If we work around this assumption of being cis as the default… like, for example, if we stop thinking about the fact that as an abstract, general question a random human being is much more likely to be cis than trans, and instead consider the question in terms of whether, given everything we observe in ourselves, and everything we feel, and how strong our feelings are about this question of gender, which (cis or trans) is more likely for us… if we consider “is it really all that likely that I’m just a cis person who has somehow managed to convince myself that I’m trans to the point that I’m having this kind of crisis?”… if we reframe it, then the question becomes something very different, and more manageable.
Natalie Reed taking a very Bayesian approach to gender identity
Another good one from the same source:
Truth can be sliced and analyzed in 100 different ways and it will always remain true.
Falsehood on the other hand can only be sliced a few different ways before it becomes increasingly obvious that it is false.
I wonder if this will somehow play into Quirrell's plot to have both Ravenclaw and Slytherin win the house cup.
Moreright.net already exists, and it's a "Bayesian reactionary" blog- that is, a blog for far-rightists who are involved in the Less Wrong community. It's an interesting site, but it strikes me as decidedly unhelpful when it comes to looking uncultish.
I don't actually remember why I retracted it. I tried to un-retract it afterwards, but I don't think that's possible.
If you put the cloak over someone who is dying, they would stay alive, at least until the Cloak is removed and death can find them again.
I'm surprised Harry didn't try this for Hermione, then. Maybe he wouldn't have expected it to work, but it's still an easy hypothesis to test.
It was amazing how many different ways there were to kill your best friend by being stupid.
You're right; it is.
The emphasis I used was in the original, but I agree that it would work better with the emphasis on "think."
Whatever you think can't be done, somebody will come along and do it.
Thelonious Monk
I've seen several people on Less Wrong recommend Mencius Moldbug's writings, and I've been curious about how he became so popular here. He's certainly an interesting thinker, but he's rather obscure and doesn't have any obvious connection to Less Wrong, so I'm wondering where this overlap in readership came from.
[EDIT by E.Y.: The answer is that he's not popular here. The 2012 LW annual survey showed 2.5% (30 of 1195 responses) identified as 'reactionary' or 'Moldbuggian'. To the extent this is greater than population average, it seems sufficiently explained by Moldbug having commented on the early Overcoming Bias econblog before LW forked from it, bringing with some of his own pre-existing audience.... (read more)
Good point; I hadn't really thought about it that way! I had interpreted it as reminding you to update your probability estimates based on observed evidence.