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social_intell on IG says the way to distinguish between genuine interest and polite dismissal is specificity.
If someone says ‘keep me posted on that’ or ‘we should hang out sometime’, that’s vague; they’re politely ending the conversation. If you do follow up with them, you’re outing yourself as low value and socially incompetent.
If they really want you to follow up, or if they really want to hang out again, they’ll be specific: ‘let me introduce you to my colleague Peter, he can solve your problem, what’s your email?’, or ‘are you free next Wednesday at 7?’
Composing a top-level idea on mobile is atrocious. Need to scroll all the way down to see the form, the form keeps hiding itself, etc.
When somebody asks what you do for a living, there’s two layers to this question, according to IG account social_intell.
One layer is surface: taking the question literally, answering literally like ‘I’m a project manager at company X.'
But social_intell says they’re really gauging your status and whether you extract or provide value. You should explain what problem you can solve for people and what you’re building: eg “I help companies build products people actually want. What about you?”
#4264·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoAnother rule of thumb: in verbal group conversations, like in Twitter spaces, keep an eye on speakers’ average mic time and try not to go above that. (Realistically, that means undershooting the average, because you’re liable to underestimate your own mic time.) Consistently going above will come off as rambling or dominating.
I forget if I came up with this myself or if I read this somewhere.
Another rule of thumb: in verbal group conversations, like in Twitter spaces, keep an eye on speakers’ average mic time and try not to go above that. (Realistically, that means undershooting the average, because you’re liable to underestimate your own mic time.) Consistently going above will come off as rambling or dominating.
I’m kind of socially retarded, but explicit study of social skills has helped. Here are some things I’ve learned.
I read Atomic Attraction years ago but I remember liking it. I’ve spoken to the author, Christopher Canwell. As I recall, he argues that the ratio between gray and blue text bubbles should be roughly 1:1. As a rule of thumb.
#2753·Benjamin Davies revised 5 months agoIdea: Veritula Articles
Currently, Veritula is a discussion website. I believe it could one day do what Wikipedia and Grokipedia do, but better.
A step towards that would be enabling users to produce ‘articles’ or something similar.
An ‘Articles’ tab would be distinct from the ‘Discussions’ tab, featuring explanatory documents similar to encyclopedia entries, and perhaps also blogpost-like content.
Articles focus on distilling the good ideas created/discovered in the discussions that occur on Veritula.
Another idea: letting users post ideas to their own profile. Such ideas wouldn’t be part of a discussion.
#4257·Knut Sondre Sæbø revised about 2 months agoThose are still spatial metaphors. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. When we try to explain how bats perceive through echolocation, we fall back on visual simulations, because sight is the only perceptual world we know. Ideas have a similar limitation
I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc.
That’s what you were originally saying in #3626. That’s what the claim “Living according to reason and rationality alone is impossible” amounts to.
#4254·Knut Sondre Sæbø, about 2 months agoWe explain the world by postulating invisible things, but we can only understand those abstractions through concrete metaphors rooted in our physical experience. A concept or idea with no experiential grounding is meaningless.
A concept or idea with no experiential grounding is meaningless.
Maybe, but that’s different from confusing a parochial factor for a fundamental one.
#4254·Knut Sondre Sæbø, about 2 months agoWe explain the world by postulating invisible things, but we can only understand those abstractions through concrete metaphors rooted in our physical experience. A concept or idea with no experiential grounding is meaningless.
Not all explanations use metaphors.
Those are still spatial metaphors. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. When we try to explain how bats perceive through echolocation, we fall back on visual simulations, because sight is the only perceptual world we know.
Those are still spatial metaphors. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. When we try to explain how bats perceive through echolocation, we fall back on visual simulations, because sight is the only perceptual world we know. Ideas have a similar limitation
Those are just spacial metaphors though. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. Can you think of any ideas that isn't rooted in an experiential perspective?
Those are still spatial metaphors. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. When we try to explain how bats perceive through echolocation, we fall back on visual simulations, because sight is the only perceptual world we know.
#3769·Dennis HackethalOP, 3 months agoHumans use flight-related words even though we can’t fly. From ChatGPT:
- Elevated (thinking, mood, language)
- High-level (ideas, overview)
- Soar (ambitions, prices, imagination)
- Take off (projects, careers)
- Grounded (arguments, people)
- Up in the air (uncertain)
- Overview (“over-see” from above)
- Perspective (originally spatial vantage point)
- Lofty (ideals, goals)
- Aboveboard (open, visible)
- Rise / fall (status, power, ideas)
- Sky-high (expectations, costs)
- Aerial view (conceptual overview)
- Head in the clouds (impractical thinking)
Those are just spacial metaphors though. I'm not saying we can't extend our ideas through imagination, creativity etc. Only that the metaphors and concepts we use/have meaning for us, are constrained by the perspectives we can take as humans. Can you think of any ideas that isn't rooted in an experiential perspective?
#3768·Dennis HackethalOP, 3 months agoI think that depends on the "embodiment" of the AGI; that is, what it's like to be that AGI and how its normal world appears.
Yeah maybe but again (#3693), those are parochial factors, starting points. Ideas are more important. AGI could just switch bodies rapidly anyway.
We explain the world by postulating invisible things, but we can only understand those abstractions through concrete metaphors rooted in our physical experience. A concept or idea with no experiential grounding is meaningless.
#4251·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoBut the criticisms don’t try to find out how easy to vary the Persephone myth is. Nor do we try to find out how hard to vary the axis-tilt theory is.
Basically, a small part of the notion of ‘easy to vary’ gets to live on in Veritula as an approximation, as Popper would phrase it.
#4250·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoBut some of the criticisms basically say that the Persephone myth is “easy to vary”.
That’s only some of the criticisms though. Others have nothing to do with easy/hard to vary.
#4250·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoBut some of the criticisms basically say that the Persephone myth is “easy to vary”.
But the criticisms don’t try to find out how easy to vary the Persephone myth is. Nor do we try to find out how hard to vary the axis-tilt theory is.
#4249·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months ago@liberty-fitz-claridge take a look at this discussion as a whole. At the time of writing, the Persephone myth (#4240) has 5 pending criticisms, whereas the axis-tilt theory (#4243) has no pending criticisms. Hence a rational preference for the latter: Veritula says to reject ideas with pending criticisms and adopt those without.
But some of the criticisms basically say that the Persephone myth is “easy to vary”.
@liberty-fitz-claridge take a look at this discussion as a whole. At the time of writing, the Persephone myth (#4240) has 5 pending criticisms, whereas the axis-tilt theory (#4243) has no pending criticisms. Hence a rational preference for the latter: Veritula says to reject ideas with pending criticisms and adopt those without.
If any prediction of this theory is found to be false, we could easily change it to make different predictions. That’s bad.
If any prediction of this theory is found to be false, we can easily change it to make different predictions. That’s bad.
#4240·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoLong ago, Hades, god of the underworld, kidnapped and raped Persephone, goddess of spring. Then Persephone’s mother, Demeter, goddess of the earth and agriculture, negotiated a contract for her daughter’s release, which specified that Persephone would marry Hades and eat a magic seed that would compel her to visit him once a year thereafter. Whenever Persephone was away fulfilling this obligation, Demeter became sad and would command the world to become cold and bleak so that nothing could grow.
If any prediction of this theory is found to be false, we could easily change it to make different predictions. That’s bad.
#4240·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoLong ago, Hades, god of the underworld, kidnapped and raped Persephone, goddess of spring. Then Persephone’s mother, Demeter, goddess of the earth and agriculture, negotiated a contract for her daughter’s release, which specified that Persephone would marry Hades and eat a magic seed that would compel her to visit him once a year thereafter. Whenever Persephone was away fulfilling this obligation, Demeter became sad and would command the world to become cold and bleak so that nothing could grow.
“[W]e have no way of knowing that Demeter is sad…” (BoI chapter 1)
#4240·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoLong ago, Hades, god of the underworld, kidnapped and raped Persephone, goddess of spring. Then Persephone’s mother, Demeter, goddess of the earth and agriculture, negotiated a contract for her daughter’s release, which specified that Persephone would marry Hades and eat a magic seed that would compel her to visit him once a year thereafter. Whenever Persephone was away fulfilling this obligation, Demeter became sad and would command the world to become cold and bleak so that nothing could grow.
“[P]eople do not generally cool their surroundings when they are sad…” (BoI chapter 1)
[T]he true explanation of seasons [says] that the Earth’s axis of rotation is tilted relative to the plane of its orbit around the sun. Hence for half of each year the northern hemisphere is tilted towards the sun while the southern hemisphere is tilted away, and for the other half it is the other way around. Whenever the sun’s rays are falling vertically in one hemisphere (thus providing more heat per unit area of the surface) they are falling obliquely in the other (thus providing less).
[S]urfaces tilted away from radiant heat are heated less than when they are facing it, and … a spinning sphere in space points in a constant direction.
#4240·Dennis HackethalOP, about 2 months agoLong ago, Hades, god of the underworld, kidnapped and raped Persephone, goddess of spring. Then Persephone’s mother, Demeter, goddess of the earth and agriculture, negotiated a contract for her daughter’s release, which specified that Persephone would marry Hades and eat a magic seed that would compel her to visit him once a year thereafter. Whenever Persephone was away fulfilling this obligation, Demeter became sad and would command the world to become cold and bleak so that nothing could grow.
[W]hy those gods and not others? …
[W]hy is it specifically a magic seed and not any other kind of magic? Why is it a conjugal-visits contract and not some other reason for someone to repeat an action annually?
This explanation basically just says “the gods did it.” The details have no bearing on the underlying explanation.