I love to learn, and I aspire to help people with my career while enjoying life. Interests include: information spread, ethics, and psychology.
Aaron Graifman
Karma: 58
[Question] Social Network Analysis of EA?
I was thinking that too. Not sure if that’s what he’s looking for , but it definitely would be a start.
Assuming we did use Reddit, do you know if the posts and content are something that could be exported to another site if we ever decided to migrate off of Reddit?
[Question] Building a Forum?
Motivations behind question: Novel. I’m curious to hear what Peter Singer thinks about arguments that explain away free will due to prior causality, and how this is reconciled with the Drowning Child argument. I still want to do good, and believe the argument cannot be falsified, but I’m curious to hear his thinking. For me, I believe doing good is right for a number of reasons, and whether or not free will exists, it doesn’t matter to me (choice or not), because I will donate, and share EA, and buy into the argument.
Whether I had any choice in the matter… well who knows?I would love to hear what Peter thinks about the free will debate and the ideas posed by Robert Sapolsky in Determined.
Epistemic Status of Paraphrase below: Read Sam Harris’ Free Will essay, and listened to a number of podcasts on free will, as well as this one mentioned partially.
For those who don’t know, Sapolsky is claiming a hard deterministic stance, and explains why downward causation still does not account for the idea of free will, because for this common idea to exist, the constituents would need to somehow become different. For example, wetness is an emergent property of water because wetness only exists with many water molecules involved… but this doesn’t mean that somehow the water molecules become O2H instead of H2O when they become wet.
But this is what is being claimed in free will debates. Our consciousness doesn’t magically exhibit structural changes bearing free will. The feeling of free will arises but not some structural change.
Anyway, that’s my paraphrase of what I heard in the conversation between Sam Harris and Sapolsky recently. Figured it was worth a shot posting this question, but I understand it is somewhat irrelevant and respect if it is passed over.
Cheers,
and I do truly hope this finds you well
Thank you. I looked at that yesterday. and I think it’s a great idea to have a post like that where people can “drop” in their ideas without having to commit much to them.
It’s a bit of a think tank for forum posts huh?
As to your comment about my question, “If something is worth saying, it’s worth saying more than once.” agreed.
Your music analogy reminds me of something I once wondered when I first started learning guitar chords… “If there are a limited number of chords, won’t we eventually run out of songs?” But now I realize there’s a lot more to it than just the chords and even melody and lyrics. Guitar pedals, amplifier settings, added instruments, vocal frying, and other techniques allow for a huge variety of songs with the same-ish chords. Ideas are a bit like that too.
Hi @saulius,
That’s an interesting take. I’ve thought about that before whenever I’ve been exposed to a lot of new information and felt information overload.
Some part of me has wondered “do we really need hundreds of ways to explain a single quote/book/concept” but as @MichaelStJules said above, “Having alternative write ups that are more accessible/attractive to some people, because people have different preferences over writing structure, styles, lengths, etc.” so I’ve changed my mind a bit about this.
I wonder if part of that thinking is due to a sort of scarcity mindset around internet resources.… worth reading more about perhaps.
Still, I appreciate the article you linked, and your take.
Hi @Amber Dawn,
First, thank you.
Second, it’s ironic that you used this example, “I feel like what you are doing is similar to how some EAs are like ‘oh I won’t apply to that job because I don’t want to waste the org’s time and surely I’m not a good candidate’” as I have literally said that to my brother before. Your thoughts have changed my mind on the topics discussed, and I appreciate this. Sometimes, all it takes is someone laying out the argument, showing some of the absurdities of it, and then I see it in a whole new light.
As a result of the discussions on this post, I intend to write more on the forum and my blog.
I recently wrote an article yesterday where I outlined some of my reasons for writing, no coincidence, including learning by writing.
Again, thank you for your well-thought-out response and rational encouragement!
- Aaron
Hi Riley,
Thank you. I think you’re right to call attention to the idea of writing for the intrinsic nature of the act. It is something I enjoy very much, and find it brings a certain quality of peace to my mind that is unlike any other.
”Other people may not have been exposed to these ideas, so you might be able to do more to improve the average quality. ” This is also a point that is worth taking into account and acting out. I have a Substack, which I haven’t written on as much as I’d planned to simply because I wasn’t certain of the quality of work I was putting out. I knew I could do better, but I guess the harm of putting out something not entirely fleshed, isn’t something predictable and might not be worth worrying about.
Thank you for your reply
“Having alternative write ups that are more accessible/attractive to some people, because people have different preferences over writing structure, styles, lengths, etc.”
This is an interesting benefit I hadn’t thought of yet I find myself encountering this often when I jump from website to website while learning something. Sometimes, as @Alexander David mentioned above, “the way you express it, the way you summarize it, the particular point you emphasize, etc” bears some importance.
I’m glad you made this point because it brought to mind some of the books I’d read in the past that reiterate the same physics or pop-psychology lessons in different tones or wording, but the reading is no less enjoyable and some lessons bear repeating too.
Thank you,
Aaron
Hi Alexander,
Thank you! You add an important point which is that the packaging of the ideas matters. I think what you said here is more or less the same idea “the way you look at the issue, the way you express it, the way you summarize it, the particular point you emphasize, etc.” This phrasing of packaging isn’t my concept but rather comes from the author Mark Manson. I’m glad this reminded me of it.
Yours was an encouraging response, I appreciate it greatly.
Hi @JDBauman,
Thank you for getting in touch with me. I shared that website with the local church.
I’m very happy to see that there is a thriving community of Christians involved with EA and effective charity.
- Aaron
Hi Jason,
Thank you for your response.
Do you think you could elaborate on the second point? I’m personally unfamiliar with Catholic moral theology and would be interested in learning more about the basic ideas that connect to AI ethics.
Thank you,
- Aaron
Hi Joseph,
Thank you for your thorough and thoughtful responses. This has helped me gain an understanding of your perspective. I’m now considering speaking to the head pastor this Sunday about EACH, with what you’ve said in mind. I find that this point in particular stood out to me as reasonable and important.Also, emphasizing Jesus’ teachings, like how “when you give to the least of these, you give to me” (demandingness), or the parable of the talents (effectiveness), or speaking of “you will know them by their fruits” (consequences), can be helpful to encourage a stronger moral imperative.
Side note:
I followed the Christ and Counterfactuals blog and will read more of what they have on there. Philosophy of Religion is somewhat of a natural interest for me, as is the theology of Christianity, so if you know anyone who I should reach out to about potentially contributing to the blog, that would be wonderful. I would love to add to the discussion and body of work.Thank you again,
Aaron
[Question] Nothing new under the sun?
Hi Joseph,
I’m very glad to hear that. How might one go about bringing that movement into their local church?
I’ve encountered many Christians who use the second-coming as a reason not to care too much about the long-term future and I don’t know how to reconcile this. I consider myself Agnostic, but some of my Baptist friends have become convinced that since their faith is, well, faith-based, they don’t feel like the moral imperative to do acts beyond tithing.
What’re your thoughts on this?
If there’s any advice or resources you could point me to, that would be excellent.
Thank you very much
How to communicate EA to the commonsense Christian: has it been done before?
I’m considering writing a series of posts exploring the connection between EA and the common-sense Christianity one might encounter on the street if you were to ask someone about their ‘faith.’
I’ve looked into EA for Christians a bit, and haven’t done a deep dive into their articles yet. I’m wondering what the consensus is on this group, and if anyone involved can give me a synopsis on how that’s been going. Has it been effective?
I’m posting this quick take as a means of feeling out this idea.
This mini-series would probably consist of exploring EA from a commonsense place, considering how the use of Church-language can allow one to communicate more effectively and bypass being seen as a member of the out-group, and hopefully enable more Christians to see this movement as something they may want to be a part of even if they don’t share the same first premises.
I don’t want to put more time into work that has been deeply covered in the community but feel that this is an area I can provide some insight into, as I have my motivations for reconciliation beyond academic interest.
What are your thoughts?
Thank you. When you say “regulation tasks” what are you thinking of more specifically?
[Question] Exploring an EA Equivalent to Job Simulation Websites for Skills and Aptitude Development & Seeking Insights on EA-Aligned Organizations
Thank you for sharing this journey. In addition, I will be using the STOPP routine now more often. I implemented it today when I found myself getting overwhelmed by the calls I had to make today and it helped guide me back on track.
This also helped me gain a feel for how the community has grown.
This is inspiring
Fair enough. I’ll ask there too! Thank you