The committed Rationalists often point out the flaws in science as currently practiced: the p-hacking, the financial incentives, etc. Feeding them more data about where science goes awry will only make them more smug.

The real problem with the Rationalists is that they* think they can do better*, that knowing a few cognitive fallacies and logicaltricks will make you better than the doctors at medicine, better than the quantum physicists at quantum physics, etc.

We need to explain that yes, science has it’s flaws, but it still shits all over pseudobayesianism.

I enjoyed the takedowns (wow, this guy really hates Macaskill), but the overall conclusions of the article seem a bit lost. If malaria nets are like a medicine with side-effects, then the solution is not to throw away the medicine. (Giving away free nets to people probably does not have a signficant death toll!). At the end they seem to suggest, like, voluntourism as the preferred alternative? I don’t think Africa needs to be flooded with dorky software engineers personally going to villages to “help out”.

The sole funder is the founder, Saar Wilf. The whole thing seems like a vanity project for him and friends he hired to give their opinion on random controversial topics.

Solomonoff induction is a big rationalist buzzword. It’s meant to be the platonic ideal of bayesian reasoning which if implemented would be the best deducer in the world and get everything right.

It would be cool if you could build this, but it’s literally impossible. The induction method is provably incomputable.

The hope is that if you build a shitty approximation to solomonoff induction that “approaches” it, it will perform close to the perfect solomonoff machine. Does this work? Not really.

My metaphor is that it’s like coming to a river you want to cross, and being like “Well Moses, the perfect river crosser, parted the water with his hands, so if I just splash really hard I’ll be able to get across”. You aren’t Moses. Build a bridge.

Hey, thanks so much for looking through it! If you’re alright with messaging me your email or something, I might consult you on some more related things.

With your permission, I’m tempted to edit this response into the original post, it’s really good. Have you looked over Yudkowsky’s word salad in the EA forum thread? Would be interested in getting your thoughts on that as well.

Thanks! I strive for accuracy, clarity, humility, and good faith. Aka, everything I learned not to do from reading the sequences.