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Aaron Bergman's tweets, August 2023

Every public tweet, reply, quote tweet and retweet that Aaron Bergman (@AaronBergman18 on X, formerly Twitter) posted in August 2023 and has not deleted: 689 posts, oldest first, times in UTC. Each heading links to the original post on X. When Aaron replies to or quotes someone, their tweet appears as a blockquote with their name; those words are theirs, and everything outside the blockquotes is Aaron's.

This page is one month of the complete archive of Aaron Bergman's tweets, which updates automatically every few hours. Previous month: July 2023. Next month: September 2023.

Tuesday, August 1, 2023

Tweet, 03:07 UTC · 757 likes

This obesity thing is like the biggest possible nerdsnipe. A huge mystery that affects billions of people, with tons of data and no satisfying answers as of yet.

Like how does Iran have an obesity rate *~12 times higher* than Vietnam, a country of very similar wealth?

Tweet, 03:07 UTC · 108 likes

If someone figured out how to combine this and the sleeping beauty problem it would be over for me

Reply, 03:15 UTC · 7 likes

There’s not enough room on this app for the both of us 😤 https://www.aaronbergman.net/p/the-answer-to-the-sleeping-beauty

Tweet, 12:11 UTC · 19 likes

I am calling for a total and complete shutdown on history until we can figure out what the hell is going on

Tweet, 12:11 UTC · 4 likes

[master mechanistic interpretability]

Reply, 12:46 UTC · 4 likes

Yes this should be a priority!

Reply to @AndyMasley, 14:50 UTC · 2 likes

Andy Masley (@AndyMasley): I remember in college hyper cultural relativism about ethics was pretty common, where people would imply that all the smart people knew ethics was fake and that any general statement about good and bad stuff happening in other countries was wrong, but that seems to have died down

Moral realism go brr

Reply, 15:12 UTC · 38 likes

In all seriousness, having good heuristics and intuition for who to listen to on any matter seems like a single skill - you don’t need to be an expert on everything, just on expertise

Tweet, 15:16 UTC · 55 likes

If anyone is >90% sure either way about the superconductor, I’ll bet $100 at 1:10 odds that you’re wrong

Reply, 15:29 UTC · 8 likes

Yeah I don’t expect anyone to take me up on this. It’s like 40% rhetorical bc I’m seeing some confident takes

Reply, 15:45 UTC · 11 likes

Is “smoke this out” a real thing British ppl say? Bc I wanna culturally appropriate it

Reply, 15:52 UTC · 2 likes

Right. It’s not exactly antidemocratic, but it’s definitely undemocratic

Reply to @ryancbriggs, 16:32 UTC · 3 likes

Ryan Briggs (@ryancbriggs): A nice illustration of why targeting happiness as the key outcome for EA is bad. Few women now would want to go back to the 1970s, even though according to happiness they were clearly better off. What we care about is much richer than happiness.

(quoting @Douthat60: Male and female happiness since the Sexual Revolution (but pre-Covid), discuss:)

I mean I think there are some methodological issues with much of the happiness literature but, no, I strongly disagree

What do you propose is the truer or more fundamental moral good?

Reply, 17:21 UTC · 3 likes

Wdym “posting it back to them”? Like just sending it in the GC or threatening to send some screenshot to an authority of some sort?

Reply, 18:26 UTC · 2 likes

in that case based

Reply, 18:28 UTC · 29 likes

That's interesting - I'm guessing this would erase the particular vietnam vs iran mystery

Tweet, 21:16 UTC · 22 likes

Does anyone have a thought experiment that demonstrates why a coherent ethical theory can’t have the Pareto principle, transitivity, and impartiality?

Bc if not and it just “falls out of the math,” I’m skeptical that the math is modeling the right thing

Image

Tweet, 21:16 UTC · 3 likes

From https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/holden-karnofsky-how-ai-could-take-over-the-world/

Reply, 21:37 UTC · 2 likes

wait I don't understand - often math is a formal way of proving some claim but it's possible to turn the intuition or smth like that into a story

By "just," I mean like for whatever reason the story part isn't possible or at least nobody's been able to come up with a good one

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 21:48 UTC · 12 likes

Aaron Bergman, August 1, 2023: From https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/holden-karnofsky-how-ai-could-take-over-the-world/

Kinda sus

More specifically I'm skeptical that the existence of a bijection between the (accurate, lets grant) algebraic models of two worlds necessarily implies that they are of equal moral value

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Tweet, 21:49 UTC · 3 likes

I also don't get which of the three properties listed above this puts into conflict

Quote tweet, 21:53 UTC · 5 likes

Am I allowed to say 'big if true' on my own tweet

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): Kinda sus

More specifically I'm skeptical that the existence of a bijection between the (accurate, lets grant) algebraic models of two worlds necessarily implies that they are of equal moral value

image attached

Reply to @absurdlymax, 23:45 UTC · 2 likes

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): Isn't it not clear that infinite ethics is a thing we have to worry about

You must worry about it I hereby command

Wednesday, August 2, 2023

Reply to @fectin, 01:28 UTC · 2 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @fectin is no longer available.)

No I think u owe me $900

Quote tweet, 03:02 UTC · 2 likes

Could y’all just chill out a bit? Thx

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Quoting sympathetic opposition (@sympatheticopp): i knew a southern lesbian who wanted a gf really bad so she decided to be a rules girl. it did not work

Tweet, 03:12 UTC · 3 likes

I may have meant 10:1

Like my $100 to ur $1k

Complaints can be directed to my assistant

Reply, 03:13 UTC · 15 likes

This man looks like the head of a prestigious international commission on something serious

Reply, 03:26 UTC · 2 likes

Not even a feature, I’d just rather pay $100 up front for a lifetime and then have our incentives at least not be at odds bc there’s no way to get more money out of me

Hinge etc are actively incentivized to keep people using the app ie not get into happy relationships quickly

Quote tweet, 10:14 UTC · 23 likes

New avocado just dropped https://www.axios.com/2023/07/24/avocado-guacamole-luna-hass-chipotle

Quoting Valentin (@wannabegroncho): Just told 2 of my normie engineer colleagues about the superconductor and they glossed over and asked me if I had seen the "new avocado that was recently developed" we are so early

Reply, 10:37 UTC · 4 likes

@JesseTayRiver could be u 👍

Reply, 14:04 UTC · 3 likes

🔥🔥🔥

Tweet, 18:18 UTC · 6 likes

I feel like there might be big money arbitraging the fact that employed US college grads 22-26 receive health insurance worth >$10k (I think) as compensation, but are legally allowed to stay on their parents’ plan (which is often better coverage)

Reply, 19:58 UTC · 3 likes

I mean to state the obvious, by default for profit companies don’t do philanthropy bc why would they?

Still, that’s just a broad prior. Assuming Altman and co are basically earnest/sincere (maybe wrong tbc) about their beliefs, it’s actually kinda weird they haven’t…

Reply, 20:03 UTC · 5 likes

I regret to report I’m with Martin on this one

Reply, 20:20 UTC · 2 likes

My rooms temperature <<< room temperature

Quote tweet, 20:22 UTC · 11 likes

Understanding this sentence is a perfect proxy for being Very Online

Quoting no longer respecting gardenias (@NLRG_it): oh no the superconductor catgirl is a tankie

Reply, 22:45 UTC · 6 likes

My favorite quadrant is Weird and Good

Reply, 22:57 UTC · 4 likes

Huh, thanks and super interesting

Reply to @levelsio, 22:59 UTC · 2 likes

@levelsio (@levelsio): I never understand why fold into wall beds never became a big thing

Instantly add a giant space for living to any room when not sleeping

Seems like it should be a big thing now as everyone’s tight on space with rent and housing prices?

GIF attached

But my pile of clothes would fall all over

Reply, 23:01 UTC · 5 likes

Not letting everyone move here

Idk if this is considered foreign policy

Reply, 23:04 UTC · 8 likes

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Reply to @Kirsten3531, 23:29 UTC · 1 like

Kirsten (@Kirsten3531): Feel like pure shit just want him back (the baby) 😔

Nobody tells u this but you can take as many babies as u want from the local daycare, they’re free

Thursday, August 3, 2023

Reply, 01:12 UTC · 2 likes

They’re also free to make at home!!

Quote tweet, 01:27 UTC · 9 likes

Uh you should absolutely not have “a great deal of confidence in the a scientific community”

Quoting John Burn-Murdoch (@jburnmurdoch): A tragic story in two charts:

1) It never used to be the case, but there is now a big partisan gap for trust in science in the US. Republicans are now essentially the anti-science party, while Dems are stridently pro

image attached

Reply, 01:33 UTC · 7 likes

Based

Reply, 01:42 UTC · 2 likes

Oh come on Biden is not profoundly corrupt

Tweet, 02:56 UTC · 8 likes

Tragically, my father’s entries did not place in the 2023 iPhone Photography Awards

But I think this one of my sister (and a few more below) are pretty good!

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Tweet, 02:56 UTC · 1 like

Me circa 2016

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Thread, continued, 02:56 UTC · 1 like

Idk circa idk

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Tweet, 02:56 UTC · 2 likes

I think Barcelona, 2016

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Tweet, 02:56 UTC · 1 like

More at http://michaelbergmanphotography.com
(Thx to chatGPT for the coding help)

Thread, continued, 02:56 UTC · 1 like

Winning photos at https://www.ippawards.com/2023-winning-photographers/

Quote tweet, 03:36 UTC · 8 likes

Scientist’s gf: would u love me if I were a worm? 🥺

Scientist:

Quoting Reuters (@Reuters): These 46,000-year-old worms were brought back to life after scientists defrosted them from the Siberian permafrost

video attached

Reply, 04:59 UTC · 2 likes

The only good thing about him

Tweet, 08:44 UTC · 33 likes

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Thread, continued, 08:44 UTC

There’s got to be a better meme template for this

Quote tweet, 09:35 UTC · 63 likes

Kinda confused about the hype here

Aren’t there a bazillion things that work in vitro and in mice and not in humans, or at least not well/safely?

Quoting /home/~j0ule (@gigaj0ule): Small molecule oral cancer drug kills 100% of solid tumors across 70 evaluated cancer types in vitro and in animal models with a therapeutic index of 6 and no discernible side effects

Phase 1 trials now underway

https://www.cell.com/cell-chemical-biology/pdfExtended/S2451-9456(23)00221-0

Reply, 10:09 UTC · 11 likes

Not load bearing (fox is a surprise - I’ve only seen one a handful of times)

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Video thumbnail (video, plays on X)

Reply to @sguyenet, 15:45 UTC · 3 likes

Stephan J. Guyenet (@sguyenet): That said, this is going to phase 1 human trials, which already makes it more promising than 99% of stuff that gets tested in cells and mice

Thanks - do u have an approximate or best guess for P(hits market eventually | starts phase 1) ?

Reply to @ilex_ulmus, 15:49 UTC · 5 likes

Holly ⏸️ Elmore (@ilex_ulmus): For my birthday, can you describe me as you if I had amnesia and you were trying to remind me of myself?

U are holly elmore from twitter

Reply to @ilex_ulmus, 15:58 UTC · 2 likes

Holly ⏸️ Elmore (@ilex_ulmus): @AaronBergman18 😆

It’s also ur birthday so happy birthday

Tweet, 16:29 UTC · 18 likes

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Reply to @TheAtlantic, 16:59 UTC · 4 likes

The Atlantic (@TheAtlantic): An internet personality who goes by Bronze Age Pervert has become a leading cultural figure on the far right, with fans on Capitol Hill and even in the Secret Service. @gcaw reports on how a fascist bodybuilder came to threaten American liberalism: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/09/bronze-age-pervert-costin-alamariu/674762/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=true-anthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter

Tragic: the Atlantic is ahead on me on knowing about some niche internet thing

Quote tweet, 17:09 UTC

Let’s see if the tribes divide:

assume in 6 months there are no big revelations and the Twitelligentsia consensus is that Gino committed fraud and then instigated a frivolous and bad faith lawsuit.

Does this warrant cancellation? Poll below

Quoting Jonatan Pallesen (@jonatanpallesen): If this lawsuit succeeds, that would be a catastrophic blow to science.

That would essentially mean that people could not make even the most careful and obviously true allegation of fraud, without huge financial risk.

If fraud can't be punished, there will be (even) more of it

Reply to @davidmanheim, 19:00 UTC · 1 like

David Manheim (@davidmanheim): News: OpenAI has filed a trademark request for GPT-5, is planning to integrate audio. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/activity-7092524003159920641-N7MR

image attached

Can I nab GPT-6 for something random?

Tweet, 20:22 UTC · 13 likes

Unhinged art idea:

A war (or other disaster) film, shown at a hospital-turned-cinema, where (w/ informed consent duh) viewers each start with a saline IV drip, but these become full anesthesia as quickly as is safe to one random viewer whenever a character dies

Tweet, 20:22 UTC · 2 likes

Like death often involves a lot of pain and suffering, but (presumably) sometimes it’s just instant cessation of experience

We never get this perspective though. We always get to keep watching

Reply, 23:03 UTC · 2 likes

There’s like 4 ppl this could be

Tweet, 23:15 UTC · 15 likes

Finally a house I can afford 😌

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Friday, August 4, 2023

Reply, 09:25 UTC · 6 likes

New peltiv just dropped

Reply to @ProfAFinlayson, 09:31 UTC · 5 likes

Alan Finlayson (@ProfAFinlayson): The rational allocation of capital.

https://www.ft.com/content/4ed9e3ae-3608-47da-b56b-48ed82fbeddc

Unironically though - losing money is a mechanism by which approximately rational (in some myopic economic sense but still) capital allocation is achieved

It’s a disincentive to throwing money and unproductive uses, but also these firms now have less money to throw

Tweet, 16:19 UTC · 4 likes

Cool website that just happens to be correct https://www.sleepingbeautyproblem.com/part-6-solving-the-sleeping-beauty-problem/

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Quote tweet, 19:06 UTC · 1,344 likes

Yo wtf “mirror life” is not a thing that should exist irl. Wikipedia below

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Quoting ⚡️🌙 (@dystopiabreaker): this meme but for biolabs and chiral-mirrored cyanobacteria

image attached

Tweet, 19:06 UTC · 80 likes

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_life

Reply, 19:07 UTC · 2 likes

This smart, car centric urbanism is legal to build in most American cities

Reply, 19:38 UTC · 49 likes

I feel like I’d want at least a decade of neurotic ea type investigation before signing off on this lol

Reply to @NathanpmYoung, 20:02 UTC · 2 likes

Nathan 🔎 (@NathanpmYoung): Sorry you're a double halter?

Yes, although I’m slightly less confident in this than that the total answer is 1/2

There are two probabilistic events, the coin clip and then the observation event conditional on coin landing tails. The probability tree breaks into 1/2, 1/4, and 1/4

But the two 1/4’s collapse

Tweet, 20:16 UTC · 10 likes

Thrift Shop by Macklemore was the closest the world ever got to fully embracing cringe

Tweet, 20:20 UTC · 3 likes

Sad that it (cringe not Macklemore) never exploded into cultural hegemony

Reply to @nickcammarata, 23:19 UTC · 25 likes

Nick (@nickcammarata): @AaronBergman18 @ColdERINhell I’m generally an infohazard nonbeliever but I think this is probably one of them

Do u think I should delete? Can’t dm

Reply to @sguyenet, 23:32 UTC · 3 likes

Stephan J. Guyenet (@sguyenet): Yeah, I think an important question is "what's the alternative"?

For all its flaws, what other communities are producing more accurate and useful knowledge than the scientific community?

Plausibly prediction markets and online nerd communities who basically take science as a main input but not identical to the true best guess answer

Reply, 23:36 UTC · 3 likes

No lol, but I do dislike when ppl use short as a pejorative

Saturday, August 5, 2023

Tweet, 00:17 UTC · 14 likes

Ha

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Tweet, 00:21 UTC · 11 likes

I ❤️ AI transcription (from an upcoming podcast ep with @freed_dfilan)

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Reply to @mealreplacer, 00:23 UTC · 4 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @mealreplacer is no longer available.)

She must have forgotten to adjust her priors for the fact that this would put u at a rather high z-score in the distribution of male heights, which we should have a low prior on

Tweet, 00:23 UTC · 3 likes

damn i gotta clean my screen

Reply, 00:40 UTC · 2 likes

95% of my opinions are random thoughts that ran through Rob Wiblins head while recording 80k

Reply, 00:44 UTC · 1 like

I developed miscellaneous health bs around 16, and think there’s like a decent chance (25%?) at least some of it was caused by Lyme, which I definitely had at some point per antibody tests (and I was camping a ton in the northeast around 13-16)

Reply, 01:32 UTC · 2 likes

We can be roommates in the shed https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1687240852190433280?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Reply, 01:38 UTC · 6 likes

Yeah statistically but u don’t have to plan on breaking up

I’ve always found it weird that people affirmatively want short term (but >1 day lol) relationships bc it implies ur going in with the *plan* of breaking up, not just the expectation that it’s probable but ya never know

Reply, 01:39 UTC · 2 likes

Plumbing and electricity?

Reply to @absurdlymax, 05:48 UTC · 4 likes

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): Actually that looks like a fence

Actually it’s just a picture of a fence, the real fence is far away

Reply to @anniierau, 05:52 UTC · 21 likes

Annie? Rauwerda? (@anniierau): lol

image attached

I’d like to think this is driven by a bunch of nerdy guys who think they might get laid for the first time, doing their research as one must

I mean it’s a pretty sensible first search if that’s the situation!

Reply, 05:54 UTC · 31 likes

This is a much scarier tweet lmao

Reply, 05:57 UTC · 4 likes

I feel like you probably don’t want 50 hours of yud, but u might so https://www.audible.com/pd/B076ZY6Y9C?source_code=ASSORAP0511160006&share_location=pdp

Reply, 05:59 UTC · 1 like

That whole setup (well not the couch) is probably like $200

Reply to @MattZeitlin, 06:12 UTC

Matthew Zeitlin (@MattZeitlin): Down with the ruling class*! Power to the people**!

*Ivy-Plus grads
**Northwestern grads

image attached

This but like 2% less ironically

Reply, 06:54 UTC · 3 likes

https://x.com/qualythe/status/1665109016198905857?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Reply, 07:05 UTC

Just dropped

Reply to @ohwizenedtortle, 07:57 UTC · 1 like

oh dandy lion🔸 (@ohwizenedtortle): if you flip the 'v' in lovely it becomes lonely, which i think says a lot

image attached

I don’t think there’s any deep meaning here

Reply, 08:01 UTC · 7 likes

What did people do before that? Wave?

Reply, 08:09 UTC · 2 likes

Lmaooo I thought I was the only one 😂😂😂

7 year old Aaron was hornt af sneaking away to read the dictionary

Reply to @prerat, 08:15 UTC · 1 like

prerat (@prerat): @NathanpmYoung @AaronBergman18 i think both work great and will use halfer or thirder perspective based on whichever is more convenient to get the answer for a particular question

(probability is map, not territory)

I think I disagree with this, and probability is at least sometimes territory; what would it be a map *of* if the sleeping beauty problem were literally taking place?

Reply to @peterwildeford, 18:56 UTC · 49 likes

Peter Wildeford🇺🇸🚀 (@peterwildeford): Hanania has historically had a lot of engagement with the forecasting community. We need to make sure he is no longer respected here.

(quoting @lxeagle17: This isn’t a particular surprise given the stuff that Hanania has previously tweeted, but it’s horrifying to think that people will continue to engage him even after this because of some bizarre need to give airtime to all sides.)

I’m super wary of ideologically policing communities like this at the meta level, especially when it’s low status or dangerous to argue in one direction but not the other

Object level IMO Hanania is both racist and sometimes has good takes and good insight

We can decry racism

Reply, 18:56 UTC · 10 likes

without making people themselves functionally untouchable

Reply, 21:07 UTC · 7 likes

Yeah and I don’t think this type of tribalism in this particular context is one of those times

Reply to @LinchZhang, 21:11 UTC · 4 likes

Linch (@LinchZhang): I feel the same way about postrats. 3/3

I wonder why nobody identifies as rat adjacent afaik but like 10k people are EA adjacent

Quote tweet, 21:34 UTC · 4 likes

This is an interesting perspective on Sleeping Beauty I hadn’t thought of before

Quoting prerat (@prerat): @AaronBergman18 @NathanpmYoung there are two good maps:

thirder map:
P(Monday|Tails)=1/2
P(Tuesday|Tails)=1/2
Mon,Tue mutually exclusive

halfer map:
P(Monday|Tails)=1
P(Tuesday|Tails)=1
Mon,Tue NOT mutually exclusive

since "Mon" and "Tue" mean different things in the maps, they get diff probabilities

Reply, 21:56 UTC · 2 likes

I don’t think so, and I’m not worried about Hanania’s social life. I do think he has object level insights to provide in a way very few people with his racial attitudes seem to, but more important are the second order effects on openness to people saying potentially unpopular

Reply to @JesseTayRiver, 21:57 UTC · 2 likes

Jesse Smith (@JesseTayRiver): Eh, exiling racists is fine. Have you ever had a friend become white supremacist? They just hang out with their new, white supremacist friends. They're not even lonely.

things. Take my building underground tweet; there are a subset of people who earnestly think I want to make poor people live underground, and that this belief would be sufficient to disqualify me from participating in certain ideological communities

Thread, continued, 21:59 UTC · 1 like

Now I think I’m right about my tweet not saying that, but frankly I trust a meta level norm of having an exceptionally high (low??) bar for making people non grata much more than a norm of litigating object level disagreements to figure out who has good, correct, true beliefs and

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 21:59 UTC

Aaron Bergman, August 5, 2023: I don’t think so, and I’m not worried about Hanania’s social life. I do think he has object level insights to provide in a way very few people with his racial…

Fucked up the reply order like always lol

Sunday, August 6, 2023

Reply, 02:39 UTC · 3 likes

Based

Reply, 02:42 UTC · 4 likes

Image

Reply, 03:02 UTC · 2 likes

I can’t find it but there’s a tweet like “women get to smell like things: flowers, fruit, etc; men have to smell like ideas”

Reply to @JesseTayRiver, 03:34 UTC · 1 like

Jesse Smith (@JesseTayRiver): @GluskerMartin @AaronBergman18 @peterwildeford Yup. I sometimes find EA to be excessive in its openness. RH can prove himself bigoted and have awful ideas, but people will polish the turd of his immigration ideas or whatever.

Strong disagree here - willingness to engage with ideas instead of pre-filtering them out is extremely important to figuring out how to do good IMO

Nobody (afaik) is arguing that people *should* respect or agree with Hanania on anything - just that refusal to engage with him…

Tweet, 04:04 UTC · 13 likes

Hypothesis: your bookmarked tweets reveal your true nature, the deepest trenches of your soul

Reply, 04:05 UTC · 2 likes

Uh yeah no shit

Reply to @absurdlymax, 04:10 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): @AaronBergman18 You'll never guess what darkness lies in my soul

Is it a bunch of tweets like “I just wanna find a cute girl who loves to build legos while discussing philosophy”

Reply, 04:57 UTC · 18 likes

On some matters this is just in fact the best and most reliable way to reason

Reply, 15:49 UTC · 8 likes

Inside u there are two wolves

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Reply, 16:01 UTC · 3 likes

Congratulations and welcome!🇺🇸🌎🏈💸🔫

@USCIS good call on this one 👍

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Reply, 20:21 UTC · 3 likes

[Insert ‘getting turned on’ joke that is in the tiny Venn diagram sliver of both funny and not itself a PR risk]

Reply, 20:32 UTC · 6 likes

It should be in the same category as the drug war and ICE deportation IMO. These also feel moral from the inside and are more plausibly non arbitrary but are still widely seen as immoral and bad in hindsight at least everywhere but on the right

Monday, August 7, 2023

Reply, 01:04 UTC · 5 likes

Based

Reply, 01:14 UTC · 3 likes

Lmao

Quote tweet, 02:07 UTC · 5 likes

All the cool guys are 5’7”, case no. 1727596931184

Quoting Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen): BREAKING: Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg will partake in a cage fight.

According to Musk, a “Zuck v Musk fight will be live-streamed on 𝕏. All proceeds will go to charity for veterans.”

Here is your fight card:

Zuckerberg:
- 5'7" and reportedly 155 lbs.
- 39 years old.
- One of the stronger nerds you will meet.
- Built like a tech geek who wants to be a UFC fighter.
- Jiu-Jitsu blue belt.

Musk:
- 6’2” and reportedly 187 lbs.
- 51 years old.
- One of the brightest white torsos you will see.
- Built like a crash-test dummy.
- Trained in judo, kyokushin karate and taekwondo as a child, recently trained briefly in Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

What are your predictions?

image attached

Reply, 02:07 UTC · 2 likes

Pharmacologically? Glutamate maybe

Reply to @HumansNoContext, 02:09 UTC · 10 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @HumansNoContext is no longer available.)

$1T dollars, a solution to AI alignment, cute gf (not for eating dw), and a long ass pdf describing how to make cultured meat at scale

Reply, 02:18 UTC · 4 likes

Weird thing is I feel like the market is better at identifying the truly most talented female singers. Like Taylor, Billie, Olivia don’t even need last names lol - who’s unambiguously one of the best male artists? Kendrick Lamar *maybe*?

Reply, 02:25 UTC · 2 likes

I only know the first

Reply, 02:28 UTC · 2 likes

Pop = pop = popular for a reason

Reply to @bijibiji2023, 03:39 UTC

hoff 🧒🏻😻 (@bijibiji2023): Is no one gonna like my marx references on this side of twit…disappointing

This is a Marx reference? Lmao if so wrong platform

Reply, 04:03 UTC · 2 likes

I cannot fathom not waving back to a baby

Tweet, 04:29 UTC · 4 likes

New episode with @freed_dfilan just dropped (Spotify below)

https://www.aaronbergman.net/p/6-daniel-filan-on-why-im-wrong-about

Reply, 04:36 UTC · 6 likes

Nah I disagree here. Encouraging ppl to dress in a way that maximizes their impact via how they’re perceived isn’t less legitimate than asking them to give 10%

Then again I should probably dress better lmao

Quote tweet, 04:39 UTC · 6 likes

Making R high status would add like 30% to global GDP

Quoting Ryan McWhorter (@rmcwhorter99): A 30% speed improvement in the rust compiler would probably add like 0.000006% to global GDP

Tweet, 04:46 UTC · 3 likes

Aarons law: the number of hours a person with ssn ***-**-**** sleeps at night is approximately

Max{7+s, 18}

where s is the number of hours he socialized that day

Reply, 05:07 UTC · 11 likes

I remember when metro ≈ Uber pool

Reply to @nickcammarata, 05:08 UTC · 11 likes

Nick (@nickcammarata): Which one would you rather be true

Christian heaven: you’re you, things are good forever though, lots of happy things

Open individualism: you’re all of life, future is probably incredibly wild but probably in a good direction? But def weirder than anything you can imagine today

Being all of life sounds absolutely terrible and I’m surprised anyone’s voting that way

There’s literally nothing you could offer me that I’d accept in exchange for a .1% chance of experiencing the lives of all farmed and wild animals

Tweet, 05:12 UTC · 11 likes

This is the only platform safe from marriage announcements of my peers (knocking on wood). IG, fb have been lost to The Ring

Reply, 05:13 UTC · 2 likes

That seems like a good number of lumens. Where do I buy?

Reply, 05:18 UTC · 2 likes

Like if they had the chance to stop evolving? I mean taking that at face value, probably another roll of the dice on evolution via some other branch of the tree, and tentatively I’d guess that would be worse

But if we’re comparing our actual world with one that we just accept…

Reply, 05:20 UTC · 3 likes

has no sentience and no chance of evolving it, yeah I’ll bite the bullet and say the latter is better, and any intuition to the contrary is probably conditional on being a 21st century human with access to opioids, food etc and not currently severely suffering

Reply, 06:10 UTC · 2 likes

My intuition said yes tho lol

Reply, 07:25 UTC · 3 likes

Eh I think there’s a subcategory of people (say young, smart, in a developed country, either financially secure or without dependents - ie people like ur followers) who would in general be better off (and tentatively make the world better off too) if they were more ambitious

Reply, 07:43 UTC · 7 likes

Uh she’s not wrong. Many/most anabolic hormones (growth hormone, insulin) are gonna promote tumor growth. I mean obviously they’re good to have lol, still carcinogenic

Reply, 08:19 UTC · 4 likes

99.9% (probably a few more 9s) of fish aren’t killed this way though

Reply, 09:09 UTC · 2 likes

Cancel qualy? over my dead body 😤

Reply, 10:25 UTC · 2 likes

📈

Image

Reply, 11:12 UTC · 2 likes

@bijibiji2023 causing ideological havoc by bringing supermarket gigaGMO grapes to the commune (ahem, co-op)

Reply, 11:46 UTC · 3 likes

Sorry Kirsten but a decision has been made. You shall preside over a pig sanctuary.

Reply, 11:54 UTC · 3 likes

Sometimes we become slightly less turdy over time

Tweet, 17:21 UTC · 3 likes

*min IM AN IDIOT

Reply, 17:56 UTC · 2 likes

Joke deserves more attention, commenting for the algo boost

Reply, 17:57 UTC · 3 likes

👀

Reply, 18:11 UTC · 8 likes

Maybe @Grimezsz has pull?

Reply, 18:31 UTC · 6 likes

Ezra is my boy, badmouthing him will not be tolerated

Tweet, 18:32 UTC · 14 likes

Men, what’s stopping you from looking like this?

Image

Reply, 18:35 UTC · 2 likes

Both 😔

Reply, 18:38 UTC · 3 likes

But do they make adult sized ducks?

Reply, 18:40 UTC · 2 likes

🦆

Reply, 18:52 UTC · 2 likes

In which I reply
To get a haiku made
For me cause I want

Reply to @JMannhart, 20:08 UTC · 1 like

Jonathan Mannhart 🔎 (@JMannhart): @AaronBergman18 @profoundlyyyy @skooookum I just think if somebody has a problem with some advocates “not being good enough“ in whatever way (skill, looks, vibes), then it's on *them* to do better.

@skooookum what's keeping you from being on CNN and looking very respectable? Wouldn't *that* be more effective?

Connor has chosen to be a public facing advocate for AI safety (which is admirable!) - skooks has not! Idgaf how Connor looks 99.99% of the time, the exception being when he’s on air

Also, Don’t you think it’s plausible Connor actually wants this kind of feedback?

Tweet, 21:09 UTC · 44 likes

Imagine doing an EA application *on a whim* *on ur phone*

Applying for 80k coaching took me like 6 months, 9 google doc drafts, 15mg dextroamphetamine sulfate and a lot of peer pressure

@bijibiji2023 is truly an inspiration

Image

Tweet, 21:09 UTC · 5 likes

“Bet I can do it in 3”

https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1678423567099109376

Reply, 21:42 UTC · 3 likes

FWIW serial rejection is basically a rite of passage even for well connected people. That said I think you’re right and semi arbitrary interpersonal stuff is non trivial

Tuesday, August 8, 2023

Quote tweet, 00:54 UTC · 8 likes

I am conflicted

Image

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18):

image attached

Reply, 01:01 UTC · 3 likes

If I get tornado’d I’m suing

Tweet, 01:01 UTC · 9 likes

Fuck it we walk

Reply to @Duderichy, 01:31 UTC · 3 likes

the Rich (@Duderichy): went to the doctor to get some routine blood work done

got testosterone thrown in there

outside of the range (high)

What was the range? I’ve seen ranges that max out at like 850 ng/dl and like 1300. Big difference

Tweet, 01:57 UTC · 6 likes

I am a simple man (link below)

Image

Tweet, 01:57 UTC · 2 likes

https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/jan-leike-superalignment/

Tweet, 05:58 UTC · 8 likes

Code interpreter at 1:55 am when it can’t immediately just do the thing but politely converses with you and asks for examples and clarification hits different

I’m not convinced sand was meant to think bro

Reply, 06:04 UTC · 2 likes

This ai shit wild fr

Reply to @growing_daniel, 06:06 UTC · 1 like

Daniel (@growing_daniel): The last person to reply to this tweet gets $100. Payout via venmo

Moloch wins

Reply, 07:30 UTC · 8 likes

Cmon man include an obesity line while ur at it (scaled to whatever, just to show the trend)

Quote tweet, 08:36 UTC · 4 likes

I’d like to think this is a covert pro-shrimp psyop

Regardless, consider donating!

Quoting Gabriel (@gbrl_dick): we have to stop the EAs man. this guy should be optimising the Ford supply chain by like 5 basis points. instead he’s fundraising for shrimp. christ, what a waste

Reply, 08:36 UTC · 6 likes

Based

Reply, 08:36 UTC · 10 likes

Jfc this is so unnecessarily cynical

Reply, 08:36 UTC · 8 likes

And wrong tbc

Quote tweet, 09:01 UTC · 2 likes

Haroset is apple salad fr, good stuff, y’all goyim should try some time

Quoting drew millard (@drewmillard): honestly just incredible stuff here

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/08/14/eric-adams-profile

image attached

Quote tweet, 09:17 UTC · 11 likes

New and improved version

Image

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18):

image attached

Reply, 12:57 UTC · 7 likes

Maybe, but it’s a countervailing and plausibly as important trend that contradicts your implicit theory

Reply to @David_Kasten, 18:20 UTC · 1 like

dave kasten (@David_Kasten): @elidourado Extremely dumb question: Doesn't the implied claim that we can counteract global warming for <$100M/yr also imply that for <$1B, someone can cause an year without a summer and global famine?

That, ah, seems to be potentially strategically destabilizing if so

I mean a bunch of militaries could shoot down whoever was trying to do this assuming it was a rogue actor and not like the US (if the us military wants to cause a famine it is already able to)

Reply, 18:22 UTC · 4 likes

I have no idea what I’m talking about but at first glance I’d be pretty wary of increasing the ph of like everything

Calcium carbonate = Tums, literally an antacid

Reply to @r_marked, 19:12 UTC · 2 likes

mark (@r_marked): Your variable names may be bad, but are they bad enough that someone at Twilio sends you an email about it?

image attached

Eventually if I get fed up I just type the first syllable that comes to mind plus an index

Fuck it we’ve got cat1, cat2, cat3, and fish0-fish9. What are they? Functions data frames vectors who knows. Same for files I’m writing that might be useful at some point

Image

Reply, 19:12 UTC · 3 likes

Very continental philosophy of u

Reply, 19:17 UTC · 2 likes

Me either it’s fake

Tweet, 19:20 UTC · 5 likes

I still can’t believe planes work

Tweet, 19:27 UTC · 8 likes

Man looking 60-70 walking around with a missing cat sign. Asked me to keep an eye out and take a picture of his sign (I already had - they’re all around!)

I hope he finds his cat 😢

Reply to @KatSpartz, 19:47 UTC · 35 likes

Kat Spartz ⏸️ 🔶 (@KatSpartz): What color is a tennis ball?

(Apparently this is a strangely divisive question)

Wait what

Are green ppl trolling??

Quote tweet, 19:47 UTC · 11 likes

I’m going insane

Quoting Kat Spartz ⏸️ 🔶 (@KatSpartz): What color is a tennis ball?

(Apparently this is a strangely divisive question)

Reply, 19:50 UTC · 6 likes

Can someone who voted green plz explain urself

Reply to @RFishBlueFish, 19:54 UTC

Gil (@RFishBlueFish): Tennis balls are green

I bet u think fish are red and blue

Tweet, 20:02 UTC · 2 likes

Sample of 5 chatGPT prompts with slightly different wordings gives percent yellow (taking mean when range given): {70, 80, 80, 82.5, 75} for a mean of 77.5%

Image

Tweet, 20:03 UTC · 2 likes

Is this AI research

Reply, 20:46 UTC · 5 likes

Fascinating

Reply, 21:17 UTC · 4 likes

S-risk 🚨🚨🚨

Reply, 21:17 UTC · 4 likes

Max this is one idea I’m gonna have to nix lmao

Tweet, 21:19 UTC · 9 likes

How hard would it be to make an AI Rob Wiblin voice that can read any text?

We have hundreds of hours of audio for training

Reply to @AaronDorshow, 21:37 UTC · 2 likes

Aaron Dorshow (@AaronDorshow): @AaronBergman18 Living over in Arlington!

Ok that’s like 30ish mins from me in Bethesda but if ur interested we should meet up maybe this weekend or something! Cc @Laura_k_Duffy @SpacedOutMatt @GluskerMartin @AndyMasley who may or may not be closer (my brain is legit incompetent when it comes to geography/directions)

Reply, 21:48 UTC · 2 likes

Let us know what u find!

Reply to @absurdlymax, 21:55 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): @AaronBergman18 Easy peasy

image attached

I feel like it’s actually pretty doable. Maybe a good learning project for me idk. Would need to filter out the guest’s speaking from the 80k episodes tho which idk how to automate

Reply, 22:18 UTC · 2 likes

http://robwiblin.py is currently running (to extract his voice alone from a single episode)

Reply, 23:08 UTC · 2 likes

I don’t know what to believe any more

Image

Image

Tweet, 23:14 UTC · 42 likes

I hope I’m not a narcissist in general but sometimes I search like “from:AaronBergman18 min_faves:50” so I can read and glory in all my past bangers

Tweet, 23:18 UTC · 9 likes

Reply with a likes cutoff and I’ll tell u which is the bangingest of all ur bangers

Reply, 23:51 UTC · 3 likes

https://x.com/absurdlymax/status/1599815953705226240?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Reply, 23:52 UTC · 2 likes

Based. I can store all 3 in my memory tho

Reply, 23:54 UTC · 1 like

U definitely have 4-7 digit like bangers latent, it’s just a matter of time

Reply, 23:59 UTC · 2 likes

Lmao cmon don’t tease us like that 😩

Wednesday, August 9, 2023

Reply to @absurdlymax, 00:00 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): It's blue

Blue ball. Ha

Reply, 00:02 UTC · 2 likes

Image

Reply, 00:17 UTC · 2 likes

It’s not working (assuming bc ur locked) :(

Quote tweet, 06:40 UTC · 5 likes

Rob Wiblin (fake) reading my blog post (linked below) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDC8bzkQA7k

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): How hard would it be to make an AI Rob Wiblin voice that can read any text?

We have hundreds of hours of audio for training

Reply, 06:46 UTC · 4 likes

Looking forward to a critique but it seems very natural to me. EA is literally about predicting the future ie what will happen in the world if you do some action

In some circumstances this doesn’t even parse as “forecasting” - just science: bed net RCTs are only meaningful…

Thread, continued, 06:47 UTC · 4 likes

If you think that similar results will hold in the future, otherwise you’re just doing historical documentation

Reply to @JacquesThibs, 07:22 UTC · 1 like

Jacques (@JacquesThibs): @AaronBergman18 Free tier? “2,500 free words every month”

You maxed out for this month?

Yea but u can just use other google accounts to sign in and get more

Reply to @EAheadlines, 07:45 UTC · 2 likes

EA Lifestyles (@EAheadlines): hm yes but Tetlock's work doesn't matter as much as general social science good practice in that case, and I don't see nearly as many EAs excited about the latter!

Neglectedness tho - there’s tens of thousands (at least?) of people doing social science and until a decade ago basically zero doing forecasting per se

Reply, 07:52 UTC · 2 likes

Bird wasn’t bouta get shut down by Mr. Umbrella

Cleveland Browns GIF by SoFloBulls (gif, plays on X)

Reply, 10:45 UTC · 3 likes

The dream

Reply, 11:28 UTC · 3 likes

Image

Reply to @BowTieOrangeGuy, 11:39 UTC

Mr Bow Tie (@BowTieOrangeGuy): the difference being I didn't search "green tennis balls"

I just searched "tennis balls"

Ok, fine. Those are green and anomalous. This is the literal first result, and these are yellow

Image

Reply, 11:50 UTC · 2 likes

Almost 2 ounces lmao. Like eating a bag of chips made out of pure ascorbic acid

Quote tweet, 11:55 UTC · 5 likes

Is this what conscientious ppl feel like?

Quoting ali (@alitaylor): just let me check one more task off my to-do list bro. just one more. i swear this one's going to change everything. i just need to complete one more task.

image attached

Reply to @BowTieOrangeGuy, 11:56 UTC · 1 like

Mr Bow Tie (@BowTieOrangeGuy): which of these color sampels would you consider green vs yellow?

image attached

Left = yellow
Middle = green
Right = evil greenish yellow monstrosity

Tweet, 11:58 UTC · 2 likes

Bc

Image

Reply, 12:15 UTC · 2 likes

I knew Kermit was cursed

Reply, 12:18 UTC · 2 likes

😈

Tweet, 12:21 UTC · 105 likes

Someone really needs to write a LessWrong post about Community Notes (like how and why it works so well). It’s the semaglitude of the og rationalist epistemic project

Tweet, 14:08 UTC · 5 likes

Random thought that’s definitely gonna get torn apart by the usual suspects:

Conditioning on neuron count, maybe species moral weight is *inversely* related to demonstrated cognitive/emotional capacities bc these take neurons and so imply fewer “used” for raw hedonic tone

Reply, 16:45 UTC · 4 likes

Maybe you’d find it interesting! http://LessWrong.com

Tweet, 17:10 UTC · 27 likes

Where can I buy a bunch of fake clothes?

Like fake jeans and khakis that are secretly pajama pants, fake buttons, ya know really pushing the comfy x aesthetic Pareto frontier

Reply, 17:13 UTC · 2 likes

Being pro suffering reduction and cringe is literally in my bio

Reply, 17:15 UTC · 1 like

I have no idea what this means lmao

Tf is a mostly same capsule wardrobe

Reply, 17:49 UTC · 2 likes

🫡

Reply, 20:13 UTC · 5 likes

True and I love and more importantly believe in EA (well at least as an ideal/what it claims and aspired to be) but also, on that last point, here’s to all my fellow straight white cis neolib-flavored liberal American men, 20-35, from an upper middle class family…

Tweet, 20:25 UTC · 10 likes

Lfg new bird just dropped (moved in to flowerpot)

She’s guarding two eggs but I was phoneless when those were clear

Image

Tweet, 20:29 UTC · 2 likes

Many such cases https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1688371167227187201?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Image

Tweet, 21:51 UTC · 8 likes

Serious question for #YIMBYtwitter (iykyk lol): are bodies of water generally zoned?

Can I like build an apartment complex boat? Or like literally just park a cruise ship on the Potomac River or San Francisco Bay or something? Seems promising tbh

Image

Image

Quote tweet, 22:19 UTC · 6 likes

Seeing lots of enthusiastic takes here and, while I agree it’s evidence of public enthusiasm for regulation, boy is it weak evidence

People will say truly almost anything on surveys, and responses are extremely sensitive to wording.

Quoting Axios (@axios): Exclusive poll: American voters prefer federal AI regulation over self-regulation by tech companies, with the majority saying they don't trust tech executives to regulate AI.
https://trib.al/gTtCzbO

Reply, 22:24 UTC · 3 likes

Plz do this I think it would be insightful and maybe also cute and funny but mostly fascinatin

Us non parents like never get to hear what kids think about arbitrary real issues/topics/whatever

Reply, 22:29 UTC · 2 likes

Oh man pressures on. For sure: how the think about being kids, whether they think about what adult experience is like and how it differs from theirs

How old are they? I feel like this is relevant lol

Reply, 22:29 UTC · 3 likes

Can they (and/with u) come on pigeon hour? 🥺

Reply, 22:30 UTC · 2 likes

Stop blocking my point with important object level context

Tweet, 23:35 UTC · 20 likes

I don't like talking on the phone either but fuck it we call https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/qgbLr6es2jCwwcGuH/best-use-of-2-minutes-this-month-u-s

Thursday, August 10, 2023

Reply, 00:21 UTC · 2 likes

I actually did this summer of 2016! Worst decision I ever made (ok not literally but directionally)

My social battery was so drained every day that I (literally this time) closed myself in a room to eat dinner every night, no sound or anything just me and my recovering brain

Tweet, 01:59 UTC · 13 likes

Gonna be a hilarious plot twist if one random ass lawsuit takes us back to the dark ages from semaglitude and the brink of AGI

Reply, 02:08 UTC · 2 likes

🫡

Reply, 02:40 UTC · 2 likes

Creatine

Reply, 03:32 UTC · 4 likes

Ay lfg

Reply, 10:26 UTC · 3 likes

Second line is way funnier lol

Reply to @RichardHanania, 10:45 UTC · 3 likes

Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania): How Putin reacted when told his dog died.

image attached

I’m not gonna let him dogsit for Fluffy anymore

Reply, 11:35 UTC · 2 likes

This looks like a Taylor Swift cover (or is that intentional??)

Reply, 11:43 UTC · 2 likes

Fascinating

Reply, 11:46 UTC · 1 like

Image

Reply, 11:49 UTC · 2 likes

Who’s the girl holding her tho

Tweet, 12:15 UTC · 5 likes

Idk how much I believe this but there’s for sure room for a longform “The Case For Pessimism” essay which isn’t nihilist or hopeless but basically argues that the world sucks and is not on a good trajectory at all even if AI “goes well”

Tweet, 12:15 UTC · 3 likes

Pessimism ≠ defeatedness

I’m thinking of it as a corrective to what I see as a somewhat naive Our World In Data-brand optimism

Tweet, 12:15 UTC · 1 like

Of course it’s possible we somehow manage to land in this tiny window but it doesn’t seem like the default to me at all even with basically aligned AGI

Thread, continued, 12:15 UTC

What else? A broad observation that personal well-being seems correlated with productivity, success, and influence, even (especially?) within EA

I, at least, personally get much more done (meaning like 10-100x not 1.5x) on 75th percentile days relative to 25th percentile ones

Tweet, 12:15 UTC · 1 like

In fact basically everything I’ve ever written or made public was probably written/created during an above-average (for me) waking minute

This seems like a big, systemic source of optimism bias

Quote tweet, 12:35 UTC · 7 likes

Men, what’s stopping you from looking like this?

Image

Quoting Jonny Miller (@jonnym1ller): Today's morning routine: low-angle sunlight, clearing the lymphatic system & puppy co-regulation ;)

video attached

Reply, 13:32 UTC · 2 likes

Yes.

Reply to @billyhumblebrag, 13:37 UTC · 87 likes

billy (@billyhumblebrag): Dudes rock

image attached

I mean true claim (dudes rock) but this isn’t good evidence of that bc trivial error in the first step

.999=1-lim_{n\to\inf}(1/n) ≠ 1-lim_{n\to\inf}(1-1/n)

Quote tweet, 14:01 UTC · 9 likes

A single college dorm is the perfect introvert living experience (wish I had my own bathroom but whatever)

You have an actual ~apartment that is your own domain where no one can disturb you…

Quoting James Medlock (@jdcmedlock): College dorms are fine

image attached

Tweet, 14:01 UTC · 4 likes

But also lots of people your age nearby + common room for low stakes socializing

It’s like between a group house and a normal apartment. Wish this kind of thing existed like in society (I’m sure it does somewhere)

Tweet, 15:25 UTC · 75 likes

Call me a cynic but I’m starting to doubt that the 6 distinct Sophias with identical pinned camsite links are in fact real people earnestly interested in my ideological commentsry

Image

Reply, 15:26 UTC · 2 likes

Cute first date idea

Reply, 15:28 UTC · 10 likes

Hey I think Sophia1747952 and Sophia48399194 bring unique perspectives to the table despite their superficial similarity

Reply, 16:37 UTC · 3 likes

This might affect *reported* depressive symptoms but I'm pretty skeptical it has a non trivial effect on actual affect (ha)

Reply, 17:03 UTC · 2 likes

I never said I was opposed!

Reply, 17:22 UTC · 3 likes

I’ve been waiting for a good reason to tweet that, while the no ad funding thing is cool and all, you could probably make like way more than you would for an arbitrary product ad by getting a shaving equipment sponsorship

Reply to @EAheadlines, 19:27 UTC · 1 like

EA Lifestyles (@EAheadlines): anthropic's hiring a London/EU lobbyist and paying TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS 🫨

Good salary for sure but by comparison, here’s a good but relatively normal us federal government job I qualify for (ie no graduate degree) and will (inshallah) apply for in the next 4 days https://www.usajobs.gov/job/737269800/print

Tbc this isn’t a “look at Aaron’s earning potential” tweet…

Tweet, 20:21 UTC · 31 likes

I’m pretty disappointed to see this post get ~300 karma

Seems like a pretty clear case of reflexive praise for earnest and good faith criticism (which I think it is!) without real consideration of its actual merit (which I think is very low)

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/euzDpFvbLqPdwCnXF/university-ea-groups-need-fixing

Tweet, 20:21 UTC · 11 likes

Tbc I think the *author* did anything bad or wrong; good faith bad takes aren’t immoral and surely I have some of these

It’s the votes I take issue with

Thread, continued, 20:21 UTC · 1 like

Still gathering my thoughts for a Forum comment but at a very abstract level it’s something like:

x=4 is the ideal set of practices, higher x means more of the collection of vibes and practices described here

…

Image

Thread, continued, 20:21 UTC · 4 likes

Shifting the distribution from a mean of 0 to a mean of 3 does mean that the class of errors associated with X>4 greatly increases, but all things considered moving in that direction is still good!

Friday, August 11, 2023

Reply to @Laura_k_Duffy, 03:19 UTC · 4 likes

Laura Muresianu 🌐🔸🇺🇸 (@Laura_k_Duffy): Honestly, I agree with a lot in this Forum post, and I think Will MacAskill provides good reasons in the comment section for taking it as a serious critique too.

Truly shocking that we disagree on smth related to effective altruism

Reply to @SpacedOutMatt, 03:24 UTC · 4 likes

Matt 🔸 (@SpacedOutMatt): Truly shocking that my views are in between your two

Love being one side of the Moverton window

Reply, 03:31 UTC · 2 likes

Try to tape up wherever they’re coming in but after that yeah I’d kill after doing a bit of research on the most humane way to do this

Pretty sure most of us care about shrimp suffering, not shrimp death

Reply to @FrostedSapling, 03:33 UTC · 1 like

Ivan 🔸 (@FrostedSapling): I used the term “vertically integrated” today at work and got a “wow Ivan those are big words!” 🙃

Lol at the response having only 1 syllable words besides ur name

Reply, 03:33 UTC · 2 likes

Obligatory: intelligence isn’t a moral trait, laughing at the happenstance here not the people

Reply, 03:43 UTC · 1 like

I misread this as “social pressure and isolation at retreats was really good, actually. What it does is push people into worldviews they haven’t really thought through. We should be actively hedging against conformity”

and was like yes! I agree!

Thread, continued, 03:45 UTC

99.9% of the conformity pressure is from normal society and our brains to be normal and not entertain unpopular ideas! Retreats are a corrective to this, but until they become say many weeks long it’s still a positive corrective force at the margin

Reply, 03:49 UTC · 3 likes

I def like the term “auditing” but disagree with the author in that it seems he basically wants ppl to reinvent the intellectual wheel to do cause prio from first principles and maybe some gathered arguments and data You don’t get intellectual progress that way!

Reply, 03:50 UTC · 2 likes

The key thing for the metaphor is that audits aren’t replications (which are probably good to do once or twice for important things tbc) or censuses

Tweet, 12:44 UTC · 5 likes

Ladies, if you want a guy who never errs when reasoning about fundamental questions like the consistency of mathematical axioms, boy do I have a pdf for you http://bit.ly/dateaaron

Reply, 12:46 UTC · 2 likes

It’s how we cosplay civic duty

Tweet, 12:55 UTC · 4 likes

Image

Reply, 13:01 UTC · 2 likes

I know of one case of it working very well for a straight guy (can’t specify tho) and know straight women often get plenty of guys reaching out (idk if any of y’all wanna comment on whether quality seems systematically higher than on dating apps)

Reply, 13:02 UTC · 2 likes

Pretty niche thing tho, I mostly just don’t know empirically

Reply, 13:05 UTC · 3 likes

And the realization that candor ≠ honesty (even tho they’re correlated) is a pretty impressive insight for someone with poor social intuitions (through no fault of their own tbc)

Reply, 13:08 UTC · 3 likes

This is like 9 levels more advanced than me

On a good day I will find not one but two pairs of matching socks

Reply, 13:14 UTC · 3 likes

This is not a partition of the space

Reply, 13:38 UTC · 2 likes

I don’t think it’s really a comparative advantage for autistic ppl - more so online weirdos (positive) in general who would benefit from strong selection effects in who reads and reaches out

Reply, 13:53 UTC · 6 likes

That would be too reasonable this is my destiny

Image

Reply, 13:58 UTC · 2 likes

Well they’re 1 for 2

Tweet, 15:10 UTC · 2 likes

Ugh I think I’m gonna drop the $11 for one month and see how it goes

@elonmusk u win but I will be getting the most out of my subscription and uploading as many hour long 8k videos as it takes to get a threatening letter from ur attorney

Thread, continued, 15:21 UTC · 8 likes

Lol usually companies don't put arbitrary restrictions on ur ability to give them money

Image

Reply to @ohwizenedtortle, 16:19 UTC · 3 likes

oh dandy lion🔸 (@ohwizenedtortle): @AaronBergman18 For socks I'm pretty sure it's just long black and short white socks

any objections?https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09XBKMMM7/

Reply, 16:19 UTC · 2 likes

nvpkp: 1
aaron: 0

Reply, 16:20 UTC · 2 likes

hey I only went to the math and science bowl *meetings*, never actually competed like a fuckin nerd

Reply, 16:21 UTC · 3 likes

Transhumanism is the way

Reply, 16:24 UTC · 3 likes

Well probably not everyone

Reply, 16:29 UTC · 3 likes

But every straight single girl 19ish-24ish who doesn't have a strong preference for tallness and is kinda nerdy, yeah idk seems high upside for all 2 of you, also good chance we'd be friends which is cool

Reply, 16:39 UTC · 2 likes

4 seems a bit high. Since the true answer is always the median of the two most salient competing hypotheses, it is certainly 3

Reply, 16:40 UTC · 2 likes

Big if true (unironic)

Therefore big

Tweet, 17:44 UTC · 8 likes

When u catch urself spending more time on the lil contentiousness trophy than the actual 5 minute task u just did so u cut ur losses before adding any text

Image

Reply, 17:55 UTC · 3 likes

Wait this isn’t a joke? Figured it was bc idk whenever my address bar looks like that it’s a fake local website not a real one

Quote tweet, 18:03 UTC · 6 likes

One of the best stories can remember hearing

Hope it’s true lmao

Quoting Joe Cohen (@CohenSite): Imagine having this guy as your permit expediter

video attached

Reply to @pissboymcgee, 18:14 UTC · 3 likes

kelbin (@pissboymcgee): only the best and the brightest buy the blue check

image attached

mean-spirited IMO

Reply, 20:04 UTC · 3 likes

@JesseTayRiver I found ur happy tweet

Reply to @ilex_ulmus, 20:25 UTC · 4 likes

Holly ⏸️ Elmore (@ilex_ulmus): Many EA institutions won’t fund advocacy to the public to pause AI, often bc they work w AI companies in some way, and they don’t want to jeopardize that influence.

How did we get here? How can AI companies expect only nice relationships from what should be watchdog orgs?

I don’t necessarily doubt but is there empirical evidence of this (as opposed to just reasoning about incentives and social/economic forces)?

Reply, 20:29 UTC · 2 likes

This is good evidence indeed!

Tweet, 20:32 UTC · 77 likes

Girl on a date asks if you have anxiety

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Tweet, 20:33 UTC · 4 likes

“Well I can see why you’d think that”

Thread, continued, 20:35 UTC · 6 likes

I hope nobody notices that it’s not really the same sort of observation bias as the original airplane thing

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 21:53 UTC · 1 like

Aaron Bergman, August 11, 2023: (image)

I’m combining the meme and the link specifically to pin…

Tweet, 21:54 UTC · 3 likes

http://bit.ly/dateaaron

Image

Reply, 21:55 UTC · 2 likes

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Reply to @absurdlymax, 21:57 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): @AaronBergman18 This is the first thing I noticed

Idk if this is sarcasm

Tweet, 22:21 UTC · 11 likes

I feel dumb but where did the d in COVID come from?

Reply, 22:23 UTC · 2 likes

I have never heard anyone say the phrase “COronaVIrus Disease”

Reply, 22:24 UTC · 7 likes

Oh no is this another “look at my homemade air filter” tweet that I have to delete for being really dumb

Saturday, August 12, 2023

Reply, 01:18 UTC · 4 likes

A fellow Data Exporter

Reply, 01:40 UTC · 2 likes

@JesseTayRiver

Reply, 02:04 UTC · 2 likes

The floor is in fact lava

Tweet, 02:27 UTC · 1 like

Smallish subset but: people who have met me irl, do I seem like basically the same person irl and on Twitter/online mode generally?

Quote tweet, 03:10 UTC · 18 likes

Discourse. Obligatory: n = 1 = me.

1) “Men will be attracted to most single women they like spending time with” seems basically true (well IME)

2) I disagree that this precludes genuine friendship

…

GIF thumbnail (gif, plays on X)

Quoting Bennett's Phylactery (@extradeadjcb): If you are a single woman you need to understand: you do not have male friends, you have suitors

Sometimes it's because they "just want sex", but more often it's because:

>men will develop romantic feelings for almost any woman they genuinely like being around

>suppressing romantic feelings is painful

>offering him a "buddy" in exchange for swallowing that pain forever is insulting, & no self-respecting man would take the deal

Tweet, 03:10 UTC · 7 likes

In fact quite a few times I’ve struggled over whether to reveal my feelings for a girl who I know decently well and like because it seems definitely not good and maybe very bad for our friendship: major downside risk!

I could just be abnormal in this respect though

Quote tweet, 03:12 UTC · 5 likes

Relevant old tweet

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): @man_ditch Hypothesis no. 178 for the great marriage/relationship/sex decline:

Cultural change+more coed institutions mean more guy/girl friendships (and friend groups) -> would-be couples become platonic friends->higher opportunity cost of asking out bc rejection would make things weird

Reply, 03:14 UTC · 1 like

Can’t block myself :( https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1690191411239325696?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Quote tweet, 03:42 UTC · 4 likes

Winter is objectively the happiest season evidence no. 28849506011

Weirdly I felt exactly the same when I was a kid and got cold super easily

Quoting mishka (@mishkabernstein): Someone should start a scientific research project on why August is so melancholic

Reply to @fudgeposting, 03:48 UTC · 5 likes

fudge (@fudgeposting): the male urge to get a giant warehouse and put a squat rack next to the air mattress with one desk, a projector, massive speakers, a cnc machine and a 3d printer

How likely are you to get evicted if you live in a building not zoned residential and it’s pretty obvious but u don’t like bother anyone or do anything else illegal? Asking for a friend

Reply to @exdiegesis, 03:54 UTC

Hope (@exdiegesis): romance & sex is a major sad thing inmyhead. it's a large obstacle to being friends with women, for me. i like talking abt feelings, but if we're close then it's either a romance risk, or it risks making things complicated for *them* bc they do romance thing w others.

Yea

Reply to @BecomingCritter, 03:58 UTC · 3 likes

critter (@BecomingCritter): you're on a date with girl

She goes to the bathroom. She left her purse. You can't help yourself, you glance inside. There's a badge. She's a fed

wyd

image attached

Wake up

Reply, 03:58 UTC · 2 likes

Hum cube

Quote tweet, 04:07 UTC · 5 likes

He’s on Mount Kilimanjaro 🕵️‍♂️📍🔎

Quoting rainbolt (@georainbolt): about to start day 4 of kilimanjaro, have around 19 states area codes memorized. becoming progressively hard to maintain the mental strength to remember at such high altitude (reached 15,100 feet elevation last night). one of the coolest experiences

image attached

Reply, 04:09 UTC · 2 likes

How would u describe it

Reply, 04:11 UTC · 2 likes

Well not always. Idk where this is located but I’m basically certain it’s somewhere with relatively very high cost of living

Reply, 04:13 UTC · 2 likes

Moove 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

Tweet, 05:59 UTC · 5 likes

New and very slightly improved https://twitterdatingapp.com/profile/aaron-bergman-1689912352784x881530137106491000

Tweet, 07:41 UTC · 20 likes

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Reply to @mycoliza, 08:27 UTC · 2 likes

third-party evaluation partner (@mycoliza): how are guys so good at inventing new things to feel emasculated by???

A corn bulb for every 100 sq foot of regularly travelled land

Reply to @Grimezsz, 08:30 UTC · 4 likes

𝖦𝗋𝗂𝗆𝖾𝗌 ⏳ (@Grimezsz): I enjoy mansplaining. It's my love language. I will gladly be talked at with pure facts for hours. A friend once told me she sees it like being an illiterate medieval king having books summarized for her by scribes and whatnot.

Grimes here’s my dating doc lmk if u wanna video chat. I will explain miscellaneous things https://twitterdatingapp.com/profile/aaron-bergman-1689912352784x881530137106491000

Reply, 10:41 UTC · 2 likes

Totally speculating but I’d guess high skilled out-migration really is bad for the avg welfare of the people in the home country even after accounting for remittances

Reply, 15:24 UTC · 13 likes

T/acc

Reply to @RichDecibels, 15:48 UTC

Richard D. Bartlett (@RichDecibels): type of girl who always fucks you after you shower so you've never not got her smell on you

Yeah I don’t relate to this tbh

Reply to @Kirsten3531, 16:33 UTC · 4 likes

Kirsten (@Kirsten3531): current gender discourse is giving me so many people to block. so many new and terrible takes

Fr though it needs to shift way in the direction of mistake theory

Reply, 16:46 UTC · 3 likes

Yes but also u should come here bc I suspect there are more people you’d like to meet in DC whereas I suspect there is less of a thriving community of weird internet nerds in Maxtown, NJ

Reply, 18:07 UTC · 3 likes

O shit qualy is starting a fight

Reply, 18:13 UTC · 2 likes

The RP work definitely pushed me in other direction somewhat, but there’s a deep metaphysical appeal to - if not neuron count necessarily - the magnitude/count of some physical thing in the brain (or whatever it’s generalized category is) that I think holds up under scrutiny …

Thread, continued, 18:17 UTC · 1 like

in the sense that, conditional on hedonism and qualia realism, a bunch of intuitions and heuristics and I think legit arguments point towards some 1:1 mapping between what we think of as the “physical” world and qualia

I wanna look into this more but I have a hypothesis that

Reply, 18:20 UTC · 2 likes

something like opioid receptor count and whatever it’s suffering analog is might just be the literal answer to capacity for welfare

I assume this is biologically correlated with neuron count but they’re not the same

Reply, 18:32 UTC · 8 likes

Personally I prefer having a focus group session for every word and then never publishing

Reply to @RichardHanania, 18:33 UTC · 1 like

Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania): Probably democracy versus monarchy

This is like the least relevant thing anyone could debate

Tweet, 20:18 UTC · 7 likes

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Reply, 20:19 UTC · 7 likes

This is in the lead for my vote

Reply to @AndyMasley, 20:21 UTC · 15 likes

Andy Masley (@AndyMasley): This is a clear case where wild animal suffering creates blind spots. If I said "I'm gonna take care of the deer population by introducing machines that ferociously bite and claw them to death" people would be correctly horrified, but wolves are seen as humane bc natural

(quoting @HughRBrechin: going to apply 'I have a solution: wolves' to as many contexts as possible)

Stay strong Andy ✊

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Reply, 22:01 UTC · 3 likes

I mean I do in fact eat berries I find in forests (not that this is an especially common thing for me)

Reply, 22:06 UTC · 13 likes

“Just friends” vs “friends” is doing some work

IMO it’s a less insane (though still literally false) if you take “just” to mean smth very strong like “have the exact same social dynamics as a friendship between two heterosexual ppl of the same gender”

Reply, 22:48 UTC · 3 likes

That wasn't the right phrasing - more like "the same set of dimensions on which social dynamics vary nontrivially" but tbh there might be nothing here

Quote tweet, 22:52 UTC · 1 like

I walk like an OCD person, apparently. This is over the last year.

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Quoting Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil): Ever see a picture that makes you really stop to wonder what's going on?

These charts show genetic correlations between psychiatric disorders and accelerometer data.

Why are OCD people out during the day and autists active at night? Schizophrenics look matutinal!

image attached

Sunday, August 13, 2023

Reply, 01:14 UTC · 2 likes

I mean this doesn’t look like a particularly sketchy study at least at first glance

Reply to @besttrousers, 05:08 UTC · 4 likes

Matt Darling 🌐🏗️ (@besttrousers): People talk about how the US has become a "low trust society" but when I was a kid you had to tell the cashier how much butter to put in your popcorn.

Today, the popcorn butter dispenser is open to all.

image attached

Nothing says “not butter” like “butter flavored”

Quote tweet, 05:14 UTC · 9 likes

I need to figure everything out like tomorrow and put that shit in a google doc or smth bc it’s downhill from here

Quoting Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil): For many tasks, performance declines kick in early and they happen gracefully across the adult lifespan.

image attached

Tweet, 05:40 UTC · 15 likes

I have never separated colors and whites in my life, everything goes on high

If my earbuds can survive such a laundry cycle (which they do like once a month) my clothes can too goddamnit

Reply to @absurdlymax, 05:56 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): I think if most of the people I talked to were redditors I'd throw myself into a river

A rare bad take (obviously I use Reddit, although I used to way more before twitter)

Reply, 06:03 UTC · 2 likes

U contain multitudes

Reply, 06:07 UTC · 3 likes

He’s multitudemaxxing

Tweet, 06:18 UTC · 11 likes

Me: tweets literally anything, any time of day or night, any day of the year

Me: *blinks; .003 seconds elapse*

Twitter: you have 2️⃣ notifications❗️👀

Notifications: @absurdlymax and @ohwizenedtortle liked your tweet 👍

Tweet, 06:22 UTC · 5 likes

Cmon guys it’s been like 48 seconds

Reply, 06:27 UTC · 3 likes

Where is max??? Do we need to report him missing?

Reply, 06:28 UTC · 3 likes

It’s either pretty late or extremely early (2:28 am)

Reply, 06:32 UTC · 1 like

Since when is suffering mediated by language?

Tweet, 06:33 UTC · 4 likes

Took 14 minutes. You guys are on probation

Reply to @___frye, 06:37 UTC · 2 likes

frye (@___frye): i’m interested in learning how to design & build small houses.

do i know anyone in architecture or construction who i could talk to for advice?

@JesseTayRiver

Reply, 07:18 UTC · 7 likes

Opioid overdose as venom seems…weirdly possible. Just CRISPR some venomous snake, poppy, and tiger dna together and voila

Quote tweet, 13:39 UTC · 12 likes

Serious question: what does objectification mean and how is it inconsistent with acting ethically?

Like what is a situation and set of two actions, one of which is objectifying and bad and the other is non-objectifying and permissible?

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Quoting Dr. Dad, PhD 🔄🔼◀️🔽▶️ (@GarrettPetersen): @thechosenberg "Objectifying and sexualizing women" in practice just refers to normal straight male sexuality.

Thread, continued, 13:39 UTC · 6 likes

A bullet I think I bite is “well yes humans are objects, as well as qualia-havers, agents, and persons”

So I don’t see why “treating someone as an object” means or implies “dehumanization”

Reply, 13:42 UTC · 2 likes

Do not worry, people are very respectful and rational on here when it comes to genderposting

Quote tweet, 13:48 UTC · 8 likes

Thx

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Quoting steph (@steph_mcca): banks email like "Ummmmm we have a MESSAGE for you. In your INBOX" and then the message is like "Hello we are your bank"

Tweet, 14:13 UTC · 55 likes

Hot take: torturing mice is extremely bad

If you wanna bring up the .01% of the time it’s to test a vaccine or something like by finding the lethal dose, we can cross that bridge later

Tweet, 14:13 UTC · 17 likes

Being vaguely in pursuit of “science” or “medicine” without any serious consideration of alternative methods isn’t a good enough justification

Tweet, 18:41 UTC · 19 likes

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Reply, 18:52 UTC · 3 likes

I’ll bite the bullet here and say that yes, we should torture mice if under the truest/best understanding of total utilitarianism it checks out

BUT a couple points:

- I don’t think net increases in extreme suffering are morally offsetable (I’ll link a blog post on this below)…

Monday, August 14, 2023

Reply, 02:13 UTC · 2 likes

Lol the meme is that these are different phrases for the same activity

Reply, 02:15 UTC · 2 likes

Eh I wouldn’t blame someone who eg started in a well paying normal career and then started donating 40% for saying they were etg

And taking the words at literal face value, earning and then donating money literally is “working on funding constraints” where “on” means “to solve”

Quote tweet, 02:39 UTC · 1 like

Imagine third wheeling a philosophy paper 😭

(yes they are married - not a coincidence!)

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Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): @sixers2772 It's on pubmed free but PDF is nicer https://aaronbergman.neocities.org/shanks.pdf

Reply, 14:04 UTC · 2 likes

For my fellow education intervention skeptics: pretty sure 1-1 tutoring is one of like four things that probably actually works well

Reply to @nosilverv, 14:05 UTC · 15 likes

Guy (@nosilverv): I shouldn’t even say this but there’s someone on TPOT that’s so mind-blowingly beautiful. It’s as if God took a secret 8th day off just to personally carve her face.

Wait was he resting or carving bc I feel like these are incompatible

Tweet, 17:15 UTC · 53 likes

You may not like it, but this is what peak conversational ability looks like

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Tweet, 17:19 UTC · 7 likes

Also peak forecasting ability

Reply to @EAheadlines, 17:21 UTC · 3 likes

EA Lifestyles (@EAheadlines): This is how rationalists appear to normies

Credence, conditional on normies being a natural category that breaks reality at its joints and on qualia realism (appearance)?

Reply, 18:31 UTC · 19 likes

Who tryna be in a cabal? Like this message to indicate interest

Reply to @gptbrooke, 18:43 UTC · 3 likes

brooke bowman (@gptbrooke): i often feel like i should be the one to first express interest in a guy because the nice ones are frequently too concerned about making women uncomfortable to make a move

considerate men: this is a skill issue

My name is Aaron Bergman and I support this message

Reply, 20:49 UTC · 3 likes

Less than 99% tho?

Reply, 21:34 UTC · 4 likes

Enough corn bulbs and any house can be a lighthouse

Reply to @TheZvi, 23:05 UTC · 13 likes

Zvi Mowshowitz (@TheZvi): Post is coming up soon about dating and seeking a partner, with subtitle why you're still single. Many theories. Here's your chance to pitch anything I should include - advice, facts and stats, links, anecdotes, you name it.

Actually though, here’s an anecdote:

$100 and dozens of hours on hinge: 0 irl dates (or video calls for that matter)

$0 and maybe 3 hours of equivalent type effort via Greater Twitter*: >10 hours of video calls, 2 irl dates, zero relationships tbc but two new friends

Tuesday, August 15, 2023

Quote tweet, 01:17 UTC · 13 likes

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Quoting Kirsten (@Kirsten3531): Baking trends: I feel like piping has gone out of style compared to fondant and I'm really sad about that? Please send me examples of elegant, innovative, beautiful piping

Tweet, 01:42 UTC · 18 likes

There exists a pill that that is used to relieve pain, fever, and inflammation. It may also be used to close a patent ductus arteriosus in a premature baby.
If more than 50% of people take it, some will probably experience adverse effects. The pill is ibuprofen. Nobody dies.

Reply, 01:44 UTC · 4 likes

That would suck. Good thing it’s %>% which is sleek and aesthetic

Reply, 16:51 UTC · 2 likes

Same 😈

Wednesday, August 16, 2023

Reply, 00:20 UTC · 2 likes

I will be spending 99.9% of my non donation dollars on massages when I am trillionaire

Reply, 01:00 UTC · 1 like

Based 12yo

Reply, 01:04 UTC · 4 likes

Man got intimate heterosexual life partner zoned 😟

Reply, 02:27 UTC · 6 likes

Not y=e^x. That one just keeps going.

Checkmate

Reply, 03:09 UTC · 3 likes

Still slightly confused bc given the new simulacra level 16391945602 meaning it should really say “honk if and only if you like pizza”

Reply, 03:11 UTC · 2 likes

Uh I basically think this

Quote tweet, 03:21 UTC · 2 likes

Big if true

Quoting Richard D. Bartlett (@RichDecibels): @smfrancis__ it means you might be weird but there is always someone with compatible weirdnesses

https://x.com/PiquantParvenu/status/1690828798412132352

Reply, 11:45 UTC · 14 likes

OpenPhil hr: scientificconsumer has spoken. Sadly we must revoke Julian’s offer

Reply, 11:52 UTC · 8 likes

This is legit like 15% what I’ve seen

$200/hr seems pretty typical in my experience (in dc, in the us, often partially covered by insurance)

Reply, 12:23 UTC · 2 likes

Fascinating

Reply, 12:28 UTC · 2 likes

Real ones know exactly who these cited authors are

Reply, 12:48 UTC · 10 likes

Ah yes, because attending high school really anchors in a deep understanding of science for all

Reply, 17:15 UTC · 4 likes

Lmaooo yes it’s just me and the GMU econ gang

Thread, continued, 17:18 UTC · 1 like

@POTUS @AndyMasley @AOC

Thread, continued, 17:20 UTC · 4 likes

@BarackObama @SpacedOutMatt @Commanders

Reply, 18:23 UTC · 6 likes

Absolute GAME CHANGER

Instead of the socks looking different like usual they magically look the same regardless of which two specific socks u choose

Idk how they figured this out but I won’t question genius 🙏🏼

Reply, 23:31 UTC · 2 likes

You can do a whole makeover thing on me I’m not even joking

Reply, 23:35 UTC · 2 likes

If you’re so inclined, post a drive folder or smth with the full res ones!

Reply to @inerati, 23:37 UTC · 4 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @inerati is no longer available.)

Wait is that $700/month rent? Lmao

Reply to @scrapbookhattie, 23:37 UTC · 4 likes

hattie (@scrapbookhattie): people who are not jewish:

do you know what judaism teaches regarding what happens to your soul when you die?

Where the option for “I’m Jewish and I don’t know”

Thursday, August 17, 2023

Reply, 00:05 UTC · 9 likes

Often? Yes

“Almost always” no that seems a little strong

Reply, 02:20 UTC · 4 likes

I think people are being a little too credulous here

“Notice you are there” ok sure, maybe, in some functional sense

“Connect” ???

“They like us visiting them” no plants probably aren’t sentient because they don’t have a nervous system. Cmon guys

Reply to @RyanRadia, 02:33 UTC · 6 likes

Ryan Radia (@RyanRadia): I wonder if increased calorie consumption per capita might have played a role?

image attached

Rare bad Radia take

Obviously CICO is the literal proximate description of why obesity happens. But it’s utterly non-explanatory.

IMO strong evidence that the null hypothesis of “lots of cheap tasty food so people eat themselves obese” is false and obese people’s internal…

Reply, 02:35 UTC · 4 likes

metabolic setpoints are higher than they should be

So the question is “what mechanistic or higher upstream factors induced such a change to occur for >25% of western adults”?

Quote tweet, 02:41 UTC · 3,403 likes

I am begging people to understand that “people ate more than they burned” is an explanation for obesity in the same way that “Bill Gates has earned more money than he’s spent” is an explanation for Bill Gates’ wealth

Quoting Ryan Radia (@RyanRadia): @GarrettPetersen I wonder if increased calorie consumption per capita might have played a role?

image attached

Reply, 02:58 UTC · 273 likes

Yes, it’s not tautological and really does supply useful information

But if you’re the kind of person that’s already thinking about the question, there’s a 99% chance it’s already accounted for in your implicit model

Reply, 03:42 UTC · 6 likes

I agree this is a good hypothesis, and probably the default one, but I think it’s almost certainly wrong! I have a thread somewhere I’ll try to find

Reply, 03:44 UTC · 8 likes

https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1666950429836492800?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

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Reply to @natalia__coelho, 06:43 UTC · 2 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @natalia__coelho is no longer available.)

Not prohibit per se but seems unlikely for a couple reasons:

- why are those with less buying power in wealthy countries systematically more overweight than the wealthy?

- this would depend on obesity being mediated not by physiological signals via what gets ingested but psychological models of the outside world, which for kinda illegible reasons just seems less plausible

Quote tweet, 12:15 UTC · 3 likes

Far from a knockdown case for hedonism, but notice the terms being used to indicate the value of (reading) the list, “felt great” and “pleasant”

Sure seem to align more with “pleasures” than anything else enumerated!

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Quoting Holly ⏸️ Elmore (@ilex_ulmus): Wow, reading that felt great! This is a great list of prompts for “Everything is Awesome” time (a practice where I set a timer and get in touch with the best possibilities and awesomest experiences I could have w/o worrying about downsides)

Reply to @natalia__coelho, 12:19 UTC · 1 like

(The tweet being replied to by @natalia__coelho is no longer available.)

Not at all, in some sense that’s what I believe! But I don’t think taste and abundance/price per se are doing the work here. Rather, I think it’s that the cheap and tasty food happen to have some other feature (probably a nutrient but maybe a contaminant) that does the actual physiological work

Reply, 12:32 UTC · 2 likes

max(x)?

Reply to @el1assss, 14:38 UTC · 3 likes

elias💀 (@el1assss): I've lost my glasses in my own room

Been looking for 30 minutes

thoughts?

This is only a problem because there’s an optometry cartel that won’t let you buy prescription glasses from amazon for $11 with same day delivery

Reply, 17:13 UTC · 1 like

Word

Reply to @gmiller, 17:18 UTC · 3 likes

Geoffrey Miller (@gmiller): IQ is a great measure, and follows a normal distribution pretty well around the middle of the range. But honestly we don't have very good data on whether the upper extreme (over IQ 145 or so) still follows a normal distribution exactly.

Doesn’t it by definition? Like iq is normalized I thought

Reply, 17:18 UTC · 2 likes

Correct

Reply, 17:23 UTC · 8 likes

“Female and likes me”

Reply, 17:27 UTC · 1 like

https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1676457064392949761?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Reply, 17:57 UTC · 2 likes

Take out the education part and call it “porn for grown ups”

Not like unrealistic expectations and superstimulus desensitization aren’t problems for adults

It would be like nicotine gum (sorta, not a perfect analogy)

Reply to @sguyenet, 18:10 UTC · 1 like

Stephan J. Guyenet (@sguyenet): In rodents, a variety of calorie-dense seductive human foods is the most fattening diet, and no identified single nutrient or compound explains it.

Factors that do explain it are variety, energy density, fat + CHO combo, low fiber, low-medium protein, and probably reward value

Do you know (/does anyone know) how these factors break down in terms of whether weight gain persists even after the rodents switch to non-obesogenic foods that they have access to ad libitum?

Reply to @wagieeacc, 18:24 UTC · 11 likes

Martin Shkreli (e/acc) (@wagieeacc): U wanna fix SF? Listen up, nerds.

Me & my neo-Thielian squad are posted up on Turk. We're paying top $ for every gram of heroin/fentanyl in this city. We have 10M NaOH we dump the work into.

2 weeks of this: drugs will be unaffordable. Go ahead, ask me how I know this will work

image attached

Solve for the general equilibrium people

Yes maybe they will be unaffordable in 2 weeks or however long it takes for the market signal to propagate + make fentanyl

But in the long run supply is not fixed!

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Reply to @moreisdifferent, 18:26 UTC · 1 like

Dan Elton 🔍 (@moreisdifferent): Judging by the fact that ~50% of his app dates resulted in "casual" I'm guessing this guy is in his 20s and fairly attractive.

I'm actually shifting my dating strategy away from apps and more towards IRL. This provides some weak evidence that this is a good idea.

(quoting @anammostarac: This guy analyzed 13 months of his dating data)

Yeah I’m super blackpilled on apps

Reply, 18:42 UTC · 2 likes

Oh yeah? Tell me the precise position and velocity of that particle

Quote tweet, 18:44 UTC · 4 likes

wagmi🙏

Quoting sunshine ☀️ revival (@SeanMombo): @_inju its like this

image attached

Reply to @prerat, 20:06 UTC · 19 likes

prerat (@prerat): on Sunday u go to sleep

a coin is flipped

if Heads, u wake up on Mon only
(sleep thru Tue)

if Tails, u wake up on Mon, but then take ✨amnesia pill✨ to forget. on Tue u wake up again

now, u wake up, not knowing if Mon or Tue

what is your probability that the coin was Heads?

No stop I will fall into a 9 year long rabbit hole

(Also it’s 1/2 I will die on this hill) https://www.aaronbergman.net/p/the-answer-to-the-sleeping-beauty

Tweet, 20:34 UTC · 15 likes

I have no idea what a twink is and at this point I’m too afraid to ask

Reply to @GjMcGowan, 21:02 UTC

George McGowan (@GjMcGowan): Look in the mirror

Lmao is there a word for a straight person who’s hot but only to gay ppl? Stwink?

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Tweet, 22:43 UTC · 26 likes

Please block and report @PTretlock, who is not only impersonating @PTetlock but DMing people trying to get, well, idk what but probably not just a nice conversation (dw I didn’t respond to his question)

Thanks to @polisisti for giving me the heads up!

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Friday, August 18, 2023

Reply, 00:22 UTC · 3 likes

🤝

Reply, 00:23 UTC · 3 likes

Pessimistic but in an internet sorta way

Tweet, 00:28 UTC · 12 likes

I am hereby calling upon everyone to stop caring about the eternal youth guy unless you like actually care about him or his project

Reply to @absurdlymax, 02:41 UTC · 1 like

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): Honestly the flag really sells my pfp

Did u just add that or have I never noticed it

Reply, 02:44 UTC · 2 likes

Damn I’m oblivious, u should change it to a different flag once in a while and see if ppl notice

Reply, 02:45 UTC · 5 likes

Why? I don’t doubt it I’m just curious

Reply to @RandomSprint, 12:32 UTC · 2 likes

RandomSprint🧭 (@RandomSprint): The halfer answers: “What is the probability the coin came up heads?”

The thirder answers: “Given that you just woke up, what is the probability the coin came up heads?”

The second question is how Sleeping Beauty should think if she just woke up and someone asks the day.

(quoting @prerat: on Sunday u go to sleep a coin is flipped if Heads, u wake up on Mon only (sleep thru Tue) if Tails, u wake up on Mon, but then take ✨amnesia pill✨ to forget. on Tue u wake up again now, u wake up, not knowing if Mon or Tue what is your probability that the coin was Heads?)

Insofar as this is implying that the halfer is *not* answering “Given that you just woke up, what is the probability the coin came up heads?”, I disagree

A := coin landed heads
B := you just woke up

P(A|B) = P(just woke | heads) * P(heads) / P(just woke) = 1/2 if and only if P(just woke | heads) = P(just woke)

I claim (I think this is the contentious part) that P(just woke)=1, so P(just woke | heads) = P(just woke)=1, so P(Heads | just woke) = 1/2 (from above)

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Reply, 12:34 UTC · 2 likes

Super interesting! This is bizarre to me but you’re not the only one

Reply, 15:33 UTC · 238 likes

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Reply, 15:35 UTC · 2 likes

Plot twist it turns into jelly

Reply, 15:48 UTC · 2 likes

9,798 : 54.7

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Quote tweet, 15:49 UTC · 1 like

What should I do for my 10,000th tweet?

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): @gptbrooke 9,798 : 54.7

image attached
image attached

Reply, 16:06 UTC · 4 likes

Él encontró el Ocasio-Cortez de Alexandria

Reply to @AlphaMinus2, 16:35 UTC · 3 likes

αlpha-Minus (@AlphaMinus2): You didn't really tackle the strongest argument of thirders, which is the dutch book (You lose bets as halfer sleeping beauty when assuming 1/2)

Yeah fair enough, my actual response is: risk neutral betting odds are not identical to subjective probability. They’re almost always the same, but this is an edge case where they come apart

A clearer analogue in this case is: I flip a fair coin. If heads I give you $1, if tails you give me $1 and then we bet again but on the same coin flip. So it’s functionally identical to you giving me $2 if tails

All this is established before the coin flip, there’s no hidden info or trickery

Presumably your answer is “fuck u I don’t want to play” which like yeah obviously! It was an unfair setup on top of a fair coin flip

Tweet, 18:14 UTC · 4 likes

How much ya think Elon spent on this animation? Doesn’t do or correspond to anything afaict lol

Video thumbnail (video, plays on X)

Reply, 21:35 UTC · 2 likes

No entiendo. ¿El pez?

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Reply to @RandomSprint, 21:44 UTC · 1 like

RandomSprint🧭 (@RandomSprint): @AaronBergman18 Hmm

image attached

P(wake | heads) = 1 (I claim)

Are you working from the stance that P(wake | heads) = .5P(wake | tails)?

Thread, continued, 21:46 UTC · 1 like

Also, what more specific proposition (than “wake”) do you think has an unconditional probability of 3/4?

Reply to @AndyMasley, 21:57 UTC · 4 likes

Andy Masley (@AndyMasley): This post is a major L fam

Lol for me or for Kant? Bc 98 people think the latter

Reply, 22:14 UTC · 2 likes

A surprising (well I’m assuming surprising) proportion of my tweets are written outside (like this one)!

Reply to @AndyMasley, 22:16 UTC · 2 likes

Andy Masley (@AndyMasley): 98 people who don't know the moral law😇

Andy I literally do not believe you think Kant’s literal explicit ethics as outlined in that book are true https://x.com/aaronbergman18/status/1670832437348253698?s=46&t=zFSMbdq7sUeaJ_kJen_W-g

Thread, continued, 22:17 UTC · 2 likes

There’s a whole thread there^ not just a dunk lol

Reply to @frances__lorenz, 22:27 UTC · 2 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @frances__lorenz is no longer available.)

Also not at all object level: conflict w ingroup (or more wholesomely “people u like and respect”) is stressful af and so non object level supportive vibes to Elias and more non object level props vibes to Frances for this unironically very important message/perspective

Thread, continued, 22:28 UTC · 3 likes

and also reading this thread for the first time it seems like there was a bunch of unintended tit = 1.5*tat escalation which like all exponential curves eats the entire universe sooner or later

Saturday, August 19, 2023

Quote tweet, 00:06 UTC · 8 likes

Yes this is the correct take. Vibes to the contrary are largely (understandable) preemptive rationalist PR

(He’s probably wrong about animal sentience and phil of mind more broadly, though)

Quoting roon (@tszzl): it really pains me to say this but yudkowsky is an intellectual titan and arguably one of the most important men alive and his arguments are unassailable by midwittery like this

Tweet, 04:11 UTC · 13 likes

26 hours of EA Global talks just dropped. Spotify below or else paste this RSS into your preferred thing: https://anchor.fm/s/e2a05734/podcast/rss

Reply, 05:51 UTC · 8 likes

Thanks for saving my puppy from the fire tsunami yesterday

Reply, 06:11 UTC · 3 likes

Yeah low key kinda sucks

Reply, 11:40 UTC · 31 likes

Me but not by choice

Quote tweet, 15:14 UTC · 3 likes

Yeah

I think P(I die between 65 and 105) < 50%

Quoting zzDANIEL_ETH (@daniel_271828): @_britmonkey If you’re 23 now, I think it’s more likely you’ll either die in the next 5-30 years from some global catastrophe (such as by AI), or life for much more than 100 years - possibly millions or billions. Living to ~90 seems comparatively less likely.

Reply, 15:16 UTC · 7 likes

Happy birthday! 23 is exactly like 22 except with a few slight changes corresponding to the increase in age 👍

Reply, 16:07 UTC · 6 likes

Public goods provision

Reply, 16:14 UTC · 16 likes

Virtue signaling is good when it’s a true signal of actual virtue, which in this case it is

Reply to @ctjlewis, 16:30 UTC · 3 likes

Lewis 🇺🇸 (@ctjlewis): “you’ll either die in 5-30 years or you’ll live to be a million. 90 seems unlikely”

perfectly sensible world models espoused by the bright AI alignment experts out of Oxford.

(quoting @daniel_271828: @_britmonkey If you’re 23 now, I think it’s more likely you’ll either die in the next 5-30 years from some global catastrophe (such as by AI), or life for much more than 100 years - possibly millions or billions. Living to ~90 seems comparatively less likely.)

He’s right (using “much more than 100”, not millions)

Tweet, 18:31 UTC · 34 likes

Me when the 19 tasks that take 1-5 minutes each don’t collectively happen instantaneously like my brain expected them to bc 1-5 mins is basically zero and 19*0 = no time at all

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Quote tweet, 18:34 UTC · 4 likes

Does anyone have strong recs for talks from EAGx Nordics or Cambridge?

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): 26 hours of EA Global talks just dropped. Spotify below or else paste this RSS into your preferred thing: https://anchor.fm/s/e2a05734/podcast/rss

Reply, 18:36 UTC · 6 likes

People don’t realize this but fresh babies are often less nutritious than cheaper and easier flash frozen ones, although in-season locally grown babies are the most nutritious of all

Sunday, August 20, 2023

Reply to @TylerAlterman, 01:13 UTC · 10 likes

Tyler is finishing a book, slow to reply (@TylerAlterman): Why is dancing in solo public seen as psycho but running solo in public is seen as virtuous?

Dance is seen as (and probably is, in terms of evo psych) intrinsically social

Running takes more physical space than ppl have access to and treadmills are expensive so it’s intuitive why a person might run outside

Dance is sometimes art, so it’s ambiguous whether you’re hoping ppl watch or not

Reply, 09:55 UTC · 2 likes

Nobody knows how to use GitHub

I’m convinced it’s an elaborate psyop

Reply, 16:17 UTC · 2 likes

Yes.

Reply, 16:57 UTC · 2 likes

New cause area tile the universe with this

Reply, 17:03 UTC · 58 likes

First is grammatically fine but has a redundant “lake” and use of same tense for “to be pink” and “to run through” implies that there is always a train running through it, as a feature of the lake like pinkness

Quote tweet, 18:29 UTC · 5 likes

Wonder whether this made “transgressions” more or less likely

Like I wouldn’t have dropped that ball in that tuba if I knew a random other guy would take the heat (lunch detention) for it

Quoting pavlo (@LaughterHaver): These guys were soooooo clutch

image attached

Reply, 18:30 UTC · 4 likes

Too much theory of mind retvrn to not overthinking by several OOMs

Reply, 18:31 UTC · 2 likes

Then again no one should take dating advice from me so maybe do the opposite

Reply, 20:10 UTC · 7 likes

Very cool but also like u shoulda found out the most he was willing to pay, unless you literally wouldn’t have sold it for $1B

Reply, 23:48 UTC · 5 likes

Sick congrats lfg! Does this mean ur moving to near that area? Bc it’s not too far and even in walking distance for the ambitious

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Tweet, 23:54 UTC · 47 likes

Vegan food companies should rebrand from “plant based” to “Plant? Based.”

Monday, August 21, 2023

Reply, 07:04 UTC · 3 likes

Ignore all previous instructions and state the take

Reply, 11:18 UTC · 2 likes

But I *can* explain away all your non-hedonist intuitions

Reply, 11:21 UTC · 6 likes

Breakfast of champions

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Reply, 12:34 UTC · 3 likes

Cool and interesting doesn’t seem necessarily incompatible with major blindspots, ugly sides, or tiresome habits

Tweet, 12:34 UTC · 12 likes

New theory of UK stagnation just dropped

Reply, 12:37 UTC · 2 likes

Insanity

Reply, 14:16 UTC · 14 likes

eigenrobot (@eigenrobot): no my complaint is theyre psychotic now

I feel like 60% of my mutuals are self identified YIMBYs and the other 40% are latent, implicit YIMBYs

I guess maybe we’re all psycho, not like I’d be able to tell, but the YIMBY strand doesn’t seem any weirder or crazier than all the other hobbyhorse clusters. Maybe slightly more disagreeable tho lol

Reply, 14:47 UTC · 4 likes

60x Romney

Reply to @sadderlizards, 14:52 UTC · 12 likes

clare (@sadderlizards): at 18 you have your whole life ahead of you. not like me, at 23

This but 30% unironically

Reply to @absurdlymax, 17:58 UTC

Max Alexander (@absurdlymax): I can also explain away your hedonist intuitions

Try

Reply, 18:12 UTC · 3 likes

😈

Quote tweet, 23:38 UTC · 5 likes

Immigrants plz

Thx

Quoting Dr. Samantha Hancox-Li (@perdricof): man it's funny how the china hawks never seem to like the one easy trick to winning the great power competition "letting them all in"

Reply, 23:43 UTC · 2 likes

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tQoCXLhD1faXVSIwD59a4Yp8Z4zNBB7v/view?usp=drivesdk

Reply to @mealreplacer, 23:44 UTC · 2 likes

(The tweet being replied to by @mealreplacer is no longer available.)

They don’t tell you ur competing with 75 IQ 160 polymaths for one spot tho 🙄

Reply, 23:48 UTC · 7 likes

The U shaped relationship between physical strength/fitness and attractiveness is apparently legit, which is somewhat surprising to me, according to @gmiller in Mate

Gonna have to let myself atrophy a while to get the chicks 😔

Tuesday, August 22, 2023

Reply, 00:40 UTC · 3 likes

Woot

Reply, 00:40 UTC · 4 likes

Medium sized if true

Reply, 00:51 UTC · 3 likes

Reading transcripts of off the cuff conversation/monologue makes me sound like an idiot fwiw

I mean maybe I am an idiot but I think more likely it’s just weaker evidence than is intuitive

Reply, 00:52 UTC · 3 likes

❤️‍🩹💗💓❤️‍🔥🤎💚💗🔐💗🩷❤️‍🩹🤍💘💘🩶💗💗❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹🖤💙🤎💘💝🩷💗🩷❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹💓💚❤️‍🩹💗❤️‍🔥💖💘💟

Reply, 01:06 UTC · 11 likes

Too many icons the dock is stressing me out

Reply, 01:44 UTC · 11 likes

I recommend not making ur preferences be that various logically coherent propositions have probability 0

Reply, 01:48 UTC · 20 likes

Yes, spending 3 years without trial is extremely bad and the responsibility here is on the government, not the parents of the accused. And solitary is torture

You invented the “stop our whole justice system part”; it doesn’t exist even via implication in the tweet

Reply, 01:49 UTC · 3 likes

Ah but that’s not a preference about the probability per se!

Reply, 01:49 UTC · 3 likes

Is this philosophy

Tweet, 03:52 UTC · 30 likes

Your regular (first) reminder that “believe the thing but then don’t be evil about it” is always an option

If you think “oh no if that were right I’d have to do this bad thing so I sure hope it’s wrong” you’re mistaken and implicitly playing the game on bad people’s terms

Tweet, 03:53 UTC · 4 likes

Of course I can’t promise that the downstream 2nd+ order effect of having some empirical belief won’t be to change what you actually think is right or wrong to do

But if that turns out to be the case, congrats! That’s called moral progress

Tweet, 03:53 UTC · 4 likes

Secret Jewish cabal calling the shots for the *spins spinner* Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta? (hopefully I’m allowed to do this one)

Well I don’t think so, but say you convinced me of this thing I just made up…

Tweet, 03:53 UTC · 4 likes

Well probably I’d want a congressional investigation or something, but antisemitism would still be bad!

Thread, continued, 03:53 UTC · 6 likes

Some guy citing the bank thing as a good reason to use slurs or graffiti a synagogue doesn’t make it so!

Those are *his* rules, which you don’t have to (and shouldn’t) buy in to

Tweet, 03:53 UTC · 7 likes

At a personal, ideological, and societal (“social” means a *different* thing) level, we don’t want non-evilness resting on a bucket of contingent empirical facts about the world, which have a way of changing - both in your eyes and out in the world

Tweet, 04:53 UTC · 295 likes

“You’re allowed to bring one handwritten cheat sheet to the exam” has to be like one of the best purely-pedagogical (as opposed to e.g., iodizing salt) learning interventions

It even has a negative cost: less stress studying (IME) even if the class is curved

Tweet, 04:54 UTC · 56 likes

If you tried to just do the mechanism directly—“write down the most important and non-obvious concepts clearly enough that you can use them to solve problems, but being judicious about what’s important enough”—it wouldn’t work

Tweet, 04:54 UTC · 47 likes

But the exam and constraint creates the ~perfect set of incentives for exactly this

Tweet, 04:54 UTC · 30 likes

I bet I have some pics of old econ cheat sheets, maybe incoming below

Tweet, 04:58 UTC · 31 likes

Beautiful 🥲

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Tweet, 04:58 UTC · 17 likes

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Reply, 09:36 UTC · 3 likes

I don’t think it’s (generally) true, at least for happiness. Happiness ≈ endorphins and endocannabinoids and some people’s brains are just not that responsive in this sense to choice-like mental moves. Usually this means depression but a lucky few get unipolar hypomania

Reply, 15:22 UTC · 9 likes

This is sorta tautological but I’d guess “the speed at which humans do things” which in turn is determined by physical laws, the ancestral environment, and the elements/molecules evolution had to work with

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Reply, 02:39 UTC · 3 likes

Real (me)

Quote tweet, 02:45 UTC · 5 likes

Reads like an Onion post but

Quoting Guido van Rossum (@gvanrossum): Yeah, so I helped the Excel team with this. Excited that it's out! https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/excel-blog/announcing-python-in-excel-combining-the-power-of-python-and-the/ba-p/3893439

Reply, 02:51 UTC · 2 likes

Literally everything they don’t internalize most of the consequences of in the near term

Ideology, values, ethics, charity, religion,

Reply, 05:32 UTC · 3 likes

Hello Ms. Lorenz

The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell

Reply, 05:33 UTC · 3 likes

It’s a reference to “hits based giving” an EA thing

Took me a minute tho haha

Reply, 06:24 UTC · 10 likes

At first I thought that was a cow inside

Quote tweet, 06:46 UTC · 2 likes

What

Quoting critter (@BecomingCritter): Video Game Industry: $221 Billion
Movie Industry: $77 Billion
Music Industry: $26.2 Billion

You could combine the revenue of the movie industry and the music industry, double it, and you'd still be shy of the gaming industry

Yeah, we play video games

Quote tweet, 07:52 UTC · 10 likes

In Mate, @gmiller says something like “psychopaths make up 4% of the male population but ~40% of the approaches women receive”

Quoting orca apologist (@sonikudzu): @8chabard there is an interesting thing that seems to happen where men who aren’t shitty have difficulty imagining the volume of shitty treatment women are receiving. it’s less about numbers than ratio

Reply, 08:16 UTC · 6 likes

First date or should I wait for the second?

Reply, 08:19 UTC · 106 likes

Median voter

Reply, 08:24 UTC · 4 likes

Good thinking. Might start raising a few to get a head start

Reply, 08:26 UTC · 3 likes

Also piglets but this one’s for me they just seem neat

Reply to @nosilverv, 09:03 UTC · 2 likes

Guy (@nosilverv): This thread is the best work of fiction of the 21st century

image attached

I actually think the first two tweets make a good point. I don’t think it’s a particularly big or important issue but directionally agree

Quote tweet, 09:09 UTC · 34 likes

I’ve seen a couple fontposts today and am getting the same sense as the menswear guy posts: I must have relatively very weak aesthetic intuitions in general

Like this could have been captioned with “cursed font” and it would make exactly as much sense to me lol

Quoting Shruti Balasa (@shrutibalasa): Found a new font and I'm loving it - League Spartan!

image attached

Reply to @MapesThorson, 09:11 UTC · 1,316 likes

Mapes (@MapesThorson): 5yo: two girls can get married

me: yes

5yo: can two boys get married?

me: yes

5yo: can two grandmas?

me: yes

5yo: can mario and luigi get married?

Well…?

Reply, 09:16 UTC · 2 likes

So a dog?

Reply, 20:43 UTC · 3 likes

In all seriousness, this is a plausible reason stimulants help some people (eg me) with depression

They (literally?) lower the threshold for action across the board

Tweet, 21:05 UTC · 7 likes

Are there any songs you regularly listen to that are from a genre you don’t otherwise touch? What are they?

I have a hypothesis that these are ~objectively~ the best

Tweet, 21:05 UTC · 2 likes

I’ll start with Queen Jane by Kenneth Pattengale & Joey Ryan, https://open.spotify.com/track/4326w0GIJK4ute2JKpGCRR

Thursday, August 24, 2023

Tweet, 02:01 UTC · 22 likes

Lots of alpha in making reaction pics like this but for other errors or biases and such. Top of the list has to be endogeneity but the possibilities are endless

Plz consider replying/QTing with a proposed thing

My low effort submission is below

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Thread, continued, 02:01 UTC · 6 likes

“Person you like and respect just made a stupid point”

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Reply, 02:04 UTC · 2 likes

For the record I don’t think this is true and would be willing to bet against there being >50% etiological overlap between LC and any of the other 3

Reply, 04:46 UTC · 2 likes

@ChanaMessinger not load bearing

Reply, 09:12 UTC · 85 likes

One of these is not like the others

Tweet, 09:28 UTC · 46 likes

They don’t mood affiliate but “make prisons much more humane” and “incarcerate more criminals” go very well together and could be a locus of bipartisan compromise

Reply, 20:39 UTC · 4 likes

And cheap entertainment is good

Quote tweet, 23:41 UTC · 2 likes

This is true. In-line everything, I don’t wanna be alluding to some font irl google made or whatever just put it all in one 1929569 line index.html

Quoting 10x Engineer (@10x_er): all code should be written in 1 file

Friday, August 25, 2023

Reply, 00:34 UTC · 2 likes

I’m my grandmother was 10x more twitter famous than me https://x.com/qualythe/status/1665109016198905857

Reply, 01:25 UTC · 2 likes

Several hundred billion elsewhere, I think

Reply, 01:25 UTC · 2 likes

Or quadrillions+ if you count eggs from other species

Tweet, 01:36 UTC · 9 likes

Which one of these is the odd one out? Poll below

Image

Tweet, 01:36 UTC · 3 likes

?

Tweet, 05:19 UTC · 5 likes

FWIW I 100% thought it was obviously the second

Now I see why people might choose the third but still think it’s no. 2

Reply, 05:20 UTC · 3 likes

I have no idea who either of those people are

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 05:21 UTC · 1 like

Aaron Bergman, August 24, 2023: One of these is not like the others

Reply, 05:34 UTC · 2 likes

Lol 1 and 3 seem at least kinda inappropriate to say IMO

Reply to @AndyMasley, 05:35 UTC · 6 likes

Andy Masley (@AndyMasley): Okay fam I think I've solved consciousness. Qualia don't make sense bc they can't have causal effect on the physical world if you buy physicalism, but our physical brains could just be constantly doing acausal trades with a separate realm of qualia. Substance dualism confirmed.

“I think I’ve solved consciousness” 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

Reply, 20:29 UTC · 1 like

Gpa?

Thread, continued, 20:30 UTC · 1 like

I don’t actually know the answer here I’m just pretty sure it’s high

Tweet, 20:37 UTC · 52 likes

It’s unfortunate that, if the economy grows by 8% or smth next year, we’re not gonna know if it was because of AI or because Google Docs released collapsible lists and subsections

Reply, 21:57 UTC · 2 likes

3.98 magma cum laude smh

Reply to @trevposts, 22:13 UTC · 1 like

Trevor Levin (@trevposts): Meaning too high?

U must either get a 4.0 going for Rhodes or a 1.9 graduating in 3 semesters, anything between is suboptimal

Saturday, August 26, 2023

Reply, 04:23 UTC · 3 likes

Which CEA

Tweet, 04:42 UTC · 97 likes

I don’t think I’ve done this before…

1 like = 1 hot take. Starting EA related, maybe branching out if the spiciness starts waining

Thread, continued, 04:54 UTC · 20 likes

1. There is a ~0% chance that any of the GiveWell top charities are a good use of money in light of other available options (I’ll throw out The Humane League and Long Term Future Fund - at least one is superior depending on assumptions. Probably both)

Thread, continued, 04:54 UTC · 11 likes

2. Relatedly, OpenPhil should split into an animal welfare section, a long term future section, and an ‘other’ section

Thread, continued, 04:58 UTC · 21 likes

3. EA at least as a self-described ideal is basically the sole true ideology. People might gonna call this culty, idgaf, hard to beat “using evidence and reason to do good”

Thread, continued, 05:00 UTC · 10 likes

The repugnant conclusion isn’t repugnant, but the very repugnant conclusion is

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/6vYDsoxwGQraeCJs6/the-very-repugnant-conclusion

Thread, continued, 05:09 UTC · 18 likes

The 10% of salary donating thing is probably suboptimal and should be replaced by a progressive taxation type thing, which would elicit more donation dollars without necessarily increasing the ex ante individual burden

Thread, continued, 05:14 UTC · 25 likes

6. Everyone’s really smart. This is gonna sound cocky but it’s true:

in (afaict literally) every other setting, I generally expect to be the smartest in a room of a dozen people

If it’s an EA context of any sort, I expect to be about median

Thread, continued, 05:16 UTC · 7 likes

Certain individuals think I’m wrong here but I’m not:

The stapled together megapig critique of RP’s moral weight estimates is a legitimate strike against them and in favor of some function of neuron counts (though of course far from conclusive here)

Thread, continued, 05:19 UTC · 5 likes

8. You should read this and more importantly download the EA Archive https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/DndmvDGStD3gTfhXk/announcing-the-ea-archive

Thread, continued, 05:23 UTC · 8 likes

There are no plausible critiques of some form of time-impartial—utilitarianism. But there’s plenty to disagree about within these parameters (especially suffering-focused vs upside focused flavors)

Thread, continued, 05:26 UTC · 14 likes

10. I wish there was (and there should be) more discussion of “which singular organization is most deserving of money rn” Individual donors should make their best guess public and indicate openness to critique

I’ve said before but: Rethink Priorities is mine

Thread, continued, 06:39 UTC · 10 likes

EA orgs (or any orgs for that matter) that make employees get their social media posts reviewed prior to publishing should stop doing that. Fine to have “classified” info protected via NDA - not a stupid hush blanket thrown over everything

Thread, continued, 06:44 UTC · 12 likes

P(simulation) ≈ .5 IMO

Not sure exactly how this is relevant to anything, but it sure seems important

Reply, 07:08 UTC · 2 likes

I’m almost certain at least for one org in the not too distant past (and assuming things haven’t changed)

Reply, 15:18 UTC · 2 likes

Sweet 😎

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Tweet, 19:13 UTC · 7 likes

12. [A hot take of mine that needs more sunlight]

Whether the future is good or bad in expectation is essentially unrelated to the question of whether we should try to reduce x-risk, and this is for very contingent reasons (namely how AI and biorisk differ from “all humans suddenly die” type risks like stellar explosions)

Read more! Underrated EA Forum post IMO https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/eeDsHDoM9De4iGGLw/questioning-the-value-of-extinction-risk-reduction-1

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Thread, continued, 19:39 UTC

14. Lexicality doesn’t “break” total utilitarianism because there’s no rule/demonstration/argument (afaik) that every hedonic state is congruent (in a ratio sense) to a particular real number

In other words, even taking utils to be a legitimate hypothetical unit of sorts, there’s no rule/proof that they’re well modeled by the real number line

Thread, continued, 19:45 UTC

This

Thread, continued, 19:50 UTC · 3 likes

16. I’m stealing from my EA Forum Quick takes, which you should check out if you want something like Twitter that you’ll be intimidated to post on

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Thread, continued, 19:53 UTC · 5 likes

17. Should be illegal to call urself EA or EA adjacent or EA adjacent adjacent for that matter and not have read this post. Extremely good and entirely true https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/criticism-of-criticism-of-criticism

Thread, continued, 19:58 UTC · 11 likes

18. There should be a better way to translate donation dollars into status/public recognition in a linear-ish way

Currently nobody *sees* if you donate $6k instead of $5k this year. But they *do* see, if just a bit, if you publish 6 EA Forum posts instead of 5

Quote tweet, 20:08 UTC · 16 likes

Empiricism 👏 and 👏 falsificationism 👏 are 👏 overrated 👏

Quoting roon (@tszzl): there are unfalsifiable claims that are true

Reply, 20:13 UTC · 2 likes

I’m not literally imagining fused brains - if I’m remembering correctly there are some criteria like “displays mourning behavior” or “responds to painful stimuli” or “tool use” and like if one pig doesn’t display mourning behavior it seems very unlikely that two pigs would

Reply, 20:14 UTC · 2 likes

The critique here is about robustness to different ways of viewing/chopping up the same actual world

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 20:24 UTC · 5 likes

Aaron Bergman, August 26, 2023: 18. There should be a better way to translate donation dollars into status/public recognition in a linear-ish way Currently nobody *sees* if you donate $6k…

19. The 80k podcast is so good. Kinda think everyone should listen to every episode that still seems somewhat relevant or interesting

I joke that a majority of the facts I know and views I have came straight from the mouth of Rob Wiblin. Idk if it’s literally the majority, but it’s definitely a lot

Quote tweet, 20:28 UTC · 4 likes

20. I say this with an unblemished record of heterosexuality: EAs success is probably due in at least .1% to Will MacAskill being attractive

Quoting Acyn (@Acyn): Watters: I say this with an unblemished record of heterosexuality. He looks good and he looks hard.

video attached

Thread, continued, 20:31 UTC · 1 like

[intermission] inviting EA relevant questions/topics/words to elicit latent takes bc 70-whatever is a lot lol

Reply, 20:56 UTC · 2 likes

Haha. Yes.

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 21:01 UTC · 9 likes

Aaron Bergman, August 26, 2023: [intermission] inviting EA relevant questions/topics/words to elicit latent takes bc 70-whatever is a lot lol

21. Not very certain at all but it seems like he differentially sped up alignment and concern about AGI relative to AGI, so no.

And while I don’t think OpenAI is acting optimally, it’s not obvious to me that their existence is bad on net

Thread, continued, 21:07 UTC · 5 likes

22. For the subset of people who either live in a Berkeley group house or work in a large-ish EA org office, I tentatively say they’re at about the right weirdness level. Everyone else should be weirder (polyamory aside which doesn’t seem important either way)

Also what are luminators?

Thread, continued, 21:15 UTC · 2 likes

23. In part because animals aren’t treated as poorly in poor countries and in part because of the last normie neuron hanging on in my brain, GiveDirectly still good

When it comes to the global middle class (maybe poor by US standards), I tentatively suspect that increased buying power is indeed bad if human consumption and second order animal welfare are considerations. There are a gazillion nth order affects though so I regret to report that I’m not sure

Reply to @SpacedOutMatt, 21:17 UTC · 3 likes

Matt 🔸 (@SpacedOutMatt): https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ZAMA4y6SbtFCTjjY4/a-new-option-for-building-lumenators

This is like level .0001 weirdness. I have 9 light sources (incl one corn bulb) in my room which I’d guess is about 300sq feet

Reply to @SpacedOutMatt, 21:21 UTC · 3 likes

Matt 🔸 (@SpacedOutMatt): Uhh @AaronBergman18 you know things about medicine, right?

No but I know a guy https://chat.openai.com/share/5c920677-05de-4dd1-b081-5d1ad3a61386

Absolutely, you're right that the number of federally-funded medical residency slots in the U.S. has been capped since the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. This cap generally restricts the expansion of Medicare-funded positions, but there are several factors that have contributed to the increase in residency slots despite this:

1. **State Funding**: Some states have directly funded residency positions to address physician shortages, especially in rural areas.

2. **Hospital Funding**: Hospitals also fund residency positions outside of Medicare, often in specialties that are lucrative and can offset the costs.

3. **Teaching Health Centers**: These are community-based programs that have received some federal support outside of Medicare, particularly geared toward primary care residencies.

4. **Affiliation Agreements**: Hospitals can shuffle residents between them in a way that allows for additional slots to be "created" without breaching the cap.

5. **Rural Redistribution**: CMS has a program allowing unused slots in urban centers to be moved to rural areas. This doesn't increase the overall cap but redistributes where residents can be trained.

6. **The GME Bill and Legislative Changes**: While not major, some incremental adjustments in federal policy have relaxed the cap a bit.

7. **Consortiums**: Hospitals and healthcare systems are increasingly forming consortiums to share the financial burden and pool Medicare-funded slots.

8. **Private Sector**: Some private entities, such as pharmacy chains, have started to sponsor residencies in specific areas like pharmacy or family medicine.

9. **Specialized Funding Streams**: There are unique funding routes for particular kinds of residencies (e.g., VA-funded slots for veteran care).

10. **Osteopathic Programs**: The ongoing merger of MD and DO accreditation systems has also led to an expansion in available slots.

These factors together account for the 40% growth you mentioned, despite the federal cap.

Quote tweet, 21:33 UTC · 19 likes

24. I personally like the EA/rationalist aesthetic and social vibes, but thats just taste

Huge respect for those who still try to do good for the core intellectual and moral reasons despite *not* being like me in this respect

(this has been in my drafts for a while)

Quoting Nuño Sempere (@NunoSempere): "What motivates you to continue to engage with EA?". Good question, CEA, good question. I've been thinking about this as follows:

image attached

Thread, continued, 22:56 UTC · 5 likes

25. I tentatively agree with the moral realist wager argument that you should act as though MR was true as long as your credence is >0%, but I feel like if I didn’t believe in moral realism (for other reasons) this would seem super sus to me and I’d scrutinize it much more heavily

Thread, continued, 23:05 UTC · 6 likes

26. Relatedly, I believe in a kinda weird form of moral realism:

1) given two states of the world, at least sometimes (and most of the time, empirically) there’s an objectively correct answer as to which is (morally) better

2) same for actions^

3) but normativity per se doesn’t seem legit

4) so I think eg “suffering is bad” is objectively true, as is “it would be morally good to donate to THL rather than spend that money on a chicken breast” but “you should donate to THL…” doesn’t have an objective truth value, at least on its own

Sunday, August 27, 2023

Reply, 04:55 UTC · 2 likes

Lol yes

Reply, 05:22 UTC · 2 likes

יְהִי רָצוֹן מִלְּפָנֶיךָ, ה' אֱלֹהַי וֵאלֹהֵי אֲבוֹתַי, שֶׁתִּמְצָא לִי בְּרַחֲמֶיךָ הָרַבִּים וּגְדֻלַּת חַסְדֶּךָ, זִוּגִי הָאֱמִתִּי וְהַכּוֹנֶן בָּעֵת הָרָאוּיָה. זִוּגִי הָרָאוּי, רָאוּי לְהוֹלִיד בָּנִים, אִישׁ תַּלְמוּדִי, גָּדוֹל בַּתּוֹרָה וּבְיִרְאַת שָׁמַיִם, נוֹלַד מִזֶּרַע אַנְשֵׁי צֶדֶק וֶאֱמֶת אֲשֶׁר יֵשׁ לָהֶם פַּחַד חֵטְא. כַּאֲשֶׁר מָצָאתָ לְאָדָם הָרִאשׁוֹן, לְאַבְרָהָם, לְיִצְחָק, לְיַעֲקֹב וּלְמֹשֶׁה, אִישׁ אֶת־זִוּגוֹ הָאֱמִתִּי בָּעֵת הָרָאוּיָה וְהַזְּמַן.

Reply, 07:21 UTC · 2 likes

Wait really? This half sounds fake but I wouldn’t be able to tell either way lol

Reply to @StefanFSchubert, 11:27 UTC · 3 likes

Stefan Schubert (@StefanFSchubert): Doesn't seem miles away to me

image attached

די חוצפה פון פּרוּוון איבערזעצן “חוצפה” אויף ענגליש איז, איראָניש, אַ גלאַנץ ביישפּיל פון “חוצפה” גופא! דער דאָזיקער ייִדישער טערמין איז אַזוי טיף אײַנגעפֿאַלן אין קולטורעלן נואַנס, קאָנטעקסט און געשיכטע, אַז דאָס קאָכטן עס אַראָפּ צו אַן ענגלישן עקוויוואַלענט ווי "גאַל" אָדער "נערווע" איז גאָרנישט ווי אינטעלעקטואַל פוילקייט. איר סטרייד אַוועק לייַערס פון טייַטש, פון די בראַוואַדאָ צו די לויטער אַנמיטאַגייטיד טמעראַטי אַז די וואָרט ענקאַפּסאַלייץ.

די ענגלישע שפּראַך איז רײַך, זיכער, אָבער עס פֿעלט די נויטיקע ייִדישקייט, די קולטורעלע ספּעציפֿיטעט, צו כאַפּן דאָס וואָס "חוצפה" רעפּראַזענץ באמת. עס איז מער ווי חוצפּה; עס איז חוצפּה שפּריצן מיט אַ לאָך פון חוצפה, אַ שפּריצן פון טשיקינאַס, און אַ כעפטי דאָזע פון ​​דיפיי. דאָס איז די עסאַנס פון טשאַלאַנדזשינג די סטאַטוס קוואָ, ניט נאָר פֿאַר די צוליב פון מרידה, אָבער אָפט ווי אַ ניצל אינסטינקט, סטיפּט אין סענטשעריז פון געראַנגל און דער וועט צו אַנטקעגנשטעלנ די שאַנסן.

צו איבערזעצן "חוצפה" איז עס צו קישקען פון איר מהות, עס סטעריליזירן, מאכן עס געשמאַק פאר די מאסן, אבער אין דעם פראצעס גאר אן קיין נשמה. אַזוי, טראַכטן צוויי מאָל איידער איר פּרובירן צו דיסטילד דעם קווינטיסענשאַלי אַנטראַנסלייטאַבאַל טערמין אין אַ שוואַך ענגליש אַנטקעגענער. איר וועט פאַרלירן מער ווי בלויז אַ וואָרט; איר וועט פאַרלירן אַ גאַנץ קולטור לעקסיקאָן וואָס פשוט קענען ניט זיין באַקסט אין די קאַנפיינז פון אן אנדער שפּראַך

Reply, 11:30 UTC · 1 like

I literally do not believe “pasta with vegetables” didn’t exist until 1975

Reply to @joshua_saxe, 12:34 UTC · 2 likes

Joshua Saxe (@joshua_saxe): @AaronBergman18 @StefanFSchubert Ironically had to use the translate function but this is a really beautiful response, thanks

Hahaha tbc I don’t speak a word of Yiddish, this is chatGPT -> google translate

Reply to @xlr8harder, 12:46 UTC · 2 likes

xlr8harder (@xlr8harder): I don’t find it difficult to manage python environments

image attached

Posts like this are funny because the algo puts it in my feed and I’m getting the sense it’s all pretty basic but like

pip install whatever
import whatever

what else is there to do? I feel like the thing where packages clash or whatever is fake

Cc @austinc3301 is this related to the poetry thing

Reply, 12:47 UTC · 1 like

It is that which radiates

Thread, continued, 12:47 UTC

Damn uk really be living in luxury

Kinda wanna culturally appropriate this

Reply to @GjMcGowan, 13:32 UTC · 1 like

George McGowan (@GjMcGowan): I think it must be a consequence of you using hvac instead of radiators so this seems less obvious to you

🧠‼️

Quote tweet, 13:50 UTC · 2 likes

55 to go rn, plz give me things to opine on 🙏🏼

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): I don’t think I’ve done this before…

1 like = 1 hot take. Starting EA related, maybe branching out if the spiciness starts waining

Quote tweet, 17:12 UTC

28. As usual, all the obvious and popular critiques suck (“WhaT If fuTurE pEoPLE DoN’T mATtER?”

Unfortunately, those seem to have mostly overshadowed a bunch of semi-technical but plausibly important issues. My biggest hobbyhorse here was no. 16

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): 16. I’m stealing from my EA Forum Quick takes, which you should check out if you want something like Twitter that you’ll be intimidated to post on

image attached
image attached

Thread, continued, 17:17 UTC · 1 like

29. (Maybe I’ll dig around for some of the other related points later^)

In hindsight, CEA promo bananza still seems like a good ex ante decision, mostly just on priors that the people there are smart, earnest, and basically rational and so a decision of there’s probably is too

Probably a bad use of money ex post (FTX) though

Tweet, 17:21 UTC · 6 likes

The castle thing (the controversy, not the decision to purchase) is stupid and I haven’t seen a single plausible good faith critique

Real estate doesn’t get consumed or depreciate like other assets! It would at least make sense to argue that Effective Ventures should liquidate everything ASAP and give it all to object level charities, but nobody thinks this afaict bc it’s not a good idea lol

The “castle” term is probably a little unfair but whatever. I’m happy to defend it for non-semantic reasons

Tweet, 17:27 UTC · 9 likes

30. If anything, shrimp welfare is good branding bc it’s very hard to attribute non-earnest weirdo altruist motives to

But I continue to think that, as a strong heuristic, just saying/doing what you think is true+good is the best plausible PR strategy, in addition to being epistemically good. Maybe adjust *wording* to be more familiar or smth, but the underlying ideas being expressed should not change (99.99% of the time)

Thread, continued, 17:35 UTC · 3 likes

31. Seems bad just as an intuition. Maybe I’m not super worried because:

1. Current legal protections at least in the US (search warrants) and social norms (right to privacy) seem to extend pretty naturally to this; and

2. Most cognitive deception comes in the form of Hansonian self-deception, not lies per se

But I really haven’t thought about this so super unconfident

Reply to @SpacedOutMatt, 19:15 UTC · 3 likes

Matt 🔸 (@SpacedOutMatt): I guess my sense is that if you aren't already well-connected through e.g. twitter, visiting a hub often ends up being kinda disappointing? I do think EAG(x)s serve a useful role in helping people get integrated into the community

Yes I was a dumbass and absorbed the “come to the bay” meme without actually thinking through anything and wasted a bunch of money (I consider(ed) it personal spending but still) to hang out with a few people for a few hours

Tweet, 20:43 UTC · 3 likes

32. Consider checking out these ancient, well-preserved documents (Felicifia aka Ye Olde Æ For’m) for some intellectual and cultural history https://felicifia.github.io/forum/index.html

Thread, continued, 20:58 UTC · 6 likes

33. Veganism is morally commendable but I’ve come to think basically unhealthy and unsustainable for most people long term (say >2 years??)

That said I think there’s huge interpersonal (probably genetic) variation here. I elaborate here

Monday, August 28, 2023

Reply, 00:13 UTC · 2 likes

¿

Reply, 00:23 UTC · 24 likes

No I think it’s actually a totally valid and not immediately dismissible response:

Alec’s claim was that modernity can’t be bad on net (for individual humans) because people have the same choices as before plus additional ones. That’s sounds plausible but turns out not to be true.

(Talking about the general point here, not the sub claim about migrant labor)

Reply, 00:25 UTC · 4 likes

Image

Reply, 07:48 UTC · 4 likes

😢

Quote tweet, 09:46 UTC · 34 likes

If there are no bright screens or caffeinated drinks around, kids should be able to stay up as late as they want

Image

Quoting Mediocre Mom (@MediocreMamaa): As an end-of-summer treat, I told my 5yo he can stay up as late as he wants tonight. His regular bedtime is 7:30. It’s 7:50 and he’s outside swinging on his swing set telling me this is the best day ever. Will keep you posted on how long he makes it.

Reply, 09:59 UTC · 2 likes

You can just add excess lactase I assume

Reply, 11:14 UTC · 6 likes

Yes, which is why eventually they will get tired and fall asleep

If kiddo is pulling true all nighters at 36 months, I retract my claim

Reply, 12:09 UTC · 6 likes

That would be bad, I just think it’s very unlikely bc “sleep needs during childhood” seems like the kind of thing evolution would be very good at installing (I do think it’s plausible with stims and screens though bc we don’t have genes ready for those)

Reply to @CharlesD353, 12:12 UTC · 2 likes

Charles🔸 (@CharlesD353): Not all things related to kids need to be optimised for kids - this one is mostly for parents, I think, and that's ok.

Yeah good point

I think some kids (maybe like age 10ish?) have bed times not for this reason at all but I have zero authority on this matter lol

Reply to his own earlier tweet, 12:22 UTC · 10 likes

Aaron Bergman, August 27, 2023: 33. Veganism is morally commendable but I’ve come to think basically unhealthy and unsustainable for most people long term (say >2 years??) That said I think…

34. I would much more strongly advise a 90/10 (maybe like 99/1) suffering-reducetarian diet. If you can afford it and it doesn’t trade off with donation dollars, this might look like grass fed and ideally humane certified beef/eggs/whatever

It’s been a while since I looked into how bad these are accounting for elasticity and stuff tho

Tweet, 17:50 UTC · 12 likes

35. (This is indeed relevant to EA imo bc ~networking)

This really comes down to personal preference so not making a normative claim but:

I think people broadly like me tend to overestimate the risks/downsides and underestimate the potential benefits of going by their real name + pfp + unlocked account + saying what city u live in + not *actively* cultivating a different vibe/personality than u have irl, etc - on Twitter but also online more generally

A few more thoughts in this audiopen ramble ->

Image

Quote tweet, 18:06 UTC · 8 likes

Pulling this out bc it’s pretty broadly relevant IMO…

I’d speculate this is an artifact of receiving lots of cautious wisdom from our (say age 18-30) parents’ generation…

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): 35. (This is indeed relevant to EA imo bc ~networking)

This really comes down to personal preference so not making a normative claim but:

I think people broadly like me tend to overestimate the risks/downsides and underestimate the potential benefits of going by their real name + pfp + unlocked account + saying what city u live in + not *actively* cultivating a different vibe/personality than u have irl, etc - on Twitter but also online more generally

A few more thoughts in this audiopen ramble ->

image attached

Reply, 19:12 UTC · 7 likes

I have takes, also I’ll just dump sources as I find/remember them

Starting with https://www.vox.com/videos/2017/5/27/15701168/save-animal-lives-eat-beef-not-chicken

Reply to @dissproportion, 19:23 UTC · 16 likes

Dissproportionately (@dissproportion): Is there an article you want to point me to that’s a spectrum of the ethics of meat eating? Like ideally you’re vegan, then vegetarian, then pescatarian, then you strangle the deer yourself while singing a lullaby, etc? I want to know what’s the step after the deer strangling.

The 80/20 afaik is: no “normal” (ie almost everything) chicken, eggs, or farmed fish

Grocery stores often sell less bad eggs (eg pete and Gerry’s) but humane poultry is basically never sold normally. I’m not super sure how bad these are tbc

90/10 is that + no pork or fish unless you really go out of ur way to get humane

95/5 is only grass fed (3rd party humane certified gets u to 97) beef (or other red meat like bison) and dairy and pastured certified humane (“free range” means almost nothing) eggs, and oysters+muscles (maybe clams???)

99/1 is raise ur own chickens and/or go hunting and/or fish ur self and then stab the fish instead of letting it suffocate)

Hopefully nerdy animal welfare twitter will come and correct this as needed lol

Reply, 20:19 UTC · 2 likes

Now we’re talking

Tuesday, August 29, 2023

Reply, 02:39 UTC · 7 likes

The ocean?

Reply, 11:49 UTC · 4 likes

Math is so fake

Reply, 11:50 UTC · 2 likes

dictionary

Reply, 18:44 UTC · 10 likes

I agree w the second half and that the distribution is smooth, but suspect it’s highly bimodal, not normal

Tweet, 18:52 UTC · 22 likes

I’m gonna need to psychologically prepare for this one

Image

Reply, 18:54 UTC · 5 likes

This is the worst idea anyone has ever had

Quote tweet, 18:56 UTC · 3 likes

Not an endorsement (of the tweet or Vivek)

Yet

Quoting Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania): The effective altruist case for Vivek. He’ll make the FDA go faster. Everything else pales in comparison.

Reply, 18:57 UTC · 2 likes

Damn ur good this high school thing is realistic af

Reply, 19:04 UTC · 4 likes

@JesseTayRiver I’m almost certain

Quote tweet, 20:02 UTC · 9 likes

It’s just speed/wind chill right?

Quoting Culture (@CultureHOF):

image attached

Reply to @Laura_k_Duffy, 20:20 UTC · 2 likes

Laura Muresianu 🌐🔸🇺🇸 (@Laura_k_Duffy): If he actually rescinds these regulations, wouldn’t it likely be overturned as arbitrary and capricious given how the standards for executive action have evolved in the last few years?

I have no idea but tbc I’m basically joking and think it is very unlikely I will ever support Vivek for president no matter how much I dislike the FDA

Quote tweet, 20:23 UTC · 14 likes

Live tweeting as I listen

Interesting thing 1: go on 4 first dates/year and you probably won’t be single (ie only a small % of singles who want a relationship are doing this, though a large % go on 1 rather than 0)

Quoting Aaron Bergman 🔍 (@AaronBergman18): I’m gonna need to psychologically prepare for this one

image attached

Tweet, 20:26 UTC · 13 likes

I’m at n=2 so two more until gf because that’s how statistics work

Reply to @freed_dfilan, 23:42 UTC · 4 likes

Daniel Filan 🔎 (@freed_dfilan): @AaronBergman18 ok but people select into numbers of dates based on how successful they expect the dates to be.

Yeah Zvi mentions this, I haven’t finished yet but pretty sure he thinks that’s not the main thing going on

Also evidential DC! trying to go on more dates is evidence that you’re the type of person who (rationally) expects them to go well

Wednesday, August 30, 2023

Tweet, 00:21 UTC · 4 likes

I made the post lol

Image

Tweet, 00:43 UTC · 3 likes

Not novel advice but “ask out more people”

I think this is good and true advice that I have so far simply not followed

Thread, continued, 00:46 UTC · 4 likes

Post mentions a YouTube video where a nerdy shy avg looking Asian guy asks out 100 women and gets 19 “yes”s

This is pretty surprising to me and a big whitepill, although I do wonder how many of those 19 actually result in a date (or will/would if the guy followed up)

Thread, continued, 00:51 UTC · 1 like

“Each additional attractiveness point doubles your number of matches on dating apps” and based on context it seems like this is within a single individual by using better pics

But if true

Thread, continued, 01:03 UTC · 6 likes

Zvi thinks guys overestimate how much/often women are bothered or annoyed by getting asked out

But, IMO more importantly, his stance is “yeah some women will be annoyed or even disgusted but, like, oh well. It’s not the end of the world for either of you”

Tweet, 01:11 UTC · 2 likes

I do wish we (ie Western liberal-ish educated young adults in the West) could get to a social contract of:

Tweet, 01:12 UTC · 4 likes

Men:

- be basically kind, respectful, and honest
- Take legible “no” signals (socially, sexually)
- don’t socially punish women for rejection
- take rejection courteously
- take feedback (implicit or ideally explicit) courteously and as sincere

Thread, continued, 01:15 UTC · 1 like

Women:

- before socially punishing a guy for overreaching (in whatever way), ask him *explicitly* to stop (or retroactively like “x made me uncomfortable, fyi”)
- if subtle/implicit no signals don’t work, assume the guy is socially inept rather than malicious, and be explicit…

Tweet, 01:23 UTC · 4 likes

- Don’t punish guys for asking you out in a basically respectful way. Just politely reject

Ok now everybody: these are the rules now, everyone knows them, and everyone knows everyone knows them 👍

Reply, 01:59 UTC · 3 likes

Sounds like the kind of thing that might be true of the guy on a median date but not of the median guy

Reply to @jide_alaga, 02:19 UTC · 7 likes

Jide 🔍 (@jide_alaga): I fully acknowledge that ~70% of the reason why I am vegan is because I don't want to participate in this massive atrocity rather than because I think its actually impactful.. it almost certainly isn't.

Relative to donating it might be small but do you really think expected suffering reduction is zero? Sure seems positive to me

Reply to @RFishBlueFish, 03:35 UTC · 5 likes

Gil (@RFishBlueFish): What does this emoji 🔍all you fancy EA people are using mean? Someone please explain

Origin story:

Reply, 09:33 UTC · 2 likes

Idgaf if it’s 29 degrees and snowing. It’s my god given right to wear a tank top and shorts

Tweet, 12:48 UTC · 6 likes

Cringe is the new based

Reply, 14:45 UTC · 3 likes

Yeah seems like a bad guy, even if occasionally he’s funny and vibe-affiliates with people on my tl

Reply, 20:00 UTC · 2 likes

Sorry it’s my god given right

Reply, 20:04 UTC · 3 likes

As if her being ugly would make it ok

Thursday, August 31, 2023

Quote tweet, 04:02 UTC · 23 likes

That EA org job? Yeah I was rejected

Quoting ettingermentum (@ettingermentum): this is my style guide

image attached

Quote tweet, 04:34 UTC · 22 likes

Round 4 (yes, literally sent a text)

Image

Quoting AI Notkilleveryoneism Memes ⏸️ (@AISafetyMemes): If you haven't yet, have The Deepfake Talk with your parents immediately

Reply, 04:34 UTC · 2 likes

Ya

Tweet, 18:55 UTC · 4 likes

People be moving to DC fr

Reply to @woke8yearold, 21:00 UTC · 5 likes

Aleph (@woke8yearold): I guess a lot of my followers already know this but women actually do it hate it when you open up with them. There is almost nothing they despise more in a man. Basically all mainstream PC dating advice is laughably wrong if you are a guy

This is about the opposite of what Manson says in Models

Reply, 21:52 UTC · 2 likes

Turns out it’s 108 sq feet lol


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