2018-04-02 RRG Notes
- Beliefs should have consequences
- Beliefs should constrain future experiences
- Empiricism is the process of asking what experiences our beliefs predict and what they prohibit
- When arguing about beliefs, ask about what differences in anticipated experience those beliefs would result in
- If you can't find the difference, you're probably arguing about which name you should put on the label for a particular experience, not the experience itself
- My thoughts
- This is probably one of Eliezer's best essays
- Succicntly explains what empiricism is
- Science fiction parable, in which people have been driven from the Earth's surface
- Have no idea what the sky looks like any more - only knowledge come from books that describe the sky as "cerulean"
- Debate arises over whether cerulean is a shade of blue or a shade of green
- This debate takes on political dimensions and leads to violence
- As a result, the question of whether the sky is blue or green isn't a simple question about color - it's entangled with many other social and economic beliefs
- One day there's an earthquake and a path to the surface opens up
- What happens next depends on who takes the path
- Aditya the Blue - sees the color of the sky as vindication for all the Blues have fought for; decides to end the truce between blue and green
- Barron the Green - sees the color of the sky as proof that the universe is evil
- Charles (moderate Blue) - saw the knowledge itself as dangerous; vows to come back the next day and seal off the path
- Daria, a green - forces herself to look at the sky and change her mind, even though it's hard and painful
- Eddin, a green - struck by the pointlessness of all the conflict over something as simple as color
- Ferris - just notices the color and proceeds to explore the rest of the surface world
- My thoughts
- The possibility that Eliezer misses is that the people who believe the sky is green look up and see a green sky, and the people who believe the sky is blue look up and see a blue sky
- Color is culturally mediated - societies don't develop words for color until they develop the dyes for those colors
- This is why, etymologically, words for "blue" are often thousands of years younger than words for other colors - blue dye is the hardest to develop
- Small children, when asked the color of the sky, will say the the sky is white. It is only after they read books and are corrected by their parents that they say that the sky is blue
- Homer describes a "wine-dark sea" - we see the sea as having a totally different color than wine, but perhaps thats a result of our culture drawing the borders between colors differently
- Russians are more quick to distinguish between light blue and dark blue, because Russian has different words for those two colors - culture primes us to notice certain distinctions and dismiss others are irrelevant
- It's often much easier to believe that one ought to believe something than it is to actually believe the thing
- People often claim to believe something even when they don't anticipate the outcomes of that belief
- These people often make excuses to pre-emptively explain away experimental results that contradict the belief they profess to hold
- This means that they hold a true model of the world somewhere within their mind, but it's become decoupled from the beliefs they profess to hold
- In many ways, people who genuinely believe something are easier to convince because you can debate them at the object level by mustering evidence
- My thoughts
- It's good to distinguish between first and second order beliefs
- Other than that, it's a standard Eliezer piece
- Eliezer encounters someone who asserts that Artifical Intelligence is impossible because intelligence requires souls and souls can only be created by God
- Eliezer responds that if he does succeed in creating an AI, then that proves that person's religion false
- Person attempts to retreat by saying that they were referring to emotional experience
- Eliezer replies by saying that if the AI appears to have an emotional life, then, it proves that person's religion wrong
- Person says that they might have to agree to disagree, but then Eliezer uses Aumann's agreement theorem to assert that rationalists cannot agree to disagree
- My thoughts
- Let me just say, Eliezer is being a TREMENDOUS ASSHOLE
- The other person was just trying to retreat and save face
- But no, Eliezer can't just let it go
- Never ever behave like this. Even if you're right, you proving that you're right is not worth being a dick, unless real money or lives are at stake
- Many people signal wisdom by refusing to pass judgement
- There is a real difference between suspending judgement and asserting that every point of view is as plausible as every other point of view
- There is a real difference between skepticism and relativism, between doubting a particular answer and asserting that all answers are equally valid
- Remember that neutrality is also a judgement - refusing to choose sides is also a choice
- There is a difference among:
- Passing neutral judgement
- Refusing to pass judgement
- Pretending that either of the above is a mark of deep wisdom that sets you above the rest
- My thoughts
- This highlights the sort of attitude that allows e.g. global warming denialism
