I think time perception is contingent on cultural and lifestyle factors, I don't recognise it in my own life. My twenties (chaotic) lasted forever, now in my 30s, this last year in particular felt incredibly long (it was eventful and full of change).
It seems so obvious to me. It's all about what you do with your time, if you're stuck in a boring routine of commute, repetitive work, and a few soulless vacations here and there you'll build virtually no memorable moments and it will all feel like a blur
Move to a new city, get a radically different job, get a kid, switch up your routine, pick up unusual hobbies/interests and every year will feel like a new life.
Childhood feels very long because you have to go through mandatory checkpoints imposed from the outside, add that to your adult life and it'll feel the same. Why don't you go get a parachute intro course next weekend? Or rent a car on a race track? Go ice climbing next winter? Join a yoga club, a music class, a reading group, a dance class, &c. try things you don't necessarily want to do and you'll open many doors.
Most humans have a tendency to go the path of least resistance, and in today's world of working from home and unlimited screen based entertainment you can very easily waste decades your life
I would agree with this from subjective experience. My non-IT based career has been highly volatile with unintended unemployment, companies going out of business, changing entire sectors and roles many times. Huge volatility in relationships and partners also.
Much downside to this but the upside is my life feels incredibly long and I haven't even reached 50 yet. I have already lived numerous lives compared to the self that would have had a very stable life the last 25 years. My working life feels vastly longer than my very stable childhood. That came and went in the blink of an eye from this perspective.
right things that are eventful and full of change take a long time, childhood is generally eventful and full of change. If having an eventful and changing life increases the amount of subjective life we experience how should we live.
My childhood had less change than my adulthood. I've lived in different countries as an adult; I spent my childhood in one village near a town. The events I value most and recall most strongly all happened as an adult. I struggle to remember really significant childhood events. There were a few, like finally grokking a for loop in BASIC, or my first machine code execution, but the more common remembering is of undifferentiated days in school, reading, warm summer days.
But as an adult, learning how to ride motorcycles, touring; fine dining and discovering a love for fine wine; travel generally; the perspective that living in multiple countries gives you; the birth of my son, and how it changed my perception of my parents; these things were more significant and still more salient to me now. I am a very different man to the one I was at 20, and I feel I changed more between 25 and 35 than I did between 10 and 20.
Autopilot is a choice- most people are on it, some aren't. Society has always been like this. Society is attacking self aware and fully conscious people more than ever now though :(
It's not exactly GEB: there many paragraphs that are really just lists of things to go and look at deeper, and are therefore skim-readable (or a useful list of search terms). The chapters are structured quite similarly so you get a feeling of where the meat is after a few. Works well as an occasional downtime book that feeds some good thinking away from it, IMHO
He has some great essays and research pieces and has fostered a generally nice community of people who grew out of LessWrong. There aren't many places online to talk about those things in a certain way without it devolving rapidly.
Strangely, a popular formulation of utilitarian ethics attracts utilitarian ethicists, some of whom were eugenicists and the like already by inclination, the rest merely having become so under the suasion of this fringe theory's false axioms.
When your scheme of rules for how human societies should run does nothing to exclude or even discourage the worst atrocities of human history - when that scheme is fairly evaluable on its own terms as declaring those atrocities insufficient! - you've already made a catastrophically terrible mistake. To advocate it thereafter through persuasion rhetorical and otherwise is contemptible, but unsurprising.
As it happens I'm neither an EA nor much of a utilitarian, in the traditional sense, probably closer to a Christian "post-rat". I'd be hard pressed to say that it's worth killing a bunch of people to say, save the universe. I still have had a good time reading Scott and occasionally engaging with other people in the community.
> I'd be hard pressed to say that it's worth killing a bunch of people to say, save the universe.
Well, thank God for that, at least. Do you honestly not realize how you sound? That's a genuine question, if not an especially friendly one. You can answer it out loud if you like, but no one really needs you to.
I strongly suspect we agree on nearly nothing, including the moral value of your desiderata. But it makes some sense out of how people in this community go dangerous, if that's the sort of "architecture astronaut" philosophy you people are pairing with the assumption you can think yourselves out of anything and everything including human imperfection and emotion. The lack of oxygen up there has gone to your head.
Right, it's not like such "do this awful thing or do that awful thing" scenarios are constantly relevant in medical, the government, or dare I say, military decisions.
You need to start actually having conversations with real individuals, I was giving you a chance, but I'm not bothering with it any more, except to say this: I am not "you people", I am not whatever you are projecting me to be, at all, least of all someone with a lack of moral disgust. Because I am capable of engaging in deliberate thought about awful things does not make me awful too, and I have no idea why you think that Scott Alexander is somehow the boogieman in the current ethico-political landscape, go look at Curtis Yarvin.
> medical, the government, or dare I say, military decisions
Which of these are you making?
> Because I am capable of engaging in deliberate thought about awful things does not make me awful too
Are you sure? Being able to entertain ideas you don't agree with is necessary, but there is a sting in the tail. There was an old warning about that, something about how it looks back. I don't believe people nearly often enough understand what was meant. I don't believe you do.
> I have no idea why you think that Scott Alexander is somehow the boogieman in the current ethico-political landscape, go look at Curtis Yarvin.
Yarvin's never been anything but a jackoff wannabe who dresses up in big bro's old rocker drag to indulge his humiliation kink on stage, and reliably struggles to achieve even that much.
I'm more interested in people capable of being taken seriously, and "Alexander's" whole schtick is making the implausible, nonsensical, and unconscionable go down easy. Eugenics is one example. I don't hold against him that he's justified it once long ago; anyone in their 20s or early 30s is likely to say dumb shit occasionally. It's just that I see no compelling evidence he has in the interim developed an understanding of what was wrong with his prior thinking, only learned in the manner of an incompletely socialized child what makes people angry to hear talked about. Unfortunately, he is no child; like anyone his actions have consequences in the world, all the more in his case for his outsized profile and persuasive qualities. That makes him a somewhat dangerous person in his own right, and as anyone else's 'useful idiot' potentially a good bit more so. As such he merits interest, which as a public figure he also recruits. And, of course, it is always interesting to observe who lately seems to be recruiting him, which appears pretty simple to do.
What a shame. As an author of fiction the man has a genuine gift, I think, yet he will always in the end be "better known for other work."
Again you speak completely arrogantly, you have no idea what decisions I've taken in my life, no, none of the list, and yes, ones that involve significant threat to life. I specifically did not use the word "entertain" for those ideas because I have firsthand experience of the aforementioned sting. There's a reason I described myself as "post-rat". Yarvin was taken seriously for quite a time and is far more well-aligned with the sorts of people and views you're alluding to. Scott's Jewish, for god's sake.
I can only conclude you're a troll with far too much time on your hands. Goodbye.
You ask me explicitly to address myself to the individual, and then object when I do so. I was trying to do you a favor with "don't agree with," and I have no idea what anyone's ethnicity is meant to do with anything or why you bring it up, but according to you I'm arrogant and unreasonable. You want credit for not being a "rationalist" or an "EA" any more, now that the other Scott has officially declared those words smell funny, while changing only your taste in axioms and leaving the ubiquitously and shamelessly tendentious method of ratiocination wholly intact. You call yourself a Christian and know nothing of humility. Sure. So long.
While I'm detecting you feel strongly about trolley problems, I think it's fine to discuss them, and I really don't see why you need to try and shame me for providing an example of where I tend to sit on them.
Anything that causes huge suffering, like forcing eugenics on people, is obviously not utilitarian because suffering has negative utility.
Unless you mean things like parents choosing to screen for Down syndrome, which is not what most people call "eugenics" since it's completely voluntary.
That's just, like, your utility function, maaaaaaan.
I joke, but that actually is the problem. I mean, look at you! Even trying to disclaim eugenics you can't manage not to espouse it, just in the "positive" or "voluntary" or "new eugenics" or "liberal eugenics" variety that bothers people less than all the others.
I mean, I get why a programmable system of ethics appeals to programmers, just as a mathematical one to mathematicians, and for like cause in both cases. But you are required to acknowledge reality has the permanent right of veto, not merely pay lip service to the concept of it possibly for the moment holding that privilege.
I'm saying you should own yourself a eugenicist and at least be honest about that, rather than strive to advance a heterodox and unappealing, actually rather amoral and inhuman, ideology through instrumental deceit. You certainly should not do so on the backs of parents facing what I understand can be one of a lifetime's more difficult decisions.
You know as well as I do suffering under utilitarianism has exactly the value the advocate of the moment cares to give it at the moment, whether that be negative, neutral, or vastly to the greater good. Why even attempt such a trivially obvious lie?
What? How does any of this follow from anything I've said? What's utilitarian about demanding a scapegoat for something that isn't even indictable?
I'm not criticizing parents' decisions, but yours. This specifically includes your using the sorrow of others, in this case parents faced with a harrowing dilemma, as an excuse for your own behavior, rather than demonstrate anything resembling the courage of your supposed convictions.
> I'm not criticizing parents' decisions, but yours.
I don't know man, if you think it's fine for parents to abort downs babies, I think that means you're the utilitarian.
You can try deny it, but in your heart of hearts you think it's fine to value avoiding the inconvenience of a downs baby higher than the value of a fetus's life.
> I don't know man, if you think it's fine for parents to abort downs babies, I think that means you're the utilitarian.
> You can try deny it, but in your heart of hearts you think it's fine to value avoiding the inconvenience of a downs baby higher than the value of a fetus's life.
> That's pretty damn utilitarian.
Thank you for conceding that utilitarianism trivially entails arrogating unto oneself the right to decide universally who lives and who dies, in quite literally every imaginable case - this being obviously true to so reflexive and unreflected-upon an extent that you can only conceive of even an overtly hostile and disdainful interlocutor arguing he should instead be given that power, rather than that no one should.
Is there anything you'd care to add to that, or are you content with having revealed your vicious ideology in all its bare-fanged, blood-soaked glory?
Would you like at any point to argue claims of your own, rather than inventing ones to falsely attribute to me? Not that you'll disembarrass yourself at this point, but one would hope to see you show the sense at least to stop digging.
You're not making any coherent points. You vaguely refer to aborting downs fetuses as evil and "full of bloodshed" but then you're unwilling to support laws that would prevent that.
Do you actually believe in anything except misunderstanding what utilitarian means?
Well, I haven't been willing to take you at your word when you showed up to tell me how wrong I am based on nothing but your say-so. Sure, I'll give you that.
Were you not expecting to have to convince anyone? If that really is so, then again I have to ask, do you imagine this sort of thing normal? Are you in the habit of letting harangue stand in for conversation in ordinary life also, or is this a special occasion?
For the sake of this argument, let's assume my moral framework is identical with that of a priest of Tezcatlipoca, at the height of the Aztec Empire. Astonish me.
What began as a complaint about HN’s interest in Scott Alexander devolved into a prolonged, hostile, and circular argument about whether certain reproductive choices are a form of eugenics, whether that’s compatible with utilitarianism, and whether utilitarianism itself is morally bankrupt.
Neither side persuades the other, and the thread becomes more about rhetorical sparring than the original topic.
> There aren't many places online to talk about those things in a certain way without it devolving rapidly.
Now we have an illustration of precisely what that means, more or less entirely in spite of those irritated into furnishing it.
Oh, I understand why rhetoric gets a bad name. No fool ever likes being made to look foolish. That's worth doing, in public, as often as possible, with the kind of person it takes to look utilitarianism full in the face, 'repugnant conclusion' and all, and still embrace it.
> For the sake of this argument, let's assume my moral framework is identical with that of a priest of Tezcatlipoca, at the height of the Aztec Empire. Astonish me.
Easy, your utility function is an indicator on WWPTD (What Would a Priest of Tezcatlipoca Do)?
+1000 when your actions are in accordance with a priest of Tezcatlipoca, and -1000 when they are not.
Like string theory, you can make utilitarianism fit anything. So on its own, it is neither good nor evil.
Intentionally wiping almost all of my obsidian vaults and accidentally wiping my 2TB HDD was the most freeing thing.
I'd amassed so many books and papers and notes and half-finished projects over a frenzied couple of years where the main drivers were stimulant abuse and low self-worth.
It turns out that the excitement of finding some resource that's perfectly fit for your requirements is it's own rare pleasure, and it can be harmful to make them a demand on yourself in their own right, and especially harmful to try and catch'em all
I think I'd decided to grind my way out of my situation and channelled that energy into the most elaborate resource-hoarding and procrastination. I did genuinely learn a lot but very, very inefficiently, and in such a way I was sick of computers and self-motivated learning for a couple years.
Second-brain culture definitely provides an open door to hoarding (and stimulant users). I still like using obsidian but I don't care for the various "methods", I just do what makes sense. It turns out when I enjoy the process of doing/learning things, I remember stuff about them pretty well.
Well, if done quickly, it only takes 2 minutes or so, so it's worth trying I guess. And even if it doesn't work as intended, I guess it helps to control faeces better when we get older.
My experience with them doesn't quite fit either: I've primarily used LLMs for giving me hints when I'm struggling with a leetcode problem or similar. They're surprisingly good at it, providing you regularly remind them to provide little clues only.
Right, so we can just completely ignore the symbolic/iconic importance.
I don't know why I've seen Instagram mentioned several times already but it's recognition as a place of significant natural beauty and featuring in all sorts of media was WELL before some stupid website of people sharing photos existed.
> we can just completely ignore the symbolic/iconic importance.
I think the person above was arguing for the opposite of this: Not that we should ignore this tragedy, but that we should more viscerally feel the extent of the greater tragedy and put energy into righting it.
The point is not that Instagram is the cause. It is the fact that upward movement in class worldwide has provided almost a billion extra people as tourists in just one generation, and the most commonly 'grammed locations tend to attract people that would not have otherwise learned about them.
Premature optimisation is the root of all evil :) I was very much in your place a few years ago - the most flexible and responsive and useful place to have most planning is in your head: crystallising ideas and plans and all that just makes them brittle and a sharp failure point.
Most of these organisational tools are for multi-person orgs.
Your PKM should look very 'suboptimal' from the outside. You need much less conscious control than you're exerting. Let your system forget stuff.
It's infinitely better to have something completely undocumented than almost nothing extremely well-documented.
I rarely find myself on "autopilot". Is that why?