check in

diff --git a/content/drafts/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-in-relation-to-my-gender-problems.md b/content/drafts/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-in-relation-to-my-gender-problems.md
index 25acc2c..b495baf 100644 (file)
--- a/content/drafts/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-in-relation-to-my-gender-problems.md
+++ b/content/drafts/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-in-relation-to-my-gender-problems.md
@@ -226,7 +226,7 @@ A single-variable measurement like height is like a single coin: unless the coin
 
 And knowledge about the distribution is genuinely informative. Occasionally you hear progressive-minded people [dismiss and disdain simpleminded transphobes who believe that chromosomes determine sex](https://archive.is/y5V9i), when actually, most people haven't been karyotyped and don't _know_ what chromosomes they have. Certainly, I agree that almost no one interacts with sex chromosomes on a day-to-day basis; no one even knew that sex chromosomes _existed_ before 1905. [(Co-discovered by a woman!)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nettie_Stevens) But the function of [intensional definitions](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/HsznWM9A7NiuGsp28/extensions-and-intensions) in human natural language isn't to exhaustively [pinpoint](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/3FoMuCLqZggTxoC3S/logical-pinpointing) a concept in the detail it would be implemented in an AI's executing code, but rather to provide a "treasure map" sufficient for a listener to pick out the corresponding concept in their own world-model: that's why [Diogenes exhibiting a plucked chicken in response to Plato's definition of a human as a "featherless biped"](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jMTbQj9XB5ah2maup/similarity-clusters) seems like a cheap "gotcha"—we all instantly know that's not what Plato meant. ["The challenge is figuring out which things are similar to each other—which things are clustered together—and sometimes, which things have a common cause."](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/d5NyJ2Lf6N22AD9PB/where-to-draw-the-boundary) But sex chromosomes, and to a large extent specifically the [SRY gene](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testis-determining_factor) located on the Y chromosome, _are_ such a common cause—the root of the [causal graph](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/hzuSDMx7pd2uxFc5w/causal-diagrams-and-causal-models) underlying all _other_ sex differences. A smart natural philosopher living _before_ 1905, knowing about all the various observed differences between women and men, might have guessed at the existence of some molecular mechanism of sex determination, and been _right_. By the "treasure map" standard, "XX is female; XY is male" is a pretty _well-performing_ definition—if you're looking for a [_simple_ membership test](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/edEXi4SpkXfvaX42j/schelling-categories-and-simple-membership-tests) that provides a lot of information about the many intricate ways in which females and males statistically differ.
 
 
 And knowledge about the distribution is genuinely informative. Occasionally you hear progressive-minded people [dismiss and disdain simpleminded transphobes who believe that chromosomes determine sex](https://archive.is/y5V9i), when actually, most people haven't been karyotyped and don't _know_ what chromosomes they have. Certainly, I agree that almost no one interacts with sex chromosomes on a day-to-day basis; no one even knew that sex chromosomes _existed_ before 1905. [(Co-discovered by a woman!)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nettie_Stevens) But the function of [intensional definitions](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/HsznWM9A7NiuGsp28/extensions-and-intensions) in human natural language isn't to exhaustively [pinpoint](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/3FoMuCLqZggTxoC3S/logical-pinpointing) a concept in the detail it would be implemented in an AI's executing code, but rather to provide a "treasure map" sufficient for a listener to pick out the corresponding concept in their own world-model: that's why [Diogenes exhibiting a plucked chicken in response to Plato's definition of a human as a "featherless biped"](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jMTbQj9XB5ah2maup/similarity-clusters) seems like a cheap "gotcha"—we all instantly know that's not what Plato meant. ["The challenge is figuring out which things are similar to each other—which things are clustered together—and sometimes, which things have a common cause."](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/d5NyJ2Lf6N22AD9PB/where-to-draw-the-boundary) But sex chromosomes, and to a large extent specifically the [SRY gene](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testis-determining_factor) located on the Y chromosome, _are_ such a common cause—the root of the [causal graph](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/hzuSDMx7pd2uxFc5w/causal-diagrams-and-causal-models) underlying all _other_ sex differences. A smart natural philosopher living _before_ 1905, knowing about all the various observed differences between women and men, might have guessed at the existence of some molecular mechanism of sex determination, and been _right_. By the "treasure map" standard, "XX is female; XY is male" is a pretty _well-performing_ definition—if you're looking for a [_simple_ membership test](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/edEXi4SpkXfvaX42j/schelling-categories-and-simple-membership-tests) that provides a lot of information about the many intricate ways in which females and males statistically differ.
 

-Take faces. People are [verifiably very good at recognizing sex from (hair covered, males clean-shaven) photographs of people's faces](/papers/bruce_et_al-sex_discrimination_how_do_we_tell.pdf) (96% accuracy, which is the equivalent of _d_ ≈ 3.5), but we don't have direct introspective access into what _specific_ features our brains are using to do it; we just look, and _somehow_ know. The differences are real, but it's not a matter of any single, simple measurement you could perform with a ruler (like the distance between someone's eyes). Rather, it's a high-dimensional _pattern_ in many measurements you could take with a ruler, no one of which is definitive. [Covering up the nose makes people slower and slightly worse at sexing faces, but people don't do better than chance at guessing sex from photos of noses alone](/papers/roberts-bruce-feature_saliency_in_judging_the_sex_and_familiarity_of_faces.pdf).
+Take faces. People are [verifiably very good at recognizing sex from (hair covered, males clean-shaven) photographs of people's faces](/papers/bruce_et_al-sex_discrimination_how_do_we_tell.pdf) (96% accuracy, which is the equivalent of _d_ ≈ 3.5), but we don't have direct introspective access into what _specific_ features our brains are using to do it; we just look, and _somehow_ know. The differences are real [(a computer statistical model gets up to 99.47% accuracy)](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2015.1351#d3e949), but it's not a matter of any single, simple measurement you could perform with a ruler (like the distance between someone's eyes). Rather, it's a high-dimensional _pattern_ in many measurements you could take with a ruler, no one of which is definitive. [Covering up the nose makes people slower and slightly worse at sexing faces, but people don't do better than chance at guessing sex from photos of noses alone](/papers/roberts-bruce-feature_saliency_in_judging_the_sex_and_familiarity_of_faces.pdf).

 
 Notably, for _images_ of faces, we actually _do_ have transformation technology! (Not "magical", because we know how it works.) AI techniques like [generative adversarial networks](https://arxiv.org/abs/1812.04948) and [autoencoders](https://towardsdatascience.com/generating-images-with-autoencoders-77fd3a8dd368) can learn the structure of the distribution of facial photographs, and use that knowledge to synthesize faces from scratch (as demonstrated by [_thispersondoesnotexist.com_](https://thispersondoesnotexist.com/))—or [do things like](https://arxiv.org/abs/1907.10786) sex transformation (as demonstrated by [FaceApp](https://www.faceapp.com/), the _uniquely best piece of software in the world_).
 
 
 Notably, for _images_ of faces, we actually _do_ have transformation technology! (Not "magical", because we know how it works.) AI techniques like [generative adversarial networks](https://arxiv.org/abs/1812.04948) and [autoencoders](https://towardsdatascience.com/generating-images-with-autoencoders-77fd3a8dd368) can learn the structure of the distribution of facial photographs, and use that knowledge to synthesize faces from scratch (as demonstrated by [_thispersondoesnotexist.com_](https://thispersondoesnotexist.com/))—or [do things like](https://arxiv.org/abs/1907.10786) sex transformation (as demonstrated by [FaceApp](https://www.faceapp.com/), the _uniquely best piece of software in the world_).
 


@@ -676,9 +676,9 @@ I'm not optimistic about the problem being fixable, either. Our robot cult _alre
 
 Because of the particular historical moment in which we live, we end up facing pressure from progressives, because—whatever our _object-level_ beliefs about (say) [sex, race, and class differences](/2020/Apr/book-review-human-diversity/)—and however much many of us would prefer not to talk about them—on the _meta_ level, our creed requires us to admit _it's an empirical question_, not a moral one—and that [empirical questions have no privileged reason to admit convenient answers](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/sYgv4eYH82JEsTD34/beyond-the-reach-of-god).
 
 
 Because of the particular historical moment in which we live, we end up facing pressure from progressives, because—whatever our _object-level_ beliefs about (say) [sex, race, and class differences](/2020/Apr/book-review-human-diversity/)—and however much many of us would prefer not to talk about them—on the _meta_ level, our creed requires us to admit _it's an empirical question_, not a moral one—and that [empirical questions have no privileged reason to admit convenient answers](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/sYgv4eYH82JEsTD34/beyond-the-reach-of-god).
 

-I view this conflict as entirely incidental, something that [would happen in some form in any place and time](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/cKrgy7hLdszkse2pq/archimedes-s-chronophone), rather than having to do with American politics or "the left" in particular. In a Christian theocracy, our analogues would get in trouble for beliefs about evolution; in the old Soviet Union, our analogues would get in trouble for [thinking about market economics](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/24/book-review-red-plenty/) (as a positive technical discipline, adjacent to game theory, not yoked to a particular normative agenda).
+I view this conflict as entirely incidental, something that [would happen in some form in any place and time](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/cKrgy7hLdszkse2pq/archimedes-s-chronophone), rather than having to do with American politics or "the left" in particular. In a Christian theocracy, our analogues would get in trouble for beliefs about evolution; in the old Soviet Union, our analogues would get in trouble for [thinking about market economics](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/24/book-review-red-plenty/) (as a [positive technical discipline](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_theorems_of_welfare_economics#Proof_of_the_first_fundamental_theorem) adjacent to game theory, not yoked to a particular normative agenda).

 
 

-Incidental or not, the conflict is real, and everyone smart knows it—even if it's not easy to _prove_ that everyone smart knows it, because everyone smart is very careful what they say in public. Scott Aaronson wrote of [the Kolmogorov Option](https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3376) (which Alexander aptly renamed [Kolmorogov complicity](https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/23/kolmogorov-complicity-and-the-parable-of-lightning/): serve the cause of Truth by cultivating a bubble that focuses on truths that won't get you in trouble with the local political authorities. This after the Soviet mathematician Andrey Kolmogorov, who _knew better than to pick fights he couldn't win_.
+Incidental or not, the conflict is real, and everyone smart knows it—even if it's not easy to _prove_ that everyone smart knows it, because everyone smart is very careful what they say in public. (I am not smart.) Scott Aaronson wrote of [the Kolmogorov Option](https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3376) (which Alexander aptly renamed [Kolmorogov complicity](https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/23/kolmogorov-complicity-and-the-parable-of-lightning/): serve the cause of Truth by cultivating a bubble that focuses on truths that won't get you in trouble with the local political authorities. This after the Soviet mathematician Andrey Kolmogorov, who _knew better than to pick fights he couldn't win_.

 
 Becuase of the conflict, and because all the prominent high-status people are running a Kolmogorov Option strategy, and because we happen to have to a _wildly_ disproportionate number of _people like me_ around, I think being "pro-trans" ended up being part of the community's "shield" against external political pressure, of the sort that perked up after [the February 2021 _New York Times_ hit piece about Alexander's blog](https://archive.is/0Ghdl). (The _magnitude_ of heat brought on by the recent _Times_ piece and its aftermath was new, but the underlying dynamics had been present for years.)
 
 
 Becuase of the conflict, and because all the prominent high-status people are running a Kolmogorov Option strategy, and because we happen to have to a _wildly_ disproportionate number of _people like me_ around, I think being "pro-trans" ended up being part of the community's "shield" against external political pressure, of the sort that perked up after [the February 2021 _New York Times_ hit piece about Alexander's blog](https://archive.is/0Ghdl). (The _magnitude_ of heat brought on by the recent _Times_ piece and its aftermath was new, but the underlying dynamics had been present for years.)
 


@@ -726,15 +726,15 @@ I want a shared cultural understanding that the _correct_ way to ameliorate the
 
 In a world where surgery is expensive, but people desperately want to change sex, there's an incentive gradient in the direction of re-engineering the culture to bind our shared concept of "gender" (the social perception of sex) onto things like [ornamental clothing](http://thetranswidow.com/2021/02/18/womens-clothing-is-always-drag-even-on-women/) that are easier to change than secondary sex characteristics.
 
 
 In a world where surgery is expensive, but people desperately want to change sex, there's an incentive gradient in the direction of re-engineering the culture to bind our shared concept of "gender" (the social perception of sex) onto things like [ornamental clothing](http://thetranswidow.com/2021/02/18/womens-clothing-is-always-drag-even-on-women/) that are easier to change than secondary sex characteristics.
 

-But [_the utility function is not up for grabs._](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/6ddcsdA2c2XpNpE5x/newcomb-s-problem-and-regret-of-rationality) I don't _want_ to reliniqush my ability to notice what women's faces look like, even if that means noticing that mine isn't, even if that seems vaguely disappointing due to an idiosyncracy in my sexuality; I don't want people to have to _doublethink around their perceptions of me_.
+But [_the utility function is not up for grabs._](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/6ddcsdA2c2XpNpE5x/newcomb-s-problem-and-regret-of-rationality) I don't _want_ to reliniqush my ability to notice what women's faces look like, even if that means noticing that mine isn't, even if that seems vaguely disappointing due to an idiosyncracy in my socio-sexual development; I don't want people to have to _doublethink around their perceptions of me_.

 
 If I sound angry, it's because I actually _do_ feel a lot of anger, but I wish I knew how to more reliably convey its target. Some trans people who see my writing tend to assume I'm self-hating, suffering from false consciousness, that my pious appeals to objectivity and reason are [just a facade](https://sinceriously.fyi/false-faces/) concealing my collaboration with a cissexist social order, that I'm in cowardly thrall to scapegoating instincts: "I'm one of the good, compliant ones—not one of those weird bad trans people who will demand their rights! _They're_ the witches, not me; burn them, not me!"
 
 
 If I sound angry, it's because I actually _do_ feel a lot of anger, but I wish I knew how to more reliably convey its target. Some trans people who see my writing tend to assume I'm self-hating, suffering from false consciousness, that my pious appeals to objectivity and reason are [just a facade](https://sinceriously.fyi/false-faces/) concealing my collaboration with a cissexist social order, that I'm in cowardly thrall to scapegoating instincts: "I'm one of the good, compliant ones—not one of those weird bad trans people who will demand their rights! _They're_ the witches, not me; burn them, not me!"
 

-I have [no grounds to fault anyone for not taking my self-report as unquestionable](/2016/Sep/psychology-is-about-invalidating-peoples-identities/)—the urge to scapegoat and submit to the dominant player is definitely a thing—but I really think this is reading me wrong? 
+I have [no grounds to fault anyone for not taking my self-report as unquestionable](/2016/Sep/psychology-is-about-invalidating-peoples-identities/)—the urge to scapegoat and submit to the dominant player is definitely a thing—but I really think this is reading me wrong?

 
 I'm not at war with trans _people_—open, creative people who are just like me—I want to believe that even the natal females are "just like me" in some relevant abstract sense—but who read different books in a different order. I'm at war with an _ideology_ which I think is making a lot of philosophical and empirical claims that I think are _false_.
 
 
 I'm not at war with trans _people_—open, creative people who are just like me—I want to believe that even the natal females are "just like me" in some relevant abstract sense—but who read different books in a different order. I'm at war with an _ideology_ which I think is making a lot of philosophical and empirical claims that I think are _false_.
 

-Maybe that's not particularly reassuring, if people tend to identify with their ideology? (As I used to—as I _still_ do, even if my revised ideology is much more meta.) When the prototypical Christian says "Hate the sin, love the sinner", does anyone actually buy it?
+Maybe that's not particularly reassuring, if people tend to identify with their ideology? (As I used to—as I _still_ do, even if my [revised ideology is much more meta](http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/03/dreaming-of-political-bayescraft/).) When the prototypical Christian says "Hate the sin, love the sinner", does anyone actually buy it?

 
 [
 the political incentives propagate recursively, a phase transition: in a culture it's normal for AGP males to transition, any sub-culture where they don't is subject to attack as transphobic
 
 [
 the political incentives propagate recursively, a phase transition: in a culture it's normal for AGP males to transition, any sub-culture where they don't is subject to attack as transphobic

diff --git a/notes/post_ideas.txt b/notes/post_ideas.txt
index 4903e37..8a15fa8 100644 (file)
--- a/notes/post_ideas.txt
+++ b/notes/post_ideas.txt
@@ -1,8 +1,10 @@
 _ Point Man
 _ Link: "See Color"
 - Sexual Dimorphism in Yudkowsky's Sequences, in Relation to
 _ Point Man
 _ Link: "See Color"
 - Sexual Dimorphism in Yudkowsky's Sequences, in Relation to

+_ E.Y. as case study on unconscious-lying and self-report

 
 LW—
 
 LW—

+_ Overlapping Distributions and Cancellable Stereotypes

 - And the Wisdom to Know the Difference
 _ importance of getting the direction of causality right
 _ Multi-Level Moloch; Or, Technically, the Holocaust Was a Coordination Success
 - And the Wisdom to Know the Difference
 _ importance of getting the direction of causality right
 _ Multi-Level Moloch; Or, Technically, the Holocaust Was a Coordination Success

diff --git a/notes/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-notes.md b/notes/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-notes.md
index 2f18961..ab6ab33 100644 (file)
--- a/notes/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-notes.md
+++ b/notes/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-notes.md
@@ -1,11 +1,29 @@
 Sections I should be able to easily make progress-per-minute on—
 * Dr. Will Powers
 Sections I should be able to easily make progress-per-minute on—
 * Dr. Will Powers

-* I Don't Do Policy
-* Cara's Egregore
-* Scott Alexander Understands Language
+
+
+
+
+
+

 * Moral Error and Moral Disagreement
 
 
 * Moral Error and Moral Disagreement
 
 

+
+
+* wipe culturally defined values: https://www.greaterwrong.com/posts/BkkwXtaTf5LvbA6HB/moral-error-and-moral-disagreement (this might have to go after Failed-Utopia #4-2)
+* https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/LRKXuxLrnxx3nSESv/should-ethicists-be-inside-or-outside-a-profession "Anyone who gives a part of themselves to a profession discovers a sense of beauty in it." same thing with an ideology; http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/03/dreaming-of-political-bayescraft/
+* the moment in October 2016 when I switched sides http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2016/10/late-onset/ http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/03/brand-rust/
+https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jNAAZ9XNyt82CXosr/mirrors-and-paintings
+
+
+
+
+
+* Scott Alexander Understands Language
+
+-----
+

 Points to work in—
 
 * papal infallability / Eliezer Yudkowsky facts
 Points to work in—
 
 * papal infallability / Eliezer Yudkowsky facts


@@ -13,10 +31,6 @@ https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Ndtb22KYBxpBsagpj/eliezer-yudkowsky-facts?commen
 Never go in against Eliezer Yudkowsky when anything is on the line.
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Norris_facts
 
 Never go in against Eliezer Yudkowsky when anything is on the line.
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Norris_facts
 

-* wipe culturally defined values: https://www.greaterwrong.com/posts/BkkwXtaTf5LvbA6HB/moral-error-and-moral-disagreement (this might have to go after Failed-Utopia #4-2)
-* https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/LRKXuxLrnxx3nSESv/should-ethicists-be-inside-or-outside-a-profession "Anyone who gives a part of themselves to a profession discovers a sense of beauty in it." same thing with an ideology; http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/03/dreaming-of-political-bayescraft/
-* the moment in October 2016 when I switched sides http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2016/10/late-onset/ http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/03/brand-rust/
-https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jNAAZ9XNyt82CXosr/mirrors-and-paintings

 
 Terminology/vocab to explain before use—
 * Singularity/paperclip/Methods/existential risk
 
 Terminology/vocab to explain before use—
 * Singularity/paperclip/Methods/existential risk


@@ -43,7 +57,6 @@ Aren't those trans women going to be _embarrrassed_ after the Singularity, when
 
 like the time I snuck a copy of _Men Trapped in Men's Bodies: Narratives of Autogynephilic Transsexualism_ into the [MIRI](https://intelligence.org/) office library. (It seemed like something Harry Potter-Evans-Verres would do—and ominously, I noticed, not like something Hermione Granger would do.)
 
 
 like the time I snuck a copy of _Men Trapped in Men's Bodies: Narratives of Autogynephilic Transsexualism_ into the [MIRI](https://intelligence.org/) office library. (It seemed like something Harry Potter-Evans-Verres would do—and ominously, I noticed, not like something Hermione Granger would do.)
 

-

 [AGP is used as a weapon, but I think it's an actual claim]
 
 https://sinceriously.fyi/intersex-brains-and-conceptual-warfare/
 [AGP is used as a weapon, but I think it's an actual claim]
 
 https://sinceriously.fyi/intersex-brains-and-conceptual-warfare/


@@ -86,7 +99,7 @@ https://carcinisation.com/2015/06/03/the-memetic-commons/
 
 -----
 
 
 -----
 

-
+"never advocate" https://graymirror.substack.com/p/glasnost-and-perestroika

 
 it's that I want culture to innovate in the direction of "achieving godlike understanding of objective reality and optimizing the hell out of it" rather than "playing mind games on each other to make it artificially harder to notice that we don't actually live in a Total Morphological Freedom tech regime."
 
 
 it's that I want culture to innovate in the direction of "achieving godlike understanding of objective reality and optimizing the hell out of it" rather than "playing mind games on each other to make it artificially harder to notice that we don't actually live in a Total Morphological Freedom tech regime."