The Nonlinear Library LW - The Best of Don't Worry About the Vase by Zvi
Dec 13, 2023
20:27
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: The Best of Don't Worry About the Vase, published by Zvi on December 13, 2023 on LessWrong.
Hello everyone! This is going to be a bit of a housekeeping post and a welcome to new subscribers.
Note that this is not the primary version of my writing, which can be found on Substack, but it is a full copy of all posts found there.
My writing can be intimidating. There is a lot of it, and it's often dense. As always, choose only the parts relevant to your interests, do not be afraid to make cuts. I attempt to make every post accessible as an entry point, but I also want to build up a superstructure over time. This seemed like a good time to recap some of the very best of my old writing and talk about what I'm up to.
Over many years, this blog has morphed from focusing on rationality to COVID to AI.
But not only those things. I'm interested in almost everything. I write periodic updates about housing policy, childhood, fertility, medicine and health, gaming and grab bags of everything else.
In addition to writing, I also run a small 501c(3) with one employee called Balsa Research. Balsa is dedicated to laying groundwork on a few key issues to make big civilizational wins possible, starting with repeal of the Jones Act. This link is to an update on that, and you can donate here. Your subscriptions here are also very much appreciated.
Underlying it all continues to be my version of the principles of rationality.
Rationality
A lot has changed since my last best-of writeup six years ago. One thing that has not changed is that I consider myself part of the rationalist community. No specific interest in rationality or its modes of thinking are required, but I strive to embody my version of this style of thinking, and to illustrate and hopefully pass on this mode of thinking throughout my writing.
What is rationality? This post is one good answer. It is believing, and updating on evidence, so as to systematically improve the correspondence between your map and the territory, and using that map to achieve your values.
To me, a rationalist continues to be someone who highly values, and invests in, the version of this process and the art thereof that they believe in, both in themselves and others.
If you're wondering why anyone would think this way, my best responses to that are Responses to Tyler Cowen on Rationality and Why Rationality?
If you're interested in going deeper, you should try reading the sequences. You can get the Kindle version here.
I think rationality and the sequences are pretty great. The sequences were created by Eliezer Yudkowsky, in the hopes that those who learned to think well in general would also be able to think well about AI. Whether or not you have any interest in thinking about AI, or thinking about it well, I find it valuable to think about everything well, whenever and to the extent I can.
While I do consider myself a Rationalist, I do not consider myself an Effective Altruist. That is a very different set of norms and cultural constructs.
The Evergreen Posts
These are to me the ten posts most worth reading today, along with a pitch on why you might want to read each of them. Only one is directly about AI, exactly because AI moves so quickly, and my top AI posts are listed in the next section down.
The top ten are in alphabetical order, all are listed again in their appropriate sections.
If you only read one recent post and are here for AI, read OpenAI: The Battle of the Board.
If you only read one fully evergreen older post, read Slack.
An Unexpected Victory: Container Stacking at the Port of Long Beach. This is still highly underappreciated. How did Ryan's boat ride and Tweetstorm cause a policy change? Could we duplicate this success elsewhere in the future? How?
Asymmetric Justice. A concept I wish more people knew and understood. Many moral and f...
Hello everyone! This is going to be a bit of a housekeeping post and a welcome to new subscribers.
Note that this is not the primary version of my writing, which can be found on Substack, but it is a full copy of all posts found there.
My writing can be intimidating. There is a lot of it, and it's often dense. As always, choose only the parts relevant to your interests, do not be afraid to make cuts. I attempt to make every post accessible as an entry point, but I also want to build up a superstructure over time. This seemed like a good time to recap some of the very best of my old writing and talk about what I'm up to.
Over many years, this blog has morphed from focusing on rationality to COVID to AI.
But not only those things. I'm interested in almost everything. I write periodic updates about housing policy, childhood, fertility, medicine and health, gaming and grab bags of everything else.
In addition to writing, I also run a small 501c(3) with one employee called Balsa Research. Balsa is dedicated to laying groundwork on a few key issues to make big civilizational wins possible, starting with repeal of the Jones Act. This link is to an update on that, and you can donate here. Your subscriptions here are also very much appreciated.
Underlying it all continues to be my version of the principles of rationality.
Rationality
A lot has changed since my last best-of writeup six years ago. One thing that has not changed is that I consider myself part of the rationalist community. No specific interest in rationality or its modes of thinking are required, but I strive to embody my version of this style of thinking, and to illustrate and hopefully pass on this mode of thinking throughout my writing.
What is rationality? This post is one good answer. It is believing, and updating on evidence, so as to systematically improve the correspondence between your map and the territory, and using that map to achieve your values.
To me, a rationalist continues to be someone who highly values, and invests in, the version of this process and the art thereof that they believe in, both in themselves and others.
If you're wondering why anyone would think this way, my best responses to that are Responses to Tyler Cowen on Rationality and Why Rationality?
If you're interested in going deeper, you should try reading the sequences. You can get the Kindle version here.
I think rationality and the sequences are pretty great. The sequences were created by Eliezer Yudkowsky, in the hopes that those who learned to think well in general would also be able to think well about AI. Whether or not you have any interest in thinking about AI, or thinking about it well, I find it valuable to think about everything well, whenever and to the extent I can.
While I do consider myself a Rationalist, I do not consider myself an Effective Altruist. That is a very different set of norms and cultural constructs.
The Evergreen Posts
These are to me the ten posts most worth reading today, along with a pitch on why you might want to read each of them. Only one is directly about AI, exactly because AI moves so quickly, and my top AI posts are listed in the next section down.
The top ten are in alphabetical order, all are listed again in their appropriate sections.
If you only read one recent post and are here for AI, read OpenAI: The Battle of the Board.
If you only read one fully evergreen older post, read Slack.
An Unexpected Victory: Container Stacking at the Port of Long Beach. This is still highly underappreciated. How did Ryan's boat ride and Tweetstorm cause a policy change? Could we duplicate this success elsewhere in the future? How?
Asymmetric Justice. A concept I wish more people knew and understood. Many moral and f...