beliefs: putting a number to it and using the intuition pump of how you imagine feeling winning or losing a bet is quite instructive.  In cases where it's practical, actually betting reifies this intuition, and you get to experience actually changing your probability estimate and acknowledging it with an extremely-hard-to-fool-yourself-or-others signal. I don't actually follow the chesterton's fence argument.  What is the taboo you're worried that you don't understand well enough to break (in some circumstances)?  "normies don't do this" is a rotten and decrepit enough fence that I don't think it's sufficient on it's own for almost anything that's voluntarily chosen by participants and has plausibly low (not provably, of course, but it's not much of a fence to start with) externalities.
2Jiro1d
If you're asking how I would distinguish "horribly, horribly, wrong" from "just somewhat horribly wrong" or plain "wrong", my answer would be that there's no real distinction and I just used that particular turn of phrase because that's the phrase that evand used. Sure, but "bets that make me uncomfortable" is "all rationalist bets". I disagree.
2Dagon1d
I should be clearer yet.  I'm wondering how you distinguish "the community in aggregate has gone (just somewhat) horribly wrong" from "I don't think this particular mechanism works for everyone, certainly not me".   If making actual wagers makes you uncomfortable, don't do it.  If analyzing many of your beliefs in a bet-like framing (probability distribution of future experiences, with enough concreteness to be resolvable at some future point) is uncomfortable, I'd recommend giving that part of it another go, as it's pretty generally useful as a way to avoid fuzzy thinking (and fuzzy communication, which I consider a different thing). In any case, thanks for the discussion - I always appreciate hearing from those with different beliefs and models of how to improve our individual and shared beliefs about the world.
1Going Durden5h
I would also take issue with the "mundane" part. What does that even mean? Any explanation that is good enough to cover all UFO cases with their myriad of physics-defying feats, is in itself a proof of supertechnology which should also be under the bet. For example, an explanation that the supposed UFOs are really experimental military aircraft would simply mean that the military possesses technology that is effectively "magic" compared to the civilian aircraft technology. If you witness a flying object that can push Mach 10 effortlessly and takes instant turns without any inertia, does it matter if this is an alien craft or human military craft? It still should belong on the list.

Hesitant to bet while sick, but I'll offer max bet $20k at 25:1.

1RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Double the odds and I will accept immediately. Otherwise I might accept in the next few days depending on if I get more offers or not. I have reached out to others now and I expect when its confirmed that I really am giving out money, that more offers will come in.

If you were offering, say, $100K at 5:1 odds, I would be very inclined to take it, despite the risk that e.g. next month's X-Day finally delivers, because that would let me set in motion things that, according to me, have their own transformative potential. But I'm not sure about the value of these smaller sums. 

2ChristianKl3d
Are you suggesting that you currently have a double digit percentage that there's clear evidence of some form of nonhuman intelligence in the next five years (which would warrent the 5:1 odds)?
6Mitchell_Porter3d
Not at all. But for a credible bet, I have to have some chance of paying out my losses. On the basis of lifetime earnings so far, even $500K is really pushing it. Promising to pay millions if I lose is not credible. 
1Legionnaire1d
Smaller sums are more likely to convey probabilities of each party accurately. For example, if Elon Musk offers me $5000 to split between two possible outcomes, I will allocate them close to my beliefs, but if he offers me 5mil, I'll allocate about 2.5mil each because either one is a transformative amount of money. People are more likely to be rational with their marginal dollar because of pricing in the value of staying solvent. The first 100k in my bank account IS worth more than the second, and so the saying, a non-marginal bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

I will predict that no bet with significant stakes (say, over $200 from the poster) gets made.  This is a stunt, and the terms (of resolution and collection) are way too loose to be useful.

update a few days later: an established (ish - 6-month history, with quite a few comments and karma.  @simon.) poster has confirmed that approx $2000 payment was received.  Something weird could still be discovered, but this raises my estimate of legitimacy from ~15% to ~70% (had thought as high as 85% until I realized that it's $100k agreement for simon t... (read more)

7RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
I'm afraid you are going to lose this bet. So long as people come can up with a bitcoin/eth address or a paypal account, there will be no issues.
3Dagon2d
Don't be afraid!  This is a bet I hope to lose (well, really, a prediction I hope is false - transaction costs keep me from betting).  I wish you the best, and I really do appreciate people specifying their beliefs with precision that allows betting.   Given the site and general level of goodwill here, my estimate is maybe as high as 15% that this will result in a significant deposit in the next 2 weeks, confirmed by at least one long-term poster on the site.  That's an order of magnitude higher than I'd give anywhere else, and I'm rooting for you!
2rhollerith_dot_com3d
Want to bet on your prediction? I'll give you $100 right now if you'll commit to sending me $200 if the OP does in fact end up sending LW participants at least $200 as his side of this bet. (The OP is a complete stranger to me.)
1Dagon3d
I considered offering a bet with this, and 2:1 against it being real is probably generous.  I'd make the bet in person with someone I know, but online hassles with strangers make it not worth the amusement value for me.
2ChristianKl3d
Why would the terms as written dissuade people from betting? 
3Dagon3d
I don't doubt that there will be offers, I doubt bet will be made.  My best guess is the OP will fail to find a payment method that works, or will come up with a disagreement about terms that they use to justify backing out. I look forward to seeing what happens.  It's a GREAT example of the legible, written proposal seeming (and being) great, and the practical human part being rather suspect.  

What if UFO are indeed really weird, but this will not shake LW belief system as it will be easily retrospectively explained: e.g. 'we always know that acausal cooperation between glitching streams in dust theory will produce Bayesian artifacts with low apriori probability but also unprovable in classical statistic sense'.

1RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
If/when it comes out that ufos are legitimately weird, I would be very surprised to see anything other than utter bewilderment from most of LW, I don't expect clear resolution in my favor to be an issue.

On further edit: apparently I'm a blind idiot and didn't see the clearly stated "5 year time horizon" despite actively looking for it. Sorry. I'll leave this here as a monument to my obliviousness, unless you prefer to delete it.

Without some kind of time limit, a bet doesn't seem well formed, and without a reasonably short time limit, it seems impractical.

No matter how small the chance that the bet will have to be paid, it has to be possible for it to be paid, or it's not a bet. Some entity has to have the money and be obligated to pay it out. Arranging fo... (read more)

I am concerned for your monetary strategy (unless you're rich). Let's say you're absolutely right that LW is overconfident, and that there is actually a 10% chance of aliens rather than 0.5. So this is a good deal! 20x!

But only on the margin.

Depending on your current wealth it may only be rational to take a few hundred dollars worth of these bets for this particular bet. If you go making lots of these types of bets (low probability, high payoff, great EXpected returns) for a small fraction of your wealth each, you should expect to make money, but if you ma... (read more)

I'm interested in my $250k against your $10k.

Do you use Manifold Markets? It already has UAP-related markets you can bet on, and you can create your own.

Hm, I don't feel confident enough to place huge odds on none of these things being the answer (besides, the losses may appear deceptively smaller than they are; if you think $20,000 are a lot, try "$20,000 and having to explain to your wife why you lost $20,000 in a bet, all the while aliens may be attacking Earth"). I think the thing that really peeves me is running to "aliens" as the first exotic explanation as some do. If I witnessed something really unbelievable and seemingly breaking all laws of physics, and had plenty of evidence that it's not just a... (read more)

I don't think I have enough of a post history to participate. If I did, I'd factor into my bet that there may be less impact to be had in a world with advanced aliens, at least if those aliens could subdue an earth-originated ASI. Therefor, money might be less instrumentally valuable in that world.

I'd take a bet at 1:50 odds for $200. I'm happy to let the LW community adjudicate, or for us to talk it over. I'm currently at something like 5e-5 for there being UFOs-as-non-prosaic. So I don't think I'd be that hard to convince.

I am willing to bet 50:1 up to $20k. Would you be interested?

[EDIT] up to $20k on my side, not up $1M.

2RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
Yes! If you have any concerns over terms/resolution please let me know. Otherwise reach out with means to receive payment
2Thomas Sepulchre7h
I confirm that I have received today $400. final resolution day: 11:59pm, June 16th, 2028

This pattern matches to anonymous person on the internet offering free money, which is typically a scam. Safer to pass, I think.

5Dagon2d
Parts of it do match (free money, to be repaid years from now), parts don't (large liability years from now if the OP is correct, preference for crypto as irrevocable money transfer, desire for public agreement and public adjudication).  The trust level implied by "accepting party has final say" and "hold all the money for years" is much higher than normal, which often indicates scam.  The fact that I don't see the scam (despite knowing a bit about common ones) is some evidence that it's not a scam.  The non-specificity of terms (which payment method(s) to use, what odds they'll take, what min/max amount to consider) could go either way.   If OP were trolling for suckers or running an overpay/refund/revoke scam, they'd scale out rather than picking just one target - offer a bet to all takers, in hopes that multiple will be duped.  That doesn't seem to be happening.   Note that it can fail to be real without being a scam.  An over-simple offer that is regretted before payment is irrevocable means no bet occurs, but that's not scammy, it's just over-aggressive signaling in wanting to make a bet and then avoiding the pain of actually making the payment.  This is where I put most of my probability weight on failure (though some to scam, of course).  
3Gurkenglas2d
Doesn't smell like it to me, and paying up front makes scamming harder. Are you thinking "he's scouting for marks" or "the cost is mostly in dispute headaches" or "people who join schemes this weird end up in a ditch"?
5ChristianKl2d
There are free money scams where someone transfers money from stolen credit cards.  One way might be to agree to pay $1000 dollar and then "accidentally" transfer $2000 (from a stolen credit card) and then ask the person to transfer $1000 dollar back to another bank account.  I think RatsWrongAboutUAP did offer to pay in crypto which removes the option for these kinds of frauds. Otherwise, just avoiding transferring any money even if someone overpays you is also a good heuristic. 
2Martin Randall2d
Scamming is adversarial, so it's normal for a scam to appear like it's safe. But I'm not claiming my pattern match is superior to yours. A scam could include getting financial information to get money, or a voice print for impersonation. Maybe the scammer has insider information about UFOs. Maybe it's entrapment for breaking gambling laws. Maybe a journalist is writing a story about how evil rationalists exploit innocent people with fringe beliefs for money. The scam probability doesn't have to be large for it to dwarf the apparent benefits.
1RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Rare counterexample

Personally this type of bet just seems like a terrible idea for the "believer" side. It's terrible because I suspect most people who do not believe that any of those things are likely to be real would also be pretty happy if many of them were. I'd be willing to give up a lot of things for real, undeniable proof that alien life has visited earth. I would never have enough credence in a claim that someone had that evidence that I'd be willing to pay, but the bet creates a win-win situation where I only have to pay after seeing the proof.

This is late but if betting is still available I think I'd take 1:60 odds.

In addition I am willing to reveal my identity (in private) and write an actual contract in the interest of creating a stronger sense of commitment and seriousness if you'd like that. I am also willing to return the exact sum at the end of the 5 years if we reach an "impasse" where you believe strong evidence has been provided that I do not recognize as such (for example, if belief in a supernatural origin for UFOs becomes common in the coming years for various reasons)

I am also very interested in your justifications for this bet. Are there any historical UFO "cases" that you find compelling?

1RatsWrongAboutUAP2d
I like the odds and appreciate the offer, but these terms do not interest me.


EDIT: You can safely disregard the second paragraph of this, I misread the post initially. Still, the first applies.

In the event that you decide you're being stiffed, how will you quantify community sentiment on the issue to try and prove that the majority of the community believes in one of your categories of anomalous claims? Will you conduct a poll of some kind? Will you just say that you beg to differ?

Also, in the event that you're actually someone who has assessed that they don't want to be on LessWrong greater than 5 years from now anyway in the timeline where no substantial UFO/UAP evidence has surfaced by then, what would compel you to pay up instead of ghosting?

I said in a post to lsusr yesterday (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/oY9HNicqGGihymnzk/intelligence-officials-say-u-s-has-retrieved-craft-of-non?commentId=od73EXuSL6uKLFfeD) that I would update the post today to address his concerns, but honestly im feeling very lazy and mostly disagree that its unclear what I'm trying to do. 

I will be picking some people and moving forward with the bets today. I will ensure with my counterparties that any individual concerns they have are addressed.

 

I am still open to betting with more people (and would love to do so!). 

To be clear, to resolve the bet in your favor, it has to be the case that:

a) We have >50% credence in "ontological shock" as you define it

and

b) UFOs/UAPs identified as of June 13 2023 are meaningfully a result of such "ontological shock" right?

(To be more explicit, I want to exclude scenarios like the following thing from being scored in your favor:
1. We discover novel philosophical arguments or empirical evidence that leads LessWrongers to believe we're on balance more likely to live in a simulation than not.

2. Causally, the UFOs are a result of simula... (read more)

1RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Correct, I'm not trying to collect on something like that. I would in the case of a simulation only if it was also the case that the ufos were something unique and specific (ie, actual glitches, or something expressly put in by the programmers) as opposed to being trivially true in the way that you mention. Correct, you do not have to commit the money to any third party, you merely have to affirm that you will pay out in the event that I win. At the moment 30:1 is less than I would prefer, if in the next few days I do not get enough new offers then I might take you up on this. 50:1 is currently the lowest I have accepted.

Leftovers of an ancient civilization 

Archaeologist here: you'd want to really, really narrow down on what you mean here, otherwise we will clean your pockets pretty easily. Since about 2016, new discoveries of ancient civilizations, predating the most reasonable estimates crop up like mushrooms.

My estimate is that we will have several proofs pushing the the origins of civilization at least 10k years backwards, if not more, in the very near future, likely along the vectors of:
- Gobeli Tepe and other Turkish/Anatolian ruins being significantly older tha

... (read more)

I'm sure that this time around, it's definitely real aliens. Or, barring that, magic or time travel.

2RatsWrongAboutUAP3d
Wish to bet on it?
-6green_leaf2d

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