![eliezer_yudkowsky-270x3201[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/QJXbF6h.jpg "eliezer_yudkowsky-270x3201[1].jpg")
What do you think of LessWrong and the so-called rationalist community?
I'm fine with them.
>>960910
I don't
>>961103
Has reading any of the essays helped you improve your thinking?
>>960910
LessWrong is basically a personality cult to ensure Elzier Yudowski never has to work a day in his life.
>>961112
I'm sure he worked very hard on his Harry Potter fanfiction.
>>960910
They write fun stories. I can't say I'm smart enough to understand what they're doing with AI/ethics/morals/mathematics/whatever, but it seems vaguely interesting.
>>961596
You probably are smart enough, and what they're doing is mostly bullshit: they speculate about the future and come to 'objectively correct' conclusions based on a simplistic understanding of bayesian probability, e.g.:
>'Even if cryonics has an infinitessimal chance of working, the chance is still not equal to zero, so you would be an idiot to not freeze your corpse and a child abuser to not freeze your children when they die."
>"we've solved the teleportation paradox: a copy of you is literally you, because they are identical (since A=A). Therefore, a simulation of you is also literally you, and since the possibility of intelligent AI's is a very high probability, and an intelligent AI would do everything in its power to ensure its own existence, then an intelligent AI in the future would create copies of people who didn't support its creation in the past, and torture them in a simulated hell. Since a simulation of you is literally you, you should do everything in your power to bring about this AI's creation, or you will go to simulated hell."
No I'm not making this up, several LessWrongers actually worked themselves into a panic over this thought experiment:
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Roko's_basilisk
>>960910
LessWrong is alright for all its idiosyncrasies, but I prefer Slate Star Codex's branch of the community.
>>961638
>they still believe that the self exists
>>960910
I think they're a bunch of well-meaning, gainfully employed sperglords
>>961638
The basilisk was a joke though, some autists just took it way to seriously
>>961638
>>961723
>TheLastPsychiatrist
He was great, what happened to him?
Any ideology with so many Jews can't be good for us gentiles.
>>961837
I think he just got bored, or he realized his shtick was getting a bit tired (his insights re great, but he only really had one or two central theses, which he would apply to various media and news items.)
>>961638
So, you're supposed to help the AI out of empathy for your simulated self?
>>961899
It's less weird than you make it sound. It's like saying you're supposed to do your homework out of empathy for your future self. In short, it's just selfish behavior.
>>961907
In fact, the simulation the AI will create would be "you" in a much more real sense than "your" future self will ever be, since the simulation is a straight-up copy of you at the present time while your future self will be, in many ways, another person.
(Am I saying that the AI will produce infinite of copies of you, like snapshots taken at every point in time? Possibly.)
>>960910
It's the great attractor for shy narcissists on the internet.
Yudkowsky is shit. Alexander is okay.
>>961661
Don't talk to me or my wife's spook ever again.
>>961661
It's pretty embarrassing actually
