Regarding the intended exam answers about the universe's treatment of Keltham and Peranza—fair enough; I'll acknowledge that I didn't do great on the literary exam as assigned. Other participants in the chatroom, and readers of this memoir, _should_ correspondingly update their beliefs about my competence. When I tried to do Original Seeing about what the universe of _Planecrash_ was saying, it came out in a particular _shape_ (characteristic of my recent preoccupations), and a more powerful mind would be able to do different shapes; I could protest that the prompts didn't do enough to steer me away from that (the use of the second person in "as you, yourself, see that virtue" and "your Most Important Issues" keeping me anchored on my own concerns), but that would be too much excuse-making for a mediocre exam performance.
-(Peranza's pre-awakening username[^glowfic-username] was 'not-looking-there'! The 11th-grade English class algorithm probably would have gotten there if I had just given it more compute, instead of running with my philosophy insight!)
+(Peranza's pre-awakening username[^glowfic-username] was 'not-looking-there'! My 11th-grade English class algorithm probably would have gotten there if I had just given it more compute, instead of running with my philosophy insight!)
[^glowfic-username]: "Glowfic" stories were originally hosted on DreamWidth (a LiveJournal clone), with each character's dialogue and actions being posted from "their own" account (and therefore their own username, typically distinct from the character's own name). When the bespoke _glowfic.com_ website launched, the convention of characters having usernames was retained.
-On the other hand, however poorly my exam performance reflected on other people's estimates of my competence and the question of whether Yudkowsky should consider my criticisms of dath ilan as coming from a "peer"—it still doesn't invalidate my criticisms of dath ilan, which can, still, be evaluated on their own merits!
+On the other hand, however poorly my exam performance reflected on other people's estimates of my competence and the question of whether Yudkowsky should consider my criticisms of dath ilan as coming from a "peer", it ... still doesn't invalidate my criticisms of dath ilan, which can, still, be evaluated on their own merits.
(Was I a fool to so submissively agree to be tested, given that Yudkowsky could predictably find some grounds to dismiss me as a mere earthling? Should I have tried to negotiate—I'm happy to take your test, but only if _you_ reply to my argument that spoiler protections are morally different from coverups?)
Admirably explicit! If he were that frank all the time, I wouldn't actually have had a problem with him. (I don't expect people to pay arbitrary costs to defy their political incentives; my problem with the "hill of meaning in defense of validity" and "simplest and best protocol" performances was precisely that they were _pretending not to be political statements_; if we can be clear about the _existence_ of the Asmodean elephant in the room listening to everything we say, I don't blame anyone for not saying anything else that the elephant would report to its superiors.)
-[TODO: Arete points out that the story isn't saying not to outsource your reasoning; other commenters debate; Yudkowsky's story: the story is about Keltham trusting Cheliax wrongly; leaving that part out is politicized; other commenters pick up on "But you're still saying to trust awesome institutions"; this might belong earlier in "logical time" than the first "take this lying down" mention, even if it was chronologically later?]
+[TODO: still having trouble with how I want to summarize this part of the conversation?! maybe looking at the record of exactly how I ended up voicing my full greviance will unlock my memory-reconstruction and unblock the writing here
+ * Yudkowsky says Planecrash is the tragedy of Keltham out of dath ilan, wrongfully trusting Cheliax
+ * Arete says that the moral here isn't that you should truthseek
+ * I said that's not what the story was _about_, just an aspect of the story
+ * Yudkowsky says the standards are very high, comparison to SneerClub quoting Draco on rape, but leaving out Harry's reaction to support the politicized story they want to tell; that's tantamount to lying.
+ * Indeed, I agree that leaving out details that would undermine the politicized story you want to tell is tantamount to lying!! That's why I'm mad at him!
+ * other commenters pick up on "But you're still saying to trust awesome institutions"
+ * Yudkowsky could say "But my narrow point about pronouns was correct", but I'm suspicious that the "real" goal was political. I could say "But my narrow point about dath ilan's secrecy was correct", but Yudkowsky is suspicious that the "real" goal was political ... and we're both right??
+]
[TODO: I think there's a bit of question-substitution going on; the reason the virtue of evenness is important is because if you only count arguments for and not against the hypothesis, you mess up your beliefs about the hypothesis; if you substitute a different question "Is Yudkowsky bad?"/"Am I a good coder?", that's a bucket error—or was he "correctly" sensing that the real question was "Is Yudkowsky bad?"]
The fact that Yudkowsky had been replying to me at length—explaining why my literary criticism was nuts, but in a way that respected my humanity and expected me to be able to hear it—implied that I was apparently in his "I can cheaply save him (from crazy people like Michael Vassar)" bucket, rather than the "AI timelines and therefore life is too short" bucket.]
-
It was disappointing that Yudkowsky's reaction to my complaints was (verbatim!) "that's insane", rather than something more like, "OK, I totally see why you see this as a betrayal, but unfortunately for you, I don't actually consider myself bound by what you thought I was promising."
I gave a parable (along the lines of ["it's not the incentives; it's you"](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/5nH5Qtax9ae8CQjZ9/tal-yarkoni-no-it-s-not-the-incentives-it-s-you) to illustrate the problem: a senior scientist publishes a paper with a conclusion favorable to an organization that gave his lab a grant. The scientist's faithful student points out a fatal flaw in the paper, and suggests publishing a retraction. The scientist says, "No, that would be bad for my career." The student gets angry. The scientist says, "You're supposed to not get angry at the people who didn't create those career incentives. That's insane. Your issue is with Moloch: the publish-or-perish incentives of grant-funded science. If you can't take that down, then don't blame others who can't do that, either."
[TODO: Linta says I'm impossible to talk to and the anticipation of my pouncing stiffles discussion. (I almost wonder if this is a good thing, from a _realpolitik_ perspective? I'd prefer to argue people out of bad ideas, but if the threat of an argument disincentivizes them from spreading ...? Game theory goes both ways—I've been self-censoring, too.)]
-[TODO: I agreed that this was good feedback about my social behavior; I don't intellectually disagree that different cultures are different; I'm super-fighty because I'm super-traumatized; the thing I'm trying to keep on Society's shared map is, Biological Sex Actually Exists and Is Sometimes Decision-Relevant; Biological Sex Actually Exists and is Sometimes Decision-Relevant Even When It Makes People Sad; Biological Sex Actually Exists Even When a Prediction Market Says It Will Make People Sad; Linta agrees; Eliezer responds with a +1 emoji]
+I said that Lintamande was giving me a lot of good feedback about my social behavior. I was super-fighty because I was super-traumatized, and I should plausibly work on fixing that, whereas I didn't intellectually disagree that different cultures are different, different people are different. The reason I was super-fighty is because there was social–political territory I was trying to defend.
+
+The thing I was trying to keep on Society's shared map was, Biological Sex Actually Exists and Is Sometimes Decision-Relevant; Biological Sex Actually Exists and is Sometimes Decision-Relevant _Even When It Makes People Sad_; Biological Sex Actually Exists and is Sometimes Decision-Relevant _Even When a Prediction Market Says It Will Make People Sad_.
+
+Lintamande said they agreed with these claims. Yudkowsky replied with a "+1" emoji.
[TODO: "like, if you just went and found Eliezer!2004 and were like 'hey, weird sci fi hypothetical'
_speaking of the year 2004_; the thing I'm at war with is that I don't think he would _dare_ publish the same essay today
]
+[TODO: April saying that the essay wasn't making claims relevant to trans people; but _I_ thought it was relevant in 2008]
+
[TODO: someone said "the word in their language doesn't match the word in yours"; and got a +1 emoji; I resisted the temptation to say "So ... I can define a word any way I want"; I made a few more comments about kitchen knife deception (and let my friends talk me down from making more). I'm not worried about what he thinks about me anymore.]
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projects / Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git / commitdiff