Dennis Hackethal’s Blog
My blog about philosophy, coding, and anything else that interests me.
Tweets
An archive of my tweets and retweets through . They may be formatted slightly differently than on Twitter. API access has since gotten prohibitively expensive – I don't know whether or when I'll be able to update this archive.
But in case I will, you can subscribe via RSS – without a Twitter account. Rationale
RT @ClimateWarrior7:
Cutting Black women and Latinas out of the labour force seems kind of racist to be honest. https://t.co/OAMa4sO6dF
There was an attempt on Pinochet’s life in 1986. Just saying…
Hope we will learn more about Gus in the upcoming season of Better Call Saul.
We can't predict what new qualia will feel like. Is this a special case of the unpredictability of new knowledge?
Not someone else's cloud, but my cloud, hell yes. Death and diseases: solved ✅ twitter.com/gptbrooke/stat…
RT @StuartHumphryes:
London 1944 - this is Speaker's Corner, Hyde Park, during the midst of War. All original colour. https://t.co/6TlhJI6s…
IIRC from BoI, every fiction that doesn't violate the laws of physics is fact somewhere. So there is at least one universe (or history?) in which Hitler was killed. (Maybe multiple. Maybe infinitely many? Maybe uncountably infinitely many?)
"True controversial ideas": blog.dennishackethal.com/posts/true-con…
RT @GregAbbott_TX:
TX is prohibiting mask mandates by gov’t entities.
Starting May 21, local govts attempting to impose mask mandates can…
Ah – when I say "evolution programmed creativity in us" I don't mean that evolution did that intentionally. The programming is instead a result of mindless natural variation and selection.
“Chinese state employees physically manage the computers.” Yikes twitter.com/OrinKerr/statu…
It’s like I say in the article: programming creativity must be possible, otherwise evolution couldn’t have programmed it in us.
Some people think computers can’t be creative but that’s because they don’t understand computational universality.
I think computers can be creative, conscious, have free will, etc. and I’m trying to figure out how to program that.
I interpreted "But fire that mean that their" to mean "But that doesn't mean that their" but I may be wrong about that...
Such judges may erroneously come to the conclusion that a program is creative because they're using behavioristic criteria, yes. But an automaton that looks creative still isn't creative.
And just because behavioristic criteria are invalid doesn't mean I ended the debate by fiat
But you seem a bit annoyed with what I'm writing ("so what", "that's kind of the point") and it sounds like your mind is made up anyway, so...
I think fun and creativity are intimately related, so much so that creativity is a necessary condition for having fun. It follows that if alpha zero isn't having fun it's not creative. It was meant as a refutation of your view that alpha zero is creative.
This is so misleading. A few percent of billions is much more than a higher percentage of thousands.
Does the number of people disagreeing with a claim influence whether that claim is true?
Right on. They're all physical (and therefore deterministic).
And this reminds me: since computations are physical processes (Deutsch), and all physical processes are deterministic, all computations must be deterministic.
Again, by no means an expert on quantum physics, but from what I've learned from David Deutsch's "The Beginning of Infinity" it would seem that quantum physics is likewise deterministic. Some things look random only from our parochial, single-universe perspective.
OK but what generates the "random" noise? Is it not light?
And that purpose can be fulfilled by private corporations too...
These examples seem to me quasi indeterministic and quasi unpredictable for practical purposes. As in, overwhelmingly much information would be needed to predict the next state. That works fine for some applications, but it's different from being unpredictable in principle.
Re pseudorandom number generators: they're just that—pseudo.
Using photos for that is a cool idea but how light bumps off of objects and enters the phone's camera is deterministic, too...
A place full of cats sounds great, but I think when cats meow is deterministic, too, and so is a collection of cats meowing. Cats have an algorithm in their brains that instructs them to meow when certain conditions are met and that algorithm is deterministic like all others.
I don't doubt that they play to win, especially elite players, but people can and often do play for fun, which is something alpha zero cannot do.
Alpha Zero plays mindlessly. Human chess players do not. They have insights, feelings, interests, etc while they play. And, as David Deutsch has pointed out, they play for fun, and not always to win. Alpha Zero always plays to win. I don't think it can do otherwise.
And yes, my understanding is that quantum computers are vastly faster for some (but not all) algorithms compared to a classical computer. And I think for all other algorithms quantum computers are always at least as fast as classical ones since qcs can simulate ccs.
I don't know what "cattery noise" is, but the other sources I don't think are random...
There's one source of unpredictability (but not randomness) I can think of: the user. But we can't depend on users when building creativity. :)
You're right that there is quantum computation, but I think it also follows the prevailing conception. (I'm no expert on quantum computation by any means, so big grain of salt here.)
This is important so I'll add a comment under my post for clarification.
RT @dvassallo:
Today the US government will wrap up collecting almost 4 trillion USD in taxes. And if you don’t pay, someone with a gun wil…
Why do you think those are not predictable? Is it the introduction of a random-number generator?
Apart from the fact that text strings are easier to remember than numbers, every position in a text string can hold more information than a number (23 instead of 10). So while short strings are possibly gibberish at least some people will have short ones that are meaningful.
Then how come we don't see that happening with web domains, emails, user handles etc? If "peter" is taken someone'll take something like "peterinsanfrancisco" instead. Which is still easier to remember than a phone number.
I did point out that there may be other modes of programming and more to computational universality than we currently know.
I have read about alpha zero. It plays differently from how humans would play.
To be clear, I am aware of "AIs" generating art, which could be considered "creative" in some artistic sense. But they do it mindlessly.
"Creativity" in the epistemological (Popperian) sense I use is what the mind is. And it's kinda orthogonal to art.
Why isn't there something like DNS for phone numbers yet? So instead of calling "415-555-1234" you could call "peter"?
So it seems like there are at least two sub-categories within the indeterministic category: probabilistic and creative.
Nice, yes, it can't imply that, since creativity isn't probabilistic either. One can't assign a probability to the discovery X being made tomorrow because one can't even say what X is yet.
Creativity is unpredictable in principle. Computer programs, on the other hand, are deterministic and predictable. So how could creativity possibly be programmed?
I answer this question in my new blog post: blog.dennishackethal.com/posts/two-gues…
RT @gleason_colum:
Of all the terror organizations—from ISIS to Boko Haram—none have built brand equity faster than Hamas and Palestinian I…
RT @SpaceX:
Deployment of 52 Starlink satellites confirmed https://t.co/QqPbBl9gBz
Shouldn't it say "because of lower gun ownership"? twitter.com/2AWisdom/statu…
How do lockdown supporters explain this? How do they explain that the world hasn't exploded yet even though Texas is open? twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/…
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
OK but "I will force you if I can't persuade you" isn't very persuasive...
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
It's not pessimistic because I don't prophesy that he will kill himself no matter what. It's optimistic because I'm saying that persuasion can change his mind.
RT @ClimateWarrior7:
We need more visionary leaders with ruthless iron will who are ready to hold these people down and inject them forcibl…
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
Also, there are two ways to achieve someone not killing themselves: force or persuasion. Why just discount persuasion in favor of force? Force isn’t the only way.
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
Yes, we should, eventually. Forcing someone to live who doesn’t want to live sounds evil. We shouldn’t go around forcing unsolicited help on people. That’s a recipe for tyranny.
@JonNichEdwards @DavidDeutschOxf @alex_sukhovey @iamFilos @ernsterlanson
So, by implication, advertising "junk foods" is evil?
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
But if he's stopped arbitrarily he can never test his technology. Maybe it turns out safely swimming in a mercury lake is incredibly fun. We can be wrong about things.
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
He may have really good reasons to do it but just doesn't feel like explaining himself to you. Maybe he's developed a piece of clothing that protects him and he wants to try it out. But he also wants to keep his technology a secret for now. So he won't tell you.
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
It's like I said: urge him not to do it. Explain the consequences. If he still wants to do it let him do it. If he wants to ruin his life let him.
@JonNichEdwards @DavidDeutschOxf @alex_sukhovey @iamFilos @ernsterlanson
What connection do you see between serial killers and advertisers?
@rejectnation @OnePerfectShot @MouthDork
The guy looks a bit like Walter White. Which makes me think they should make an animated spin-off of Breaking Bad.
RT @jordanbpeterson:
How can this possibly not be in violation of Canadian Human Rights laws? And if not how can those laws be worth the p…
Or maybe playing the long game is necessary for success but not sufficient. (But it doesn't strike me as necessary either.)
"all the successful founders are playing the long game" doesn't mean there can't be arbitrarily many founders who play the long game but aren't successful. So we don't really know if playing the long game makes you a successful founder, which you seem to imply.
RT @popper1902:
New Popper video 🥳
RT @firstofequals:
The rule is now simple: get vaccinated or wear a mask until you do.
The choice is yours.
You may want to call it "opacity" not "transparency" since a value of 0 makes it completely transparent and 1 completely opaque.
@ChrisGuk1 @DavidDeutschOxf @SamHarrisOrg
In any case, I don't want to speak for others, these are just my two cents/a reflection of what I understood things to mean. :)
@ChrisGuk1 @DavidDeutschOxf @SamHarrisOrg
By implication—this is just my interpretation, I could well be wrong of course—this means that science should not be the only factor in human decision-making, and when it is, that means other factors are blocked arbitrarily, and that's not good.
@ChrisGuk1 @DavidDeutschOxf @SamHarrisOrg
So Ernst offered an explanation for why the term "obesity" might be scientism, with which David agreed ("yes") and expanded that making moral choices and talking about them are human rights.
@ChrisGuk1 @DavidDeutschOxf @SamHarrisOrg
For the "yes" to refer to a tweet, that tweet must have come before the "yes". The "yes" was a response to this question from Ernst: twitter.com/ernsterlanson/…
@SeekingApatheia @MagnetThatcher @krlwlzn @petegrif @iamFilos @DavidDeutschOxf
Can you summarize the crit-rat libertarian position in such a way that they would happily sign off on it?
Did you click on the tweet I linked to expand that thread and see what his “yes” refers to?
@MagnetThatcher @petegrif @iamFilos @krlwlzn @DavidDeutschOxf
Why don't libertarians do the work of criticising coercive advertising […]
Probably because we don’t think advertising is coercive. (Whereas banning advertising is.)
@iamFilos @alex_sukhovey @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
Many reasons. One is that it’s not for us to say how others should live their lives.
@petegrif @iamFilos @krlwlzn @DavidDeutschOxf
Re traffic rules: blog.dennishackethal.com/posts/libertar…
@CausalCulture @Pandurevich @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
Re mercury lake: Yes I think that would be coercion. You can explain the dangers and strongly urge him not to do it. But whether he does it is still up to him, and preventing him from doing so against his will is coercion.
@alex_sukhovey @DavidDeutschOxf @ernsterlanson
It doesn’t mean we should ban them, either.
The term “obesity” is a signal of scientism, not obesity itself. David explains why in the tweet below. Basically what to eat and what to talk about are moral decisions, not scientific ones, and letting science steamroll over morals is a symptom of scientism. twitter.com/DavidDeutschOx…
@iamFilos @krlwlzn @petegrif @DavidDeutschOxf
The “as in” does not seem to describe scientism but seems to be meant to.
Also, I suppose the question is how we jump from “these foods are bad for you” to “let’s ban advertisement of these foods”. There’s a logical and moral gap there.
I think you’d like Deutsch’s work. He says if you can’t program it you haven’t understood it. (And I think to understand something is to program it, if only mentally.) Since they can’t program it (that would have made the news by now!) their claim that they explain it is false.
I meant David Deutsch. I have no opinion on whether Daniel Dennett is a clear thinker.
You’re clever enough. When an author is hard to understand, that’s on the author, not you.
Curious why you find it difficult? He's one of the clearest thinkers I can think of.
RT @SenatorBrakey:
Joe Biden says 22 million Americans lost their jobs due to the pandemic.
That's not accurate.
22 million Americans los…
RT @DaFeid:
German Federal Medical Association
"Families with children can only regain equal participation in society with vaccinated chil…