Comments on: Show, Sort, Shill

By: Nick Walker

Nick Walker — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 19:29:59 +0000

You observed in a previous post insights rarely signal high status since insight without execution signals lack of power or connections.

Mark Zuckerberg didn’t invent the social network (GeoCities, Myspace, Friendster came before) but he sorted it.

Bill James of baseball statistics “sabermetrics” fame is a shower. He’d show a statistic like on base percentage and runs scored were important, but he left the heavy research and refinement to his subscribers and followers. His work was largely ignored until a general manager in Oakland used it, and that general manager is typically given equal credit for the evolution of baseball statistics.

By: uberVU - social comments

uberVU - social comments — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 12:31:29 +0000

Social comments and analytics for this post…

This post was mentioned on Twitter by iGniSz: @wendyhk trouwens als je Kurzweil leuk vind dan vind je deze 2 sites misschien ook wel leuk: http://bit.ly/cbiAuV http://bit.ly/dsfmP3 #tip…

By: Recomendaciones « intelib

Recomendaciones « intelib — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 11:53:38 +0000

[...] Show, Sort, Shill, by Robin [...]

By: In Mala Fide

In Mala Fide — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 11:03:11 +0000

Linkage is Good for You: My Other Rule 5 Pic is a Rule 5 Vid Edition…

This video of Ukrainian belly dancer Alla Cushnir comes your way via Eolake Stobblehouse. You’re welcome. Chuck Ross – “Penis Myths“, “Straw Men and Silicone Women” Eumaios – “Quitter in Chief” Max …

By: mjgeddes

mjgeddes — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 04:29:16 +0000

Excellent classification Robin! This actually matches my fundamental 3-fold ontological ‘joint carving’ of reality.

Identity Condition: Show (Defining the idea itself).
Scalar Transform: Sort (Scalar rating signals attached to idea)
Representation: Shill (Effective representation for communication)

‘Shill’ seems to be equivalent to ‘far’ mode, ‘Sort’ is the near mode. ‘Show’ should perhaps be labelled ‘very near’?

Readers note that in logic, the same 3-fold ontological division appears to be present:

Identity Condition: Axioms (Defines subject) and deductions (implicate)
Scalar transform: Probabilities and Bayes (mental ‘force’ of evidence)
Representation: Categorization (deals with logical uncertainty).

I feel the LW/OB crowd has failed to grasp the significance of the third ontological joint, ‘far’ mode is not understood!… for example in logic, categorization is the solution to the problem of logical uncertainty!!

Distrust of ‘far’ mode may cause you to underrate the significance of ‘Shill’ – Shill has its place, effective representation for communication purposes is important, there’s nothing wrong with propaganda .. Of what use is an idea if no one is moved by it? Surely, more Shill is precisely what you want to alleviate your concerns?

By: Nick Ernst

Nick Ernst — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 23:37:24 +0000

I can’t edit or delete previous posts? Perhaps those luxuries have reinforced my sloppiness. I wanted to replace the above with the following:
“I agree, the sorting was small (but non-zero). I get from your tone that length signals perceived worth of a post, so you may have assumed I was attempting to signal as much, or under the illusion that I thought I did more sorting than I actually did, when in fact I simply need to work on editing skills. I will be more concise next time I have a comment to make – but go easy on me, it was my first comment on OB!”

By: Gordon Worley

Gordon Worley — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 23:10:20 +0000

Robin, the solution seems obvious to me. You need to continue blogging in obscurity, die in obscurity, and then wait some unspecified period of time for some academic with a high desire to seek status to “discover” your writings and make them famous. Then you’ll go down as an unrecognized genius who had it all figured out, if only someone had listened to his great ideas, and still get at least one or two ideas into the main stream through your yet unborn academic parasite.

But, ha ha, only serious.

By: Nick Ernst

Nick Ernst — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 20:13:41 +0000

I suffer from excessive verbosity, 2am impaired reasoning and possibly misunderstanding of what you were getting at.

I read “I’m afraid that my blogged ideas may not get the sorting/shilling I want them to, and want to evaluate whether or not to spend more effort sorting them myself.”

My response was “worrying about not getting enough sorting/shilling could be either about audience maintenance, or actual idea development. Here is how blogs maintain themselves (in your framework, sorting the idea of showing, sorting and shilling). Conclusion: This probably isn’t your concern. Then if total sorting is your concern, here are the factors to consider, and an approach to minimize effort for sorting. Also, how publishing fits into the framework. Perhaps I did unnecessary sorting, and certainly in too many words, but my comments were not void of sorting unless I misunderstood something.

By: burger flipper

burger flipper — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 20:07:29 +0000

I suspect you have gotten more ideas “out there” thru the blog than your academic publications. A throwaway comment of mine a year or 2 back was the catalyst for a NY Times article:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/ni/buy_now_or_forever_hold_your_peace/i4f

My sage wisdom:
1) continue blogging, but maybe cut back the volume
2) ready some of your stronger/repeated ideas (near/far applications, dreamtime) for journals
3) Caplan’s popular book

By: Robin Hanson

Robin Hanson — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 20:02:40 +0000

Wei, only a small class of ideas can be easily “looked up”. A much larger class of ideas can be described in so many possible ways as to make them very hard to find.