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LessWrong House Style (2023)
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this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2024
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SneerClub
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Hurling ordure at the TREACLES, especially those closely related to LessWrong.
AI-Industrial-Complex grift is fine as long as it sufficiently relates to the AI doom from the TREACLES. (Though TechTakes may be more suitable.)
This is sneer club, not debate club. Unless it's amusing debate.
[Especially don't debate the race scientists, if any sneak in - we ban and delete them as unsuitable for the server.]
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The particular way they invoke Bayes' theorem is fascinating. They don't seem to ever actually use it in any sort of rigorous way, it's merely used as a way to codify their own biases. It's an alibi for putting a precise percentage point on your vibes. It's kind of beautiful in a really stupid sort of way.
They seem to believe that stereotypes often have a grain of truth to them, and it's thus ok to believe stereotypes.
"which stereotypes?"
"oh, you know the ones"
I would say it goes further and that they have a (pseudo?)magical trust in their own intuitions, as if they are crystal clear revalations from the platonic realms.
I will always remember Sam Bankman Fried saying it's obvious that Shakespeare can't be the greatest author ever because it's unlikely. Just because something's unlikely doesn't mean it's impossible! You need to independently evaluate the evidence!
Also I feel like the logic he based that on was just dumb. Like, some writer out of the last several centuries is going to be the best for whatever given metric. We shouldn't be surprised that any particular individual is the best any more than another. If anything the fact that people still talk about him after the centuries is probably the strongest argument in favor of his writing that you could make.
But of course Sam's real goal was to justify the weird rationalist talking point that reading is overrated because podcasts exist or something.
They take a theory that is supposed to be about updating one's beliefs in the face of new evidence, and they use it as an excuse to never change what they think.
It's the Bayesian version of Zeno's paradox. Before one can update their beliefs, one must have evidence of an alternative proposition. But no one piece of evidence is worth meaningfully changing your worldview and actions. In order to be so it would need to be supported. But then that supporting evidence would itself need to be supported. And so on ad infinitum.