Mutual Understanding

I hope to get back into recording more regularly soon, but no promises. Life has been pretty busy for me lately. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Apologies for taking forever to edit this podcast we recorded or Feb 7. We talked about the Iran situation some which was all before the US attacked, but there was some other stuff too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Relatively rambling as usual, especially the second half I think. I hope some of you enjoy it!Some links:* Kave on X* Kave’s blog (with his excellent Inkhaven posts)* some tweets of mine about being stuck in puzzles* Justin Wack and the Big Time Hack* Scott Whiskers* Mutropolis* Golden Idol games This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Last week, I went to see Matt Bateman and Aaron Stupple talk about their parenting disagreements at The Montessorium, the (pretty new!) school Matt created. I enjoyed their conversation, wanted to hear even more, asked them if they’d be up for coming on my podcast, and they did!Probably the best place to find more is on X.com, and here are a few more links too:* Aaron’s book, The Sovereign Child (the link is to the free pdf, and it’s also available at all major book stores* Taking Children Seriously* a thing I wrote a while back about some of what I think about unschooling(ETA: I have locked the comments because I both feel somewhat responsible for comments made on my posts and don’t have the bandwidth to monitor them at this time) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

A bunch of this was me trying to understanding Shea’s metaphysics of value and also where he sees property rights as coming from. It may have been more repetitive than usual, since I kept asking him to explain stuff again, but it was helpful for me at least!We reference this series of blog posts about proposed reforms to zoning laws. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Shea started out talking about recognizing thought processes as value-laden, and then we got into ~psych debugging a way I think some of my thought processes haven’t been respecting what I think are the correct internal property rights. Shea updated somewhat about what I mean when I’m saying things in an IFS framing. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Some things we mentioned include:* A Positive Account of Property Rights* the original instructions for we-ness* someone's write-up of the we-ship experiment that Malcolm ran (the one where we did the "goodbye for now, Malcolm")Malcolm also posted the same conversation but with video to his YouTube channel if you want that!I’ve included some automatically generated chapter timestamps in case that’s useful.Chapters00:00 Exploring Internal Family Systems and WeSpace03:01 Collective Selfness and Group Dynamics06:00 The We-Ship Experiment: Collective Consciousness08:59 Navigating Individuality within Collectivity11:58 Fractal Nature of Selfness in Groups15:02 Understanding Self-Energy in Group Contexts17:55 Projection and Responsibility in Group Dynamics20:49 Defining Boundaries: What is Us and What is Not Us?27:00 Navigating Relevance in Conversations29:55 The Dynamics of Group Triggers32:57 Exploring Collective Self and Shame36:12 Understanding Boundaries and Ownership39:00 Moral Layers in Property and Boundaries41:54 The Complexity of Group Dynamics44:58 Fairness and Communication Styles55:58 Earning Attention and Communication Dynamics57:03 Navigating Group Dynamics and Proactive Engagement59:00 Establishing Boundaries in Communication59:51 Finding Solutions in Parenting and Communication01:00:55 The Importance of Shared Information in Conversations01:03:05 Addressing Safety and Container Dynamics01:03:59 Self-Sustaining Dynamics in Group Settings01:05:55 The Role of Leadership in Group Containers01:07:54 Exploring Collective Self and Attunement01:10:01 Unpacking Self and Group Dynamics01:11:57 Ego Awareness and Self-Modeling in Conversations This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I probably should have split this up into two episodes, but instead it’s all together. The first part of the conversation is basically about how Shea thinks military conflicts should work in the modern world, with the recent Israel and Iran war as a jumping off point.We talked about The West Wing speech about a proportional response.I tried to summarize what I thought Shea was saying about his theory of conflict, and how it analogized to interpersonal conflicts between individuals.And then, at 1hr 28min in, we switched topics and talked some about how both of us have big families as atheists, which is pretty uncommon. I have plans to make a mini series of podcast episodes with various atheists who have large families, so this is sort of the first episode of that. (But I expect me and Shea to revisit the topic later too.) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I had a fun time catching up with my former cohost!Some links we mentioned:* Ben's website* Ben’s substack* Good Strategy Bad Strategy* my blog This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

We talked about the scarfgate and it turned into a whole thing about how discussions of ethics should work. We didn’t even really get to the part about “high agency”! We did get to analyzing how I pirated music when I was in college. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

We only had a time for a short episode today, but I hadn’t recorded anything in a while, so here it is! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I saw this Twitter thread from Sarah and offered her to talk to her about it on a podcast, and Aaron volunteered to moderate. I was more taking the position that all emotions are functional, and Sarah was approaching things from a more bio-realist perspective. Ultimately, I don’t think we disagreed about all that much once we hashed it out!Some things we referenced:* How Emotions are Made* It’s not about the nail* Ads don’t work that way* Society is fixed, biology is mutable This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

In this podcast, we recap a conversation we didn’t record where Shea and I talked about epistemology and decision theory, and I decided to flag it more when I say “but what would that even mean”I also made a case for subjective probability as a useful concept, and we talked a little about politics at the end.At one point I referenced this LW post that mentions confidence and credence.AI generated chapter time stamps:00:00 Introduction and Motivation for Discussion00:39 Exploring Timeless Decision Theory02:00 Objections to Traditional Decision Theories04:33 Functional Decision Theory and Its Implications06:01 The Role of Other People's Decisions08:17 Perspectives on Newcomb's Problem10:01 Voting and Decision-Making Dynamics12:40 The Value of Civic Participation14:03 Philosophical Perspectives on Decision Theory18:10 Platonism and Mathematical Realism23:29 The Nature of Abstractions and Probabilities25:43 Critical Rationalism and Probability Discussions33:19 Understanding Subjective Probability36:57 The Role of Betting in Probability Communication39:20 Precision in Probability Estimates41:10 The Nature of Likelihood and Causality44:56 The Complexity of Probability in Epistemology51:32 Subjective vs. Objective Probability58:48 Understanding Credence and Confidence01:13:06 Navigating Political Uncertainty01:19:41 Protests and Free Speech in Context01:24:17 Navigating Immigration and American Values01:31:06 The Left's Political Landscape and Future Directions01:36:12 Housing and Healthcare: Bipartisan Solutions?01:40:28 Education Reform and the Role of Competition01:52:03 The Need for New Leadership in Politics This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I had a great time talking to my friend Cristie Henry about unschooling, an educational philosophy that we both practice within our families.And here’s a link to the thing I wrote about unschooling that I mentioned when we were talking. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I caught up with my friend Jordan, and we talked about a whole bunch of stuff! Not a very organized conversation, and I hope you enjoy it.You can find him at The Relateful Company, and his new company Uptrust should be online soon at uptrusthq.com This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

A pretty rambling podcast about what’s been going through my head recently when trying to work on getting our dogs and cats comfortable with each other. tldr; I think I was accidentally messing up my training plans by using spatial pressure without realizing it, and I think I better get how Argos’s frustration is working This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I started a threadapalooza on natural law, Kave responded with some thoughts on natural law conflicting with itself, and now I have recorded some thoughts on what I think natural law means and why I think it doesn't. All of this is quite inspired by what David Friedman wrote on property rights. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

In this episode I try to talk though one of my top go-to frameworks for thinking through what to do when my kids are doing stuff that doesn’t work for me, or them, or the family. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

It was great having Shea back on to finish up our conversation from the other week! We talked somewhat more about the Less Wrong rationality stuff, and also hit some other topics like Shea’s issues with libertarians, why he’s against altruism, how consciousness works, and what he thinks about LLMs.He mentioned two books, The Ominous Parallels and The Open Society and Its Enemies. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

This podcast came out of a twitter conversation Ruth and I had, and we ended up comparing notes about a lot of our parenting tactics and approaches, including how to not be too stressed while having kids. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I was going to record with a guest today, but we ended up rescheduling, so instead I talked about some things I think about attachment theory and object permanence. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

When Emmett and Shea were disagreeing about the red pill blue pill twitter poll thing, I suggested that maybe they could have a voice conversation about it, and then we did! I wouldn’t say we really resolved things, but as far as I can tell we had fun talking to each other for a few hours about stuff like:* epistemology* Objectivism* how perception works* the free energy principle* how much framing effects matter* things that would make us change our votes* creating new property rights* etcHope you enjoy if you listen! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Here’s the original poll:Poll question from my 12yo: Everyone responding to this poll chooses between a blue pill or red pill.* if > 50% of ppl choose blue pill, everyone lives* if not, red pills live and blue pills die Which do you choose?The original plan was to talk to Emmett Shear about it, but he ended up being late, so first we talked to each other. This is not the promised second half to the Shea episode! That is still coming at some point.I’m going to post the followup to this where we talk to Emmett next. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Jonah and I talked a bunch about developmental models, especially Susan Loevinger’s, using AI to do research about those models, what interests Jonah in studying them, and how it may make sense to think of LLMs in terms of developmental stages. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I recorded a short episode with just me with a bit of a rant about how I think about the “does intrinsic motivation drive out extrinsic motivation” parenting discourse. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

My guest today canceled (for a great reason), so I talked about some stuff that’s been on my mind lately, including:* how I have been feeling about the election* a couple of more predictions* a little about what I’ve been reading* how I’m relating to having young kids these days This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

We originally live streamed some election night results and takes to Twitter, but I wanted to post it here too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

It was great to have Ben back on the podcast to talk election predictions! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

I had a great time learning more about the Stratfordian perspective on Shakespeare by talking to Draculaic, my twitter mutual.Divia (00:01)Hey, I'm here today with my Twitter mutual, Draculeac, who is mostly remaining anonymous. And we are here to talk about something that I touched on in the podcast with ThinkWork, but to go into it in greater depth, which is why Draculeac thinks that Shakespeare is the guy from Stratford.And he has some expertise here. He studied this stuff in college, wrote his undergraduate thesis on Lear, and is currently in the process of getting a paper on Shakespeare published. So I've prepared some. Ultimately, I am far from an expert in this topic, though I know more about it than I did when I talked to Thinkwart on a previous podcast. But yeah, I'm really excited to hear what you have to say and ultimately become more informed over the course of this conversation.Draculaic (00:50)I appreciate that. Thank you for the introduction. I think I should probably caveat one or two things before we dive in. And I'm happy to let you steer the conversation however you'd like. One is that my interest in this is primarily as in the plays as what we could call literary artifacts. And so my interest is what the plays are and how those affect the audience of Shakespeare primarily.I'm not personally a historian, but I've read up a little bit about this and I know enough to, think, know, muster an opinion. But I also just want to say that I don't particularly have a dog in the fight about authorship. don't have any particular care about who wrote the plays. I care about the plays themselves. But just in what I'veDivia (01:29)Yeah.Draculaic (01:46)been looking into researching myself. think that, and what I remember from what I've read about this previously, I think that there's, it's probably the strongest case that Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare. And I'm definitely happy to give you my opinions about why that is.Divia (01:58)Mm-hmm. Cool. And I think one of the things I discovered, which anyone who knows about this probably already knows, unless I'm wrong, is that that is the more common position, at least with academics, right?Draculaic (02:09)Yeah, people who are sort of academic literary critics or people who are literary historians tend to converge on that argument, and I think probably for good reason.Divia (02:23)Okay, so I have various things I expect to wanna ask you about that, but I would love if you would just start out by laying out the basic case for why you think for the Stratfordian position.Draculaic (02:37)Yeah, so the rough shape of it is that we know that there was a person who existed named William Shakespeare. He has plenty of peers that wrote about him. We know that he was an actor. We know that he there are people who testify at the time that he was a playwright. The people who referred to him as a playwright are generally pretty reliable people. They're people like Ben Johnson, who wrote the four basically the forward poem to his folio.which came out after he died. A lot of people I think would haveDivia (03:10)And wait, sorry, and just to be clear, like he mentioned, he didn't just say Shakespeare, he mentioned like more details about him.Draculaic (03:18)yeah, I mean, he talks about specifically, you know, I think attributes of him, like he talks about his wit is there some things that he's talked about in like, you know, written correspondence and features of Shakespeare. but he also like talks about him specifically as a playwright, in that poem. and I think he also, you know, he's generally speaking, he himself was a playwright and a peer of Shakespeare. hewould have undoubtedly known him. And again, is a pretty reliable guy. Doesn't really, there's not a lot in the historical record of things that he's written that are trying not to be true. would be, he'd have to be, it'd be a pretty big lie for him to be doing that. And it would be an extreme.Divia (04:02)Okay, wait, let me, and I know I said I was gonna want you to lay it out. Now, I guess I'm nitpicking on this point. So just to be clear though, because the case that Shakespeare wasn't Shakespeare includes that there was a guy using the pen name Shakespeare, right?Draculaic (04:07)Yeah, go ahead.Yeah, that's from what I have looked into. That's the primary version of it is that it was some kind of masked identity by various different candidates. know, Christopher Marlowe, who somehow survives his murder or, you know, or sort of dies. of the big ones.Divia (04:35)Earl of Oxford is one I read a bunch about. So I guess so how do you know, now I've forgotten the name, but the guy who was talking about him as a playwright at the time, like how do you know that he wasn't just referring to whoever went by that pen name?Draculaic (04:49)Yeah, that's a fair question. think...That would have to be like a pretty sly maneuver. And I think thatI just, I don't know. I think that it doesn't really comport with the way that Johns

In this podcast, Shea and I tried to hunt down a philosophical disagreement we seem to have by diving into his critique of rationality. We went off on what may or may not have been a big tangent about Internal Family Systems therapy, which I’m a big fan of, and which I think Shea thinks should have more caveats?Unfortunately, our conversation got cut short because partway through, Shea got a call and had to deal with some stuff. We hope to record a Part 2 soon!Transcript:Divia (00:01)Hey, I'm here today with Shea, who is my Twitter mutual, recently got a job doing software engineering management at Andro and is an objectivist. I think I've, listened to a long podcast with Shea about objectivism on Daniel Filan's podcast, The Filan Cabinet, which I recommend to anyone who's interested in that. We'll see how much we get into that today. I'm sure it'll come up. Our primary topic for today is, Shay sent me a long list of things and one of them was Contra.rationalists. So I, if you check my Twitter bio, it says I am a rationalist. So I figure there's probably some interesting disagreement here that we can dive into.Shea Levy (00:38)Yeah, sure. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I guess with respect to the rationalists, I've been rationalist adjacent for lack of a better term for I guess over a decade now. I originally kind of became aware of it through Ozzy. So Ozzy was on, I don't even remember what the thing, there's somethingSome feminist blog kerfuffle and somebody, a blog I followed, Provocracy, recommended looking at Ozzie's thing on this. And then through Ozzie, I then found the rest of the rationalist sphere. I was mainly on rationalist Tumblr for quite some time. I've been socially connected and intellectually engaged with the community since then in various ways. Some of my closest friends are rationalists.Divia (01:35)Like they say.Shea Levy (01:37)And throughout all that, there's been a kind of general fascination and love for some of the things and then deep frustration and then for some parts of the community, going from frustration into I think something seriously wrong, defective there. I don't know what's interesting to you if you want me to just give my spiel or if you want to talk, I don't know.Divia (01:57)Mm-hmm.So something that comes to mind, I don't know how much this will relate or it won't. The first conversation I remember us having on Twitter, which may not be the first one we actually had, is talking about AI boxing. Does this ring a bell? Yeah, because I think, I don't remember, but I think I was like, okay, who wants to talk about AI boxing or something like that? And you were like, no, this doesn't make any sense because I just would simply not let the AI out of the box. And we ended up talking about it, though then it seemed like-Shea Levy (02:17)Yeah. Yeah.Hey.Divia (02:35)This is probably what you're saying all along, but what I eventually understood you to be saying is, unless I think the AI should come out of the box.Shea Levy (02:41)Well, so, okay, let's start with that one. So I feel like there are a pieces to it, but let's drill into me personally, if I'm the one in charge of the AI Box. So like, will, will see that there are people you should not put in charge of that. But the fundamental thing that I don't buy in the AI Boxing argument is that there is some, like,Divia (02:52)Yeah, you were clear about that. You were not like arbitrary person. That's a good idea. Yes.Right.Shea Levy (03:10)general like key you can turn in anybody's mind to make them believe anything illegitimately like You can I'm not saying I'm like some like you completely like never fall for any scam kind of thing. I'm not saying that like if somebody could trick me about things if I were like in a normal situation where I'm treating them as a like good faith human being that I'm interacting with like I'm certain certainly people can pull something over me I'm not my claim is not thatBut my claim is if I know that this is a like potentially hostile intelligence and now let's set aside whether an AI could do that That's a separate concern I have but like yeah, if I know there's a potentially hostile intelligence. I don't understand how it works I'm well aware that it doesn't work like a human being even if I don't know the details of how it does work like there is not some magic sequence of words that it can tell me thatwill convince me of something false relevant to letting it out. I just don't buy that and none of the arguments I've seen suggest that it's true and it all really seems to rest on the sort of like determinism, lack of like the impossibility of objectivity that like, like the AI could present a like picture that is an illusion.It could present something that looks like something, but it's actually, you know, it looks like X, but it's actually Y and could confuse me visually. And I think there's this idea implicit and sometimes explicit, but implicit in the argument that like, reason is like tha

I would say this one was hard to summarize, since we jumped around and covered a lot of ground, but I had a ton of fun finally talking to Visa from Twitter in realtime.Transcript:Divia (00:02)Hey, I'm here today with Visa from Twitter. That's mostly, I know you're on other platforms too. You have essays, you're on YouTube, but that's definitely how I think of you. When I got back on Twitter in like 2019, I think of you as really the one that kind of created the Twitter scene that I then joined. I don't know. I don't know to what extent you see it that way, but like, you you really the guy that started with all the threading and like the...Visa (00:10)Mm-hmm. Yes.Divia (00:30)actually friendly norms and I don't know, maybe nothing ever starts, but like you popularized it in the corner of Twitter that I'm in anyway, so I'm super glad to be here with you today and get to actually talk.Visa (00:43)Yeah, it's nice. I still remember there were a couple of things that you responded to on my tweets that I remember thinking were uncommonly insightful. One of it was, I think it was I was asking my timeline to psychoanalyze me about why I like angry women, like my wife or my friends. And your answer, think, was one of the best ones. Something about them being able to express something that you feel like you can't express.Divia (01:02)Yeah, I remember.Visa (01:11)And that just struck me as so true. And all the other responses were so, I don't know, superficial. And yours was like, I think that it's correct. And I think it helped me shift my understanding a little bit. And so I'm grateful for that. And yeah, so.Divia (01:24)Yeah, thank you. It's definitely, mean, I don't know, maybe one reason I think of it is just because, you know, I'm female, I'm like five feet tall and you're, you you're a guy, you're tall, you're like browner than the other people around you. I think it's hard, I imagine, with the anger, right?Visa (01:35)Yeah. Mm-hmm. You become the threat. mean, it's like the beauty and the beast dynamic, Where, yeah, I am the danger when I walk down the street at night. so I don't fear for my personal safety around other people. But like, if there's something like, you know, if I'm in a random country and there's like a bar fight and like someone blames me, I'm not going to get the benefit of the doubt. And I think that'sDivia (01:51)Yeah.Visa (02:05)Subconsciously, think that influenced my whole friendly game game thing, so that I have people around who know me and can vouch for me. think there's this bit from, I can't remember, it Chris Rock or Dave Chappelle. And they got into a traffic stop, and they were stressed out about it. But then the cop recognized them, and then they had a good interaction. And then they're like, yeah, being famous kind of, it sucks that that's, you know, it's.Divia (02:11)Mm-hmm.Yeah.huh.Visa (02:34)as a solution to that kind of problem that's not ideal. But it is a solution. yeah.Divia (02:39)Yeah, I mean, if you can swing it, right? And as you've said, also, I think it's different when you go around with a baby,Visa (02:47)so much. So much. It's like, man. And sometimes I remember, think I'm walking with my wife and my child. And then the world around me just feels so warm and open. And then let's say we're going to the park or something. And I'm like, I should go and get some water or something. And I'm like, OK, I'm going to go to the store. And I separate from them. And I cross the road. instantly, it's like, the warmth is gone. It's like people are like, you know.Divia (03:13)Yeah.Visa (03:14)And I get it, know, it delivers society, people have to make snap judgments and whatever, but like it's so striking. I think I might have been motivated to have kids sooner if I knew that, but I mean, and not knowing it intellectually as well is not, I don't know if that's helpful, but so my recommendation to a lot of young guys is try and borrow a baby, like you're like a nephew or a niece or something, like borrow a baby and like walk the streets with that and feel it for yourself. And I guess some people tell me that,Divia (03:25)Yeah, it's interesting.Yeah.Visa (03:41)Having a dog is kind as opposed to having nothing.Divia (03:44)I think especially if you have like a little puppy, or at least this is my brother said, he goes around with his kid a lot, but he also, he said it was pretty similar when he had a puppy that people would just come up to him and like be really friendly.Visa (03:47)Yeah.Yeah.I can imagine that. Yeah, that makes sense. Maybe I might be likelier to get a puppy after my kids are grown or something like that. It is very addictive when people are so nice.Divia (04:09)Yeah, that makes sense. actually, know, I some other stuff, my most extreme story of this, because I don't really, I don't know, I didn't notice as dramatic a contrast. It's true that people are more likely to talk to me when I have my baby, but I feel like people are pretty warm regardless. But I woul

Matthew Pierce, @MattPiercello on Twitter, comes on the podcast to talk about his model of how to have productive conversations.Transcript:Divia (00:02)Hey, I'm here today with Matthew Pierce, who is my Twitter mutual. He is a professional cellist, systems thinker, interested in what makes people tick and how we can solve problems together. He's MJ Piercello on Twitter. That's where Pierce and cello, but they overlap. And we hadn't planned on talking today, but then I was going talk to another Twitter friend of mine about the Shakespeare thing again, which I discussed in my previous podcast, but he got sick.So instead I asked if anyone was free and Matthew was. so here we are, welcome to the podcast.Matt (00:36)So we're making this up as we go along. It's fantastic. Hi everybody. Nice to meet you.Divia (00:42)Yeah, so do you wanna, I don't know, do you wanna tell us a little bit, it seems like your top thing these days, which I read a little bit about, but not as much as I probably would have if I had it longer, is a way that you help people understand each other when they disagree. Does that seem like a fair starting point?Matt (01:00)think so, yeah. mean, one of the things you can see when you look around, especially on Twitter, right, which tends to attract these sort of things, is these massive, powerful disagreements that seem completely unsolvable, right? And I'm not convinced they're unsolvable. I think they're just a bit maybe misunderstood. And so I've been playing the cello for a really long time now, almost 40 years, but I've been playing it professionally on the order of 30 years.lots of different places, lots of different circumstances. And one of the things cello playing does is that it puts you in a position of using your body and your mind together, right?Divia (01:42)Yeah, for the record for the podcast listeners, I also play the cello not as well, not professionally, but I do have some context there.Matt (01:46)Yeah, yes, I only just discovered this. Yeah, so this is a serendipity point for me. I only just found this out myself. But yeah, so cello playing, you're not just drawing up formal equations on the chalkboard and you're not just building a brick wall that'll last for generations. It's kind of a mix of both that you've got these...incredibly abstract things you're doing with the music in an orchestra and you're sort of manipulating the emotions of the audience and of each other in real time in a performance, but you're doing it using extremely abstract structures that music itself is built out of that define the sounds while using your body to make them. Yeah, yeah, like, like, okay, harmony, melody, harmonic progression.Divia (02:28)But abstract structures, you mean like harmony and that sort of thing? Melody.Matt (02:36)form and analysis. So this song has a refrain and then it has an intro, you know, all these different bits and you can, you can categorize things, things like this as abstractly as you would like to, but you have to do them with your own body in real time performance, even if you're really nervous. So it's a very interesting window into a more complete aspect of what I think of as decision-making.And that's really where a lot of the disagreements live. They're not just rational, are they? They're sort of instinctive and habitual and emotional all at once.Divia (03:11)So for the record, I would call myself a rationalist, that's in my Twitter bio, and I'm out of the less wrong rationality tradition, and I would say, I don't know, people, I don't know how well any of us lives it, but I think I use rational, like in my ontology, it doesn't mean just conscious thought or just the things that people are aware of or anything like that.Just for the record, you should continue to use it however you want to use it, but know that in my own lexicon it means something a little different.Matt (03:42)Sure.I'll tell you how I came to use it because the problem with this stuff is exactly the problem we have in talking about music, right? I used to do this all the time when I was coaching groups of high school students. I would take the cello section of the high school and we'd go off and we'd have a sectional, right? Or I work with just them and we'd say, all right, so play these eight difficult bars for me as a group and they would play it. And then I'd say, okay, so now change.these two specific things, a little more power on your left hand, for example, or a little faster bow on this one note and play it again. And they would play it again. And I would say this, okay, did that sound better? And they would say, yeah. And then I would say, describe it. And they would all just give me funny looks, you know, cause it kind of nervous laugh because there aren't words that really say exactly what happened.And this is the whole problem, right?Divia (04:40)Or, I would say, or at least, like you didn't have words at that time. don't know, I'm also, maybe that's one of my other positions i

In this episode, I talk to my Twitter mutual Thinkwert about Twitter, the nature of whimsy, why he thinks Shakespeare is Shakespeare, and some general life stuff.Transcript:Divia (00:02)I'm here today with ThinkWert from Twitter. If you follow me on Twitter, you almost certainly also follow ThinkWert. checked and I think you were followed by 384 of the people that follow me, is a very high number. We're definitely in the same general vicinity. think, yeah. I think, so I got back on Twitter in, I think the end of the -Thinkwert (00:21)Same ecosystem, sure.Divia (00:29)At some point in 2019, I feel like that was around then when you started posting a bunch of tutors. Does that seem right?Thinkwert (00:34)It was like literally January 1st, 2020 that I kind of really hard launched ThinkWord. It was an old account I had for years and years and years, but I didn't really start honestly posting until literally like I decided that year I'm going to start really using Twitter a lot. And so, yeah, it's exactly four and a half years now.Divia (00:55)Yeah, no, I remember. think the first time you came up on my timeline, there was some reply and I'll pick a flower fairy for you. And I was like, I love flower fairies. I'll do that. So yeah.Thinkwert (01:02)Yeah. Yeah. That was also during the height of COVID too. So we had already had a lot of time. Everybody was on Twitter all the time.Divia (01:09)Right.Absolutely. Yeah, no, mean, in January, you probably, I mean, maybe you knew, but you probably didn't didn't quite know how it was going to play out. A couple of people knew in January.Thinkwert (01:16)I did.I knew before everybody else in my real life circles did because of Twitter. What everyone knew was that tidal wave was coming. I remember telling one of my classes, we're going for spring break, we're probably not coming back, take what you need with you. And nobody believed me. Every student was skeptical. said, OK, when we get back, you can laugh at me. You can laugh at me. I give you permission. But I'm telling you, we're not coming back. That's when Harvard had closed, Yale had closed, all the big schools closed.Divia (01:22)Because of Twitter. Yeah.YouYeah.Thinkwert (01:47)Yeah, we're gonna follow suit, we're gonna follow suit. So sure enough, I was right. For once, what am I predicting?Divia (01:52)It was a very bizarre time, I think, for a lot of people to be very online and then talking to people who weren't. And I think some people really like, I don't know, having the scoop or being contrarian or telling people. I was more like, no, no, I felt relieved by a lot when it became mainstream. I'm like, OK, I don't want to be the one trying to tell everyone that this is going to be a big thing. Heather, we're just... Yeah.Thinkwert (02:18)Yeah, the prophet in the square going, beware, beware, beware, it's not as fun. Like, yes, I told you so, is more fun. Yeah.Divia (02:24)Right. Yeah. Yeah. And so, OK, so it wasn't because of COVID. What was it in January? And sorry, let me finish my answer. So for people who don't know, think we're mostly posts a lot of great. I want to say memes, but not like with meme formats, not like the latest format that's going around. It's like you put a picture and some text and it's usually really funny. It's usually really whimsical. I think it's always really wholesome. Occasionally you'll postThinkwert (02:49)Yeah.Divia (02:53)You were just telling me before we started recording, you will sometimes post pictures of you holding your daughters. You've done that periodically also, but your bread and butter is like the funny, the picture and the text, funny stuff like that.Thinkwert (02:59)Yeah, yeah.Yeah, I would say the er, think word, post is a picture of an animal with a funny caption. That's probably a little bit whimsical, a little off kilter. But yeah, that tends to be the main way I post it. Yeah.Divia (03:23)Yeah, and as with the flower fairy thing, I don't know how often you're actually getting there, but the vibe is very much, at least from my perspective, like the illustrations in the books I read growing up.Thinkwert (03:33)Yeah, yeah, especially early on I used a lot of the child book illustrations. I went through the Wikipedia list of child book illustrators, like hundreds, looked up every single one of them and tried to find material to use for tweets. And I've kind of phased out of that a little more or less. yeah, definitely the first couple of years. That was my bread andDivia (03:41)Okay.So what was it that made you think you were going to get back into posting in January 2020?Thinkwert (04:06)trying to think of what my mindset was there. I've always liked to kind of be part of something social. I didn't really have any, I didn't even know what I wanted to do. I started posting just a lot of different things. lot of, you try to see what's stuck to the wall. I actually tried a lot of emoticon art early on, believe it or not. When nobody was following me, I tried to

I got some feedback that the version of this episode I originally put up was too quiet, so I’m posting it again! Apologies for the duplication—I’m still figuring out this podcasting thing.You can find JC Cassis at jccassis.com, and can check out her own podcast, Risk.We cover a bunch of topics, including friendship in adulthood, what we owe each other, and a little about parenting.Divia (00:01.721)Hey, so I'm here today with my friend, JC. And I like to say that we went to school together and if people are like, like you mean like what? And I'm like, no, all the school we went to school together, starting in kindergarten through senior year of high school. And then we also went to college together. Yeah, it's yeah. Though, as we sometimes say, you were in the other class in kindergarten. really more like 16.JC (00:02.589)Hey.JC (00:20.116)17 years of nonstop togetherness.JC (00:27.356)Right, so it's, right. And then you were in a different dorm at Harvard and, you know, different friend group and all that. you know, yeah, yeah. It certainly wasn't, it wasn't overkill and it also wasn't nothing, you know?Divia (00:33.216)But we did hang out!Divia (00:38.83)Yeah, totally. And, you know, and we've kept in touch since then. I, you know, I wish I talked to you more ultimately, but, but I would say like at least, I don't know, like at least most years I think we check in. She seems like a.JC (00:45.106)Yeah, me too.JC (00:51.836)Yeah, and I think we totally could more and we probably just should do that. I don't think you're hard to reach at all, but I think it's just living in different cities and all that kind of stuff.Divia (00:57.377)Yeah, yeah that seems right.Divia (01:03.659)Yeah, totally. And, and JC also has a podcast. Do want to tell people a little about that?JC (01:07.252)Sure, yeah, so for the last 13 and a half years, which I cannot believe how long it's been, I've been working on the podcast called Risk, which is where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. No.Divia (01:17.857)Nice. Yeah. And so we were just texting the other day and I'm still sort of like restarting up with this podcast. Everybody took a pretty long break and trying to figure out what I'm doing. But one thing I know I want is just to like actually have conversations with people. And so I was like, yeah, let's, let's get on and, catch up and talk about stuff. I don't know, share our different perspectives. So JC, welcome to the podcast.JC (01:39.72)Yeah, I'm excited to be here. Thank you, thank you. Yeah, I think it's funny. You know, it's funny, I was talking to my brother the other day and he was saying that he remembered having a conversation with you when we were kids and you came over to my house and he was like, why are you friends with her about me? And you were like very diplomatic, classic Divya, you know, like he did his great impression of you. I forget exactly what the wording was, but it was just something like, you know, well, you know, I think we have good chemistry and I like to talk to her and we have a nice time together. So like, I'm friends with her, you know? And he was just like.I just thought that was hilarious.Divia (02:09.017)Yeah, siblings, siblings are really, I don't know, it's funny with sibling relationships. I hope your brother's doing well.JC (02:17.51)Yeah. Yeah, he is, you know, and he fondly remembers you, you know, so that's nice. But he could not believe that you have five kids. His head almost exploded when I said that. So I know I told him that. Yes, you have not wavered on this. I told him I was like, well, her dream was always three kids and then she had three kids and she wanted two more. So like she's doing what makes her happy. Like, you know, it's never it's never wavered, you know, but his head exploded.Divia (02:22.573)Yeah, it's mutual, totally.Divia (02:30.751)but I always wanted a bunch of kids. I feel like this has been consistent,Divia (02:45.229)You know, actually, so a little bit of it, you say that, I think that's almost right. I definitely said three kids, but this is, and I think we're gonna come back to this topic more than once, but like what I thought was normal growing up in New York, going to like a private girl's school with you like we did, and then what, you know, later I got older and I saw some more things. so I just, it sort of didn't occur to me, I think that anyone could have more than three kids.JC (03:08.928)that's hilarious.Divia (03:09.997)Because like, who did we really, I'm like, I don't know. I feel like I barely knew anyone who did. I was like, three kids is a big family. There was one Christian homeschool group at the music school I went to that had five kids, but I think that was maybe it for what I knew, which seems, I don't know, it seems sort of weird to reflect on that. And, okay, so then here's the other part of that.JC (03:15.751)Yeah.Divia (03:30.169)The next next week, assuming you know nothing goes wrong and I get eve

Michael Vassar and I had this exchange on Twitter, and this podcast is a followup discussion. I think we mostly didn’t find a huge disagreement, but did cover some interesting ground.Transcript:Divia (00:02)Hey, I'm here today with Michael Vassar because we had a disagreement on Twitter that was actually from many years ago that I recently circled back to. And Michael, which is totally in character, was like, let's actually hash this out. And yeah, I've known Michael for a really long time, definitely more than, we met more than 15 years ago. And I would describe you as one of my biggest intellectual influences for sure. I feel like at some point you sort ofI was like, what's going on? And you were like, let me try to tell you, which is, I don't know, it's very much what you're like. Something I quite admire about you is how perhaps more than anyone I know, it seems like you are really dedicated to being like, okay, you person in front of me, how are you making sense of the world? How am I making sense of the world? Let's like actually bridge that gap and talk about it. And so, yeah, I think it's fitting that we're here going to try to do a little bit of that now.And I'll start by just sharing. So yeah, I had posted, and this was one of the early things that I posted when I got back into Twitter around 2019. I was talking about words and I said, there's an issue with the word ego where people need self -concept, self -concepts are important in load -bearing. And then the word for it makes all of that sound nefarious. And then Michael said,Self -concepts are load -bearing, but suboptimal. Memory, perspective, and epistemology concepts are better and less vulnerable to memetic infections. So, I don't know, that's kind of the context. Should we dive in? What are your thoughts?Michael Vassar (01:36)Sure, I could dive in. I mean, I can see the value of something that is non -conceptually selfie, like Schopenhauer's concept of will and representation, as something distinct from memory and epistemology. The idea that there is a thing that is not represented that structures and constructsDivia (01:52)What is?Michael Vassar (02:06)the subject matter, the content of representation, like the way Yoshibok talks about consciousness says that you're definitely a simulation because you're conscious. Things that can be you are necessarily conscious and they're necessarily simulations of something else that is not AU and is not conscious, you know?Divia (02:26)Okay, so on the one hand that makes sense to me and then I'm like, okay, but are you arguing that like we shouldn't even have a word like I?Michael Vassar (02:35)I'm not arguing that we shouldn't have a word like I, I'm arguing that the natural meaning for the word I is...also the natural meaning for ego in a stage one and two simulation non -performative world. Like there's a performative shadow world and a non -performative ego world. And the real self is in some sense a particular monkey and in some senseDivia (02:50)Right?Yeah.Michael Vassar (03:16)physics or evolution or the fabric of reality in Deutsches' sense and like the agency of the self.Divia (03:24)Like an all self type of self, mean? When you say that?Michael Vassar (03:26)Well, not all self insofar as it's evolution, it's not necessarily all self. Physics is a fully extended self, but evolution and computation are like...Divia (03:31)Okay, but in terms of its physics, I'm like, that sounds like pretty broad, yeah.Okay, all right, so there's a lot to unpack, but I think where I'm starting from is like, no, but there's a monkey, for sure, that's sort of like, I don't know, more, there's a body, there's a bag of skin, there's a thing, but there's also like a feature in the world that is not just the body, that.Michael Vassar (03:57)There is a body, there is a monkey.Divia (04:06)To me it seems natural to use some word like I to have some sort of self -concept around this feature and it's like, it's nebulous, it's fuzzy, whatever, there's a bunch of nonsense, but like, we do need something to refer to this feature, right?Michael Vassar (04:18)So like the issue is that there's the version of eye that's in my head and the version of eye that's in your head. And it's natural for the version of eye that's in my head to be a partial picture that I construct to shape my actions and the version in your head to be a partial picture that you construct to shape your actions. And for those two things to be like pretty different so thatDivia (04:35)Yeah.Yes.Michael Vassar (04:48)If I forget something that I said I was to do something for you that I said I was going to do, this is unintentional from the perspective of my eye and not unintentional from the perspective of your eye because the eye that is constructed by me is aDivia (05:04)Cool.Michael Vassar (05:10)tool for remembering commitments, among other things. And the eye that is constructed, the micol that's constructed by you, is the thing that constructs that t

In this episode, Daniel Filan and I talk about Elliot Thornley’s LessWrong post There are no coherence theorems. Some other LessWrong posts we reference include:* A stylized dialogue on John Wentworth's claims about markets and optimization* Why Not SubagentsTranscript:Divia (00:03)I'm here today with Elliot Thornley, who goes by EJT on less wrong and Daniel Phylin and Elliot is currently a postdoc at the global priorities Institute working on this sort of AI stuff and also some global population work. And at the end we're going to be discussing the his post on less wrong. There are no coherence theorems, which he wrote as part of the.the case philosophy fellowship. And Daniel, you are currently doing ML, you're research manager at MATS, which is the ML alignment and theory scholars. And you also have your own AI risk research podcast. So welcome to the podcast, both of you guys.Elliott Thornley (00:56)All right, yeah, thanks.Daniel (00:56)Thanks, great to be here.Divia (00:58)Yeah, so I had read this post, There Are No Coherence Theorems. I missed it when it first came out and then someone linked it to me on Twitter recently and I was like, this is pretty interesting to me. It's very relevant to my interests and I also thought the discussion of it was pretty interesting. yeah, Elliot, would you mind summarizing for our audience what the post is and what it says?Elliott Thornley (01:22)Yeah, the sort of background context is I was reading about all this AI safety stuff, just getting into it and looking for places I felt like I could contribute. And in particular, I came across these coherence arguments. And coherence arguments are supposed to be ways in which we can predict the behavior of advanced artificial agents. you know, maybe we can't know exactly what they'll want, but maybe we can sort ofknow the form in which they're wanting will take, namely that they'll be expected utility maximizers. So this means that they'll at least choose as if they assigned a real valued utility and probability to each outcome and makes choices that maximize the expectation of utility. They'll maximize expected utility in this sense. Coherence arguments are arguments for thinking that advanced artificial agents are going to be expected utility maximizers.And the argument basically goes that if agents aren't representable as expected utility maximizers, if they don't behave in this kind of way, then they're going to be liable to pursue dominated strategies, which basically means like you present them with a series of choices or gambles or something like that. And they sort of plot away through this decision tree. They make this sequence of choices that leaves them with an outcome or lottery that they dis -prefer to some outcome or lottery that they.could have preferred instead. And this seems like a bad consequence. If that was going to happen, then maybe it would put some pressure on you as an agent to revise your preferences. And so the thought of these coherence arguments goes that agents that are not representable as expected utility maximizers will recognize this vulnerability and so be motivated to change their preferences to the extent necessary to make them invulnerable, which will in turn make themexpected utility maximizers. And the post that I wrote is pushing it back against these arguments. So in particular, the sort of canonical version of the argument, seems to me, appeals to these so -called coherence theorems, which I define in the posters, theorems which imply sort of the result, theorems which imply that unless an agent can be represented as an expected utility maximizer,then it's liable to pursue dominated strategies. And this seemed like kind of surprising to me. I'd sort of not heard of these coherence theorems before, like theorems that imply this particular thing before. So I went looking and I sort of read the theorems that had in various places been called coherence theorems. seems to be some like haziness or disagreement about exactly which theorems were supposed to be the coherence theorems. And I found that sort of none of the listed theorems had that particular implication.And so this was sort of my way of pushing back against these coherence arguments and thinking like, no, actually, no, this argument isn't a good reason to think that advanced artificial agents are going to be representable as expected utility maximizers.Divia (04:33)Yeah, thank you so much for the summary. And is it fair in like, is it a fair summary in like somewhat less technical terms to say that the reason people think that AIs will be expected utility maximizers is because otherwise they get Dutch booked? Or is that not a not a very good summary?Elliott Thornley (04:50)That's a pretty good summary. like Dutch books, people kind of use it in different ways. Sometimes people use it just to mean like a particular kind of exploitation or like pursuit of a dominated strategy. But yeah, that's pretty much it.Divia (05:05)And t

You can find JC Cassis at jccassis.com, and can check out her own podcast, Risk.We cover a bunch of topics, including friendship in adulthood, what we owe each other, and a little about parenting.Divia (00:01.721)Hey, so I'm here today with my friend, JC. And I like to say that we went to school together and if people are like, like you mean like what? And I'm like, no, all the school we went to school together, starting in kindergarten through senior year of high school. And then we also went to college together. Yeah, it's yeah. Though, as we sometimes say, you were in the other class in kindergarten. really more like 16.JC (00:02.589)Hey.JC (00:20.116)17 years of nonstop togetherness.JC (00:27.356)Right, so it's, right. And then you were in a different dorm at Harvard and, you know, different friend group and all that. you know, yeah, yeah. It certainly wasn't, it wasn't overkill and it also wasn't nothing, you know?Divia (00:33.216)But we did hang out!Divia (00:38.83)Yeah, totally. And, you know, and we've kept in touch since then. I, you know, I wish I talked to you more ultimately, but, but I would say like at least, I don't know, like at least most years I think we check in. She seems like a.JC (00:45.106)Yeah, me too.JC (00:51.836)Yeah, and I think we totally could more and we probably just should do that. I don't think you're hard to reach at all, but I think it's just living in different cities and all that kind of stuff.Divia (00:57.377)Yeah, yeah that seems right.Divia (01:03.659)Yeah, totally. And, and JC also has a podcast. Do want to tell people a little about that?JC (01:07.252)Sure, yeah, so for the last 13 and a half years, which I cannot believe how long it's been, I've been working on the podcast called Risk, which is where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. No.Divia (01:17.857)Nice. Yeah. And so we were just texting the other day and I'm still sort of like restarting up with this podcast. Everybody took a pretty long break and trying to figure out what I'm doing. But one thing I know I want is just to like actually have conversations with people. And so I was like, yeah, let's, let's get on and, catch up and talk about stuff. I don't know, share our different perspectives. So JC, welcome to the podcast.JC (01:39.72)Yeah, I'm excited to be here. Thank you, thank you. Yeah, I think it's funny. You know, it's funny, I was talking to my brother the other day and he was saying that he remembered having a conversation with you when we were kids and you came over to my house and he was like, why are you friends with her about me? And you were like very diplomatic, classic Divya, you know, like he did his great impression of you. I forget exactly what the wording was, but it was just something like, you know, well, you know, I think we have good chemistry and I like to talk to her and we have a nice time together. So like, I'm friends with her, you know? And he was just like.I just thought that was hilarious.Divia (02:09.017)Yeah, siblings, siblings are really, I don't know, it's funny with sibling relationships. I hope your brother's doing well.JC (02:17.51)Yeah. Yeah, he is, you know, and he fondly remembers you, you know, so that's nice. But he could not believe that you have five kids. His head almost exploded when I said that. So I know I told him that. Yes, you have not wavered on this. I told him I was like, well, her dream was always three kids and then she had three kids and she wanted two more. So like she's doing what makes her happy. Like, you know, it's never it's never wavered, you know, but his head exploded.Divia (02:22.573)Yeah, it's mutual, totally.Divia (02:30.751)but I always wanted a bunch of kids. I feel like this has been consistent,Divia (02:45.229)You know, actually, so a little bit of it, you say that, I think that's almost right. I definitely said three kids, but this is, and I think we're gonna come back to this topic more than once, but like what I thought was normal growing up in New York, going to like a private girl's school with you like we did, and then what, you know, later I got older and I saw some more things. so I just, it sort of didn't occur to me, I think that anyone could have more than three kids.JC (03:08.928)that's hilarious.Divia (03:09.997)Because like, who did we really, I'm like, I don't know. I feel like I barely knew anyone who did. I was like, three kids is a big family. There was one Christian homeschool group at the music school I went to that had five kids, but I think that was maybe it for what I knew, which seems, I don't know, it seems sort of weird to reflect on that. And, okay, so then here's the other part of that.JC (03:15.751)Yeah.Divia (03:30.169)The next next week, assuming you know nothing goes wrong and I get everything recorded promptly etc. The podcast guest will be Michael Vassar whom I believe I introduced you to at one point. Yeah and I think you guys talked about like the New York City Counc

Jessica Ocean is on X, as is her husband Malcolm Ocean. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Divia Eden and Ben Goldhaber of Mutuals interviewed me about what I’ve been thinking about over the last 5 years. Below is a lightly edited transcript of our conversation. (Link to audio on Youtube with clickable timestamps.)Topics discussed include:* what religion and spirituality might have to offer moral philosophy, AI alignment, and AI coordination* Christopher Langan's theory-of-everything, the Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe, and how it might provide coherent intellectual foundations for synthesizing the metaphysical claims found across religious and spiritual traditions* speculations about non-naive interpretations of "the afterlife" * my interpretation of the Second Coming of Christ as a potential self-fulfilling prophecy, along with speculations about what it might look like* what embodied cognition means to me, and why it's led me to have longer AGI timelinesTable of contentsShow Notes[0:00] Introducing Alex[1:51] What is metaphysics?[2:54] Tenuous metaphysical assumptions behind the is-ought problem[4:43] Alex's AI alignment journey[8:30] Healing infant trauma – Alex's first formative spiritual experience[10:25] The relevance of spiritual experiences for moral philosophy[12:34] Convergent philosophical views among religious and spiritual traditions[14:43] Alex’s take on Buddhism[16:19] Mathematical formalizations of truth, goodness, and beauty might essentially coincide[18:21] Alex’s take on Christ’s crucifixion[20:14] Alex’s first "direct experience of God"[22:23] Psychological distortions as a central problem in AI alignment and AI coordination[25:18] A secular lens on spirituality – addressing psychological distortions[28:53] Introducing Chris Langan and the CTMU[29:41] How Alex got interested in the CTMU[32:48] Alex attempts to summarize core ideas of the CTMU[35:25] Alex’s ITT-passing habit[37:15] On Chris Langan’s political views[39:08] Metaethics from UDT and the CTMU, pt 1 – acting from behind the universal veil of ignorance[40:03] Logical time and the "lazy evaluation" of reality[41:31] Spirituality vs the orthogonality thesis[46:19] Metaethics from UDT and the CTMU, pt 2 – elaborations on "ethics as self-interest"[48:15] Speedrunning the AI "danger zone"?[49:20] Metaethics from UDT and the CTMU, pt 3 – "we are all one"[50:52] "Reincarnation" and "the afterlife"[54:53] How might information get transferred across lifetimes?[58:17] Is love a spandrel?[59:18] "Reincarnation" and "souls"[1:04:56] Karma[1:06:47] Overt physicalist vs subtle physicalist vs non-physicalist explanations[1:07:36] Cross-lightcone effects of prayer via influencing wave function collapse[1:10:18] The physicalism null hypothesis, pt 1[1:11:19] Cross-hemisphere remote healing with ayahuasca?[1:12:13] Learning from "plant spirits"[1:17:22] The physicalism null hypothesis, pt 2[1:19:45] "The afterlife" as already happening, but occluded by psychological distortions[1:23:37] The CTMU as an articulation of the metaphysical a priori[1:24:54] CTMU vs Tegmark IV vs ultrafinitism[1:26:19] The Distributed Second Coming as a self-fulfilling prophecy[1:30:26] Synthesizing the world religions with each other, and with science[1:31:35] AI coordination – the Second Coming as the prevailing of the "Schelling coalition"[1:33:31] AI peacemakers, for empowering human peacemakers[1:35:24] Cellular intelligence, "embodied cognition", and AI timelines[1:42:05] Transformative AIs may not outcompete humans at everything[1:43:04] Is the "AI" part of "AI alignment" a red herring?[1:45:16] ClosingSubscribe for upcoming pieces about related topicsShow notesDouble-crux: a conversational technique for arriving at mutual understandingPaul Dirac on truth and beauty: “If one is working from the point of view of getting beauty into one's equation, ... one is on a sure line of progress.”Eliezer’s LessWrong comment about a superintelligence stably believing that 51 is prime: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Djs38EWYZG8o7JMWY/paul-s-research-agenda-faq#:~:text=E.g.%3A%20Eliezer,ounce%20of%20understanding Reincarnation book that Alex recommended to Divia: https://www.amazon.com/Lifecycles-Reincarnation-Life-Christopher-Bache/dp/1557786453 Universal Love, Said the Cactus Person: https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/21/universal-love-said-the-cactus-person/ Ayahuasca retreat centers where Alex "interfaced with plant spirits": https://templeofthewayoflight.org/ and https://niweraoxobo.com/Metareligion as the Human Singularity: https://cosmosandhistory.org/index.php/journal/article/view/694 Michael Levin interview excerpt about cellular robustness, from 1:25:15 -1:27:08: [0:00] Introducing AlexDivia: Today we're here with Alex Zhu, whom I've known for a long time. I think I met you almost a decade ago? Alex: That sounds about right. Divia: Yeah, Alex is currently working full time. You have an institute now, you just said? Alex: Yes. Divia: What's it called? Alex: The Mathematical Metaphysics Institute.Divia: Okay, the Mathematical Metaphysics Institu

Sarah is a director at Nanotronics and writes on Twitter and on Substack.Timestamps[00:01:00] Why AI is probably a good thing[00:08:00] The limits of current robotics[00:13:00] Nanotronics and process improvements with AI[00:23:00] Predictions on AI[00:26:00] Input output limitations on AI models[00:35:00] Drug discovery[00:45:00] Instrumental convergence[01:05:00] Progress studies[1:13:00] Morality[01:27:30] Game Theory and Social Norms[01:41:00] Shrimp Welfare[01:48:00] LongevityShow NotesAlphaDev discovers faster sorting algorithmIt Looks Like You’re Trying to Take Over the WorldEA has a lying problemGoals (and not having them)Sarcopenia Experimental TreatmentsReality Has a Surprising Amount of Detail This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Coordination among 8 billion people is very tough. We're very far away from doing that with the intelligence that we have now, it's incredibly costly to send information to different people and for different people to learn about each other in order to trust each other… we should kind of expect that people will have a lot of trouble coordinating on a big scale. But if we could then we’d grow a lot!…In terms of least ‘failing with dignity’ do we think that the public did a good job in trying to investigate this and was misled? Or do we think that the public just like did a terrible job in like doing anything coordinated and just got hoodwinked super easily? I think we fall a lot more into the latter campOzzie Gooen is the president of the Quantified Uncertainty Research Institute (QURI). In this episode we discuss Utilitarianism, improving trust in organizations, communities, and governments, and his work in building better software for thinking, forecasting, and estimation.Links from the Show* The Quantified Uncertainty Research Institute* The QURI Medley* A video explaining QURI’s new Relative Value Estimation tool.* Reports on the failure to identify Bernie Madoff’s fraud* How to Measure Anything* The OpenAI BoardTimestamps[00:01:00] Worldview[00:08:00] Starter Pack Philosophies[00:12:00] How tools for better Epistemics fits into Utilitarianism[00:20:00] Mistake theory vs Conflict Theory[00:24:00] Improving EA institutions[00:30:00] Justified Trust in Governments[00:38:00] Contracts and monitoring for evaluating orgs[00:46:30] Estimation utopias[00:52:00] Centralization vs Decentralization[00:58:00] The value of a good investigation in the case of FTX[01:05:00] The importance of the OpenAI Board[01:09:00] Estimating Relative Values[01:18:15] Shared intellectual infrastructure[01:26:00] Epistemically mature civilizations This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

This episode may make more sense after reading Quintin’s LessWrong post about evolution and the sharp left turn, but I think we end up talking through most of it.Our conversation appeared as two Twitter Spaces:https://twitter.com/diviacaroline/status/1649925920529223680?s=20 andhttps://twitter.com/diviacaroline/status/1649957263535394821?s=20 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Robin talks about why he thinks developments in AI will be on a continuum with civilizational progress in general, and Ronny, who is mostly trying to understand Robin, talks some about why he thinks many of the things he values about humanity aren't on track to being preserved, and that he cares about that.Video version available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-fBdPnwFrI This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

In this episode we discuss several ‘frames’ - ways of processing and orienting to information - that are appearing in public discussions around AI, and in particular reflect on how grounded they are in longstanding debates within the AI X-Risk community."It’s sort of like the democratic ideal where everybody's sort of out there at the public square arguing with each other, talking about the things… I don't think there are a lot taboos about what to say yet either. It hasn't gotten super corrupted.Like it's very rare that in the real world, I'm encountering trolleys running over people right? And you can set up these fake scenarios that mess up my moral intuitions… but maybe it’s not always virtuous to endorse the repugnant conclusion that these very limited, decoupled thought experiment bring you to."Links:* MusicLM from Google* TV’s War With the Robots Is Already Here (Writer’s Strike connection with AI)* Ronny Fernandez and Robin Hanson Discuss AI Futures* Roko and Alexandros on AI Risk* Universal Fire* SpandrelsTimestamps[00:01:00] Updates on Politics[00:07:00] The State of the AI Discourse[00:13:00] The Yudkowskian Foomer vs Hansonian Continualist[00:18:00] Mood Affiliations[00:22:00] Biting Bullets vs Rejecting Fake Hypotheticals[00:28:00] Divide between Game Theorists and Engineers[00:36:00] The complexity of predictions about the future[00:47:00] How similar are the values of optimizing systems?[00:54:00] The rupture of the GMU Rationalist Alliance[01:00:00] Public Perception that AI has Moral Weight[01:03:00] AI Veganism/Freeganism[01:06:00] Overton Window Shifts This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

No transcript for this episode yet, but I wanted to get it out there anyway, since it can be hard to listen on Twitter Spaces. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mutualunderstanding.substack.com

Ben Weinstein-RaunAnd so my guess is that that fairness seems like a plausible candidate for something like an alien species might have… kind of universal, like given some sort of assumptions about how evolution worked or works.Like there is something happening that results in us making choices. And if your philosophical determinism denies that, like you're wrong. And, I think it makes about as much sense to talk about will and free will in making choices as it does to talk about a glass of water.Ben Weinstein-Raun’s Twitter and Website.Timestamps[00:02:00] - Meta-Ethical Stance[00:11:00] - Contrasting with Moral Realism[00:26:00] - What EA misses[00:47:00] - Fanaticism and Outside of Distribution Sampling[01:28:00] - Building new Tools for Forecasting and Thinking[01:44:00] - Actually using Tooling for Better Decisions[01:53:00] - Guided by the Aesthetics of our Distributed SystemsThis transcript is machine generated and contains errorsBen Goldhaber: [00:00:00] And hi I'm going to maybe make a quick introduction to our guest here, and then we'll just dive into some conversation. Ben - who has a great first name - Ben Weinstein-Raun has worked at a number of top tech companies including crews and council, number of innovative tech research organizations such as MIRI and Redwood Research, and Secure DNA.Ben is currently building a tool for forecasting estimation, and dare I say, thinking. Having known Ben for some time now, I'd describe Ben as a careful, discerning thinker on issues of not just technology, but also philosophy.And so, yes, welcome to the pod, Ben. Yeah, thanks so much. Yeah, we're excited to have you. I was saying to Divia, one of the reasons I was excited to invite you on[00:01:00] was because of a really great conversation that you and I had a few weeks ago about. Naturalism and ethics and how it's put into practice and like all good conversations about philosophy, it was like 3:00 AM around a kitchen table.And I felt like you really captured something important about I don't know, naturalism and ethics, and I really just wanna see if we could recapture some of that magic in our conversation today. Cool.Ben WR: Yeah, totally. Great. Yeah, I'm really excited to talk about it. Awesome.Divia Eden: I'm excited. I haven't heard most of this yet, so I'll get to hear it for the first time.Ben WR: Yeah. Nice.Ben Goldhaber: Well, lemme just ask for the start. How would you describe your moral stance?Ben WR: Yeah, I guess, I guess at the moment, I would describe my, like best I don't know, my, my best stab or something. My best stab at understanding ethics as more like a pretty strong stance [00:02:00] on meta ethics. And not as strong of a stance on like, sort of object level ethics.Where meta ethics is sort of questions about like where ethics comes from. Like why do we say moral sentence or like sentences about morality, sentences about good and bad and should whereas like ethics, like object level ethics would be sort of like, what sentences do we say about or like should we say about good and bad?And like sort of what's true on the, on the direct object level there? I guess the, yes, so the meta ethical stance that I really wanna take is basically derived from an observation, which is that MetaEthical questions are under I think some pretty reasonable assumptions entirely empirical.So whatever the truth of the object level, ethical facts insofar as they exist. [00:03:00] There's some reason that people go around talking about shoulds and, and good and bad and so on. And, and that reason is like entirely inside of physics. It's not mysterious. It's the kind of thing that we could figure out by like, looking carefully at humans and at human societies and at maybe, maybe game theory and math.We don't need fundamentally different tools to answer that kind of question. If we're interested in answering like, the straightforward question, why do people say sentences like that? What is sort of the driver for humans having these intuitions and having these sort of discussions and, and and so on.And so that's sort of like the, the, the meta ethical stance. And then I think it has some kind of interesting implications for taking this stance has an interesting implications for the more object level stuff. So I think the most obvious one to me is that it, it does [00:04:00] not seem like it lends itself well to sort of very simplified rule-based systems.So I think it, it pushes me pretty far away from like a sort of total utilitarian kind of a view where you're aiming to make your object level ethical system very simple and make that sort of like this very beautiful sort of object that you know, is unassailable.Ben Goldhaber: I'd love to ask a question there about that because I could see some people actually like in intuition that I feel like I have, when I hear that from a meta ethical point of view, everything is within this same kind of system and I suppose all derived from physics on down it. Lends itse