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Eliezer Yudkowsky Quotes
born 1979 United States
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (born September 11, 1979) is an American writer, blogger, and artificial intelligence researcher, the founder of and a research fellow at the w:Machine Intelligence Research Institute.
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Declaring yourself to be operating by "Crocker's Rules" means that other people are allowed to optimize their messages for information, not for being nice to you.
The AI does not hate you, nor does it love you, but you are made out of atoms which it can use for something else.
Two people using Crocker's Rules should be able to communicate all relevant information in the minimum amount of time, without paraphrasing or social formatting.
The human brain cannot release enough neurotransmitters to feel emotion a thousand times as strong as the grief of one funeral.
People go funny in the head when talking about politics.
Mystery exists in the mind, not in reality.
But the nonexistent apples will still fall toward the nonexistent ground at a meaningless rate of 9.8 m/s2.
Crocker's Rules are something you do for yourself, to maximize information received — not something you grit your teeth over and do as a favor.
When you are older, you will learn that the first and foremost thing which any ordinary person does is nothing.
Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (2010)
If cryonics were a scam it would have far better marketing and be far more popular.
A comment on reddit (2009)
Do not flinch from experiences that might destroy your beliefs. The thought you cannot think controls you more than thoughts you speak aloud.
The people I know who seem to make unusual efforts at rationality, are unusually honest, or, failing that, at least have unusually bad social skills.
I know that I can never truly understand it, and I haven't the words to say.
If you declare Crocker's Rules, other people don't need to worry about being tactful to you. (You still need to worry about being tactful to them — Crocker's Rules only work one way.)
Note that Crocker's Rules does not mean you can insult people; it means that other people don't have to worry about whether they are insulting you. Crocker's Rules are a discipline, not a privilege.
Your strength as a rationalist is your ability to be more confused by fiction than by reality. If you are equally good at explaining any outcome, you have zero knowledge.
Many have stood their ground and faced the darkness when it comes for them. Fewer come for the darkness and force it to face them.
Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (2010)
Confusion exists in the map, not in the territory. Unanswerable questions do not mark places where magic enters the universe. They mark places where your mind runs skew to reality.
To confess your fallibility and then do nothing about it is not humble; it is boasting of your modesty.
Rationality is the master lifehack which distinguishes which other lifehacks to use.
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