I have a theory concerning the function of happiness. It says that happiness does not function as an incentive we pursue but serves to regulate our social behavior conditional on our social status. The general philosophy behind the theory seems favorable to what most people here believe. So I hope you might kindly offer me some feedback :) http://sarkology.wordpress....
Hi Robin, I don't know if this has been addressed yet. The movie "Magic Mike" shows male strippers in an interesting light. Do you have a take on this movie? If you haven't seen it yet I guarantee your wife wants you to take her to it and you will probably regret going.
I recently read about 4 fascinating numbers which I have never seen discussed together. First, 30. Steve Hsu reports that a comprehensive correction of each of the many gene expression nodes relating to intelligence would result, after each is flipped from adverse to positive in a particular individual, in a g level of 30 positive sigmas. I would have guessed 7 or 8 at most. Second, 13,700. Poet and geometrician Shing-Tung Yau reports that recent telescopic observations have led experts to believe that, even if the universe curves with respect to itself (like a saddle or like the best dark and light balloon ever) it must be no less than the size of one thousand Hubble volumes of 13.7 billion light years. I would have guessed 40 or 50. Third, ten to the tenth power to the one hundred and twenty second power (give or take a power or two). Brian Greene, string theory professor, reports that it is possible that there are an infinite number of potential fully separated cosmic horizons and that "the number of distinct possible particle configurations within a cosmic horizon is about ... a 1 followed by ten to the 122 zeros" (I would have guessed, roughly, a 1 followed by ten to the google zeros to the google zeros multiplied by a number ten to the google zeros larger than that). Fourth, 12,000. Gerard t'Hooft, if I read him correctly, reports that the "theoretical minimum" to do useful creative work in physics involves prior knowledge of something roughly equivalent to (what I fairly or unfairly extrapolate to be) twelve thousand pairs of pages of catalogued physics knowledge, assuming lots of helpful interspersed equations, pictures, and diagrams, and a comfortably large type face. I would have guessed 900 or so. Two quick questions. (A) Which of these numbers is most likely incorrect. (B) Assuming each of these numbers is correct, and also assuming that materialism is "right" and theism is "wrong", what is the point of trying to scientifically extend life by relatively small magnitudes of length? Why not wait for Steve Hsu's 30 sigma souped-up-descendants who will plow through the theoretical minimum in a week or two in summer, or why not rely on the soothing and theoretically inevitable power of Brian Greene's infinitely repeated configurations, to do the job of extending everything which is worth extending?
That's an unrealistic assumption. But accepting it, consider externalities, and if there are no negative externalities that would outweigh the net quality-of-life gain for your copies, accept the offer.
(I was the guest btw, the browser hadn't stored my usual nick as a default for some reason)
He was fired because the company charges for each meter of beach they protect.By saving a person outside the area that was payed for, the lifeguard reduced the incentive the state has to buy the service, hence he damaged the company financial interests.
According to his boss he was supposed to sit and watch a man die.
So he was fired to knock his status down? His boss only had status from being rich and owning the company.
The vicarious status the boss got from being the "superior" of the high status lifeguard wasn't enough for the boss, so he fired the lifeguard, expecting that the boss would increase in status by putting the lifeguard down.
Or was he fired because the lifeguard did put human life ahead of the boss's work rules? So the boss needed to put him in his place?
It seems very implausible biologically. Memories are probably complex in implementation, so parasites would very probably only have this feature if it were an evolved function, and even that is probably not easy to evolve into. And I don't see the adaptation value for the parasite.
2) Needs more information. As a person who can predict that his copies will hate life as a subsistence farmer, it would be immoral for me to accept. If I were a person who can predict that he will probably love it, or else be able to commit reliable painless suicide at any time, it would be moral.
Because a memory is a copy of the subjective experience of an event, and because recalling something is itself a subjective experience with attributes mapping directly to the original event.
Outsourcing public services to private contractors, how nice....
The company fired him because he provided the service for free.
Or is he being a chump in risking his life (and job) in rescuing someone he was not being paid to rescue, and is that the kind of generosity that non-chumps like to exploit and take advantage of?
No, because doing such things is (was?) typically considered high status.
I would like to here other people's analysis of the story of the lifeguard who was fired for leaving his assigned area to rescue someone outside his assigned area.
On the one hand it is of course reasonable to fire him because he left his assigned area. On the other hand is it reasonable to simply watch while a man drowns just because he was outside his assigned area? There could be liability either way.
Or is he being a chump in risking his life (and job) in rescuing someone he was not being paid to rescue, and is that the kind of generosity that non-chumps like to exploit and take advantage of?
Is a "dark and light balloon" a thing, or have I misparsed your sentence?
A researcher involved in construal-level theory may have fabricated his data: http://andrewgelman.com/201...
I have a theory concerning the function of happiness. It says that happiness does not function as an incentive we pursue but serves to regulate our social behavior conditional on our social status. The general philosophy behind the theory seems favorable to what most people here believe. So I hope you might kindly offer me some feedback :) http://sarkology.wordpress....
Hi Robin, I don't know if this has been addressed yet. The movie "Magic Mike" shows male strippers in an interesting light. Do you have a take on this movie? If you haven't seen it yet I guarantee your wife wants you to take her to it and you will probably regret going.
The first number. There is no suchthing as “g”. It is simply an artifact.
http://cscs.umich.edu/~crsh...
I recently read about 4 fascinating numbers which I have never seen discussed together. First, 30. Steve Hsu reports that a comprehensive correction of each of the many gene expression nodes relating to intelligence would result, after each is flipped from adverse to positive in a particular individual, in a g level of 30 positive sigmas. I would have guessed 7 or 8 at most. Second, 13,700. Poet and geometrician Shing-Tung Yau reports that recent telescopic observations have led experts to believe that, even if the universe curves with respect to itself (like a saddle or like the best dark and light balloon ever) it must be no less than the size of one thousand Hubble volumes of 13.7 billion light years. I would have guessed 40 or 50. Third, ten to the tenth power to the one hundred and twenty second power (give or take a power or two). Brian Greene, string theory professor, reports that it is possible that there are an infinite number of potential fully separated cosmic horizons and that "the number of distinct possible particle configurations within a cosmic horizon is about ... a 1 followed by ten to the 122 zeros" (I would have guessed, roughly, a 1 followed by ten to the google zeros to the google zeros multiplied by a number ten to the google zeros larger than that). Fourth, 12,000. Gerard t'Hooft, if I read him correctly, reports that the "theoretical minimum" to do useful creative work in physics involves prior knowledge of something roughly equivalent to (what I fairly or unfairly extrapolate to be) twelve thousand pairs of pages of catalogued physics knowledge, assuming lots of helpful interspersed equations, pictures, and diagrams, and a comfortably large type face. I would have guessed 900 or so. Two quick questions. (A) Which of these numbers is most likely incorrect. (B) Assuming each of these numbers is correct, and also assuming that materialism is "right" and theism is "wrong", what is the point of trying to scientifically extend life by relatively small magnitudes of length? Why not wait for Steve Hsu's 30 sigma souped-up-descendants who will plow through the theoretical minimum in a week or two in summer, or why not rely on the soothing and theoretically inevitable power of Brian Greene's infinitely repeated configurations, to do the job of extending everything which is worth extending?
That's an unrealistic assumption. But accepting it, consider externalities, and if there are no negative externalities that would outweigh the net quality-of-life gain for your copies, accept the offer.
(I was the guest btw, the browser hadn't stored my usual nick as a default for some reason)
He was fired because the company charges for each meter of beach they protect.By saving a person outside the area that was payed for, the lifeguard reduced the incentive the state has to buy the service, hence he damaged the company financial interests.
According to his boss he was supposed to sit and watch a man die.
So he was fired to knock his status down? His boss only had status from being rich and owning the company.
The vicarious status the boss got from being the "superior" of the high status lifeguard wasn't enough for the boss, so he fired the lifeguard, expecting that the boss would increase in status by putting the lifeguard down.
Or was he fired because the lifeguard did put human life ahead of the boss's work rules? So the boss needed to put him in his place?
But remembering that you remembered X is generally different that remembering X.
Assume that living as a subsistence farmer is less desirable than your current life, but not as undesirable that you would wish to kill yourself.
It seems very implausible biologically. Memories are probably complex in implementation, so parasites would very probably only have this feature if it were an evolved function, and even that is probably not easy to evolve into. And I don't see the adaptation value for the parasite.
1) No.
2) Needs more information. As a person who can predict that his copies will hate life as a subsistence farmer, it would be immoral for me to accept. If I were a person who can predict that he will probably love it, or else be able to commit reliable painless suicide at any time, it would be moral.
Why?
Because a memory is a copy of the subjective experience of an event, and because recalling something is itself a subjective experience with attributes mapping directly to the original event.
Outsourcing public services to private contractors, how nice....
The company fired him because he provided the service for free.
Or is he being a chump in risking his life (and job) in rescuing someone he was not being paid to rescue, and is that the kind of generosity that non-chumps like to exploit and take advantage of?
No, because doing such things is (was?) typically considered high status.
I would like to here other people's analysis of the story of the lifeguard who was fired for leaving his assigned area to rescue someone outside his assigned area.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs...
On the one hand it is of course reasonable to fire him because he left his assigned area. On the other hand is it reasonable to simply watch while a man drowns just because he was outside his assigned area? There could be liability either way.
Or is he being a chump in risking his life (and job) in rescuing someone he was not being paid to rescue, and is that the kind of generosity that non-chumps like to exploit and take advantage of?