Monthly Archives: August 2015

Stop Adding Zeroes

Dylan Matthews writes a critique of effective altruism. There is much to challenge in it, and some has already been challenged by people like Ryan Carey. Perhaps I will go into it at more length later. But for now I … Continue reading

Book Review: Chronicles Of Wasted Time

I. I was recently recommended Chronicles of Wasted Time, the autobiography of Malcolm Muggeridge. It was a good choice, and not just because its title appropriately described my expectations about reading 500-page books on people’s recommendation. Muggeridge is an obvious … Continue reading

Contrarians, Crackpots, and Consensus

I. Last week we discussed whether Gary Taubes gets to be admitted to the small but prestigious pantheon of correct contrarians. And the strange part was that there was a lot less argument about how correct he was than about … Continue reading

Links 8/15: A Link In The Armor

Today, we are cancelling the beepocalypse! As per Washington Post, although colony collapse disorder remains a problem, it is not an existential threat because beekeepers are now able to breed new colonies faster than old ones are being damaged. Number … Continue reading

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OT25: Obon Thread

This is the semimonthly open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. Also: 1. Comments of the week are Kavec talking about what work in military intelligence has taught them about probability and thinking, and John Schilling … Continue reading

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Contra Hallquist On Scientific Rationality

I. Topher Hallquist recently wrote a long article calling Less Wrong and the rationalist community “against scientific rationality” and having “crackpot tendencies”. The piece claims to be about “the Less Wrong community”, but mostly takes the form of a series … Continue reading

Stalin and Summary Statistics

[Epistemic status: As always, I am not a statistician, and anything I say should be taken with a grain of salt until confirmed by others] I. A while ago, I wrote Beware Summary Statistics, where I talked about all the … Continue reading

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