This is almost too good to be true. Ultra-rationalist Robin Hanson endorses mild regulation to discourage the summoning of dark supernatural powers which might destroy us all. Seriously.
Re:Black Magick Rockets
« Reply #1 on: 2010-10-31 15:37:39 »
[Blunderov] Attempts to divide by 0 should, according to this logic, also be subject to "mild regulation". Although it is unlikely that anyone would ever achieve this, we cannot be certain that they might not. Neither can we be certain that the consequences of this might not be catastrophic.*
Robin Hanson must have his tongue firmly in his cheek surely?
Divide by zero is yet another meme from the kind pedophiles at 4chan. It is said to be highly dangerous, containing the power to open up black holes, rend time, space, and mathematics to pieces and even cause the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series. (It can even cause a chanapocalypse. It causes dozens of people to post either retarded reasons why you cannot divide by zero (which are usually wrong), or extremely retarded reasons why you can actually divide by zero. These /b/tards have not realized that the whole of mathematics and reality is against them. It is also a fantastic way to generate drama amongst numerophilic aspies on the Slashdot forums.
Re:Black Magick Rockets
« Reply #2 on: 2010-10-31 16:23:40 »
No, he is serious. The difference is the market odds on divide by zero being a danger are probably zero, so no regulation needed. Hanson probably would assign zero odds to supernatural dark lords, but the market odds are higher and that's what matters according to his principles.
« Last Edit: 2010-10-31 16:24:35 by David Lucifer »
[Blunderov] Attempts to divide by 0 should, according to this logic, also be subject to "mild regulation". Although it is unlikely that anyone would ever achieve this, we cannot be certain that they might not. Neither can we be certain that the consequences of this might not be catastrophic.*<snip>
<snip> It is said to be highly dangerous, containing the power to open up black holes, rend time, space, and mathematics to pieces and even cause the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series. <snip>
WTF ... WHY .... WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE !!!! Geeze Louise .... I'm lost .... and utter despair that folks are ..... wait .... I am going take the square root of a negative number ... that has to be much worse !
Blunderov; please make them stop, my brain hurts !
[Blunderov] If he expects to be taken seriously I think he is being optimistic: "On which risks should matter, I’d prefer to use odds from a prediction market to decide".
<snip>Prediction markets (also known as predictive markets, information markets, decision markets, idea futures, event derivatives, or virtual markets) are speculative markets created for the purpose of making predictions. Assets are created whose final cash value is tied to a particular event (e.g., will the next US president be a Republican) or parameter (e.g., total sales next quarter). The current market prices can then be interpreted as predictions of the probability of the event or the expected value of the parameter. Prediction markets are thus structured as betting exchanges, without any risk for the bookmaker.
People who buy low and sell high are rewarded for improving the market prediction, while those who buy high and sell low are punished for degrading the market prediction. Evidence so far suggests that prediction markets are at least as accurate as other institutions predicting the same events with a similar pool of participants.</snip>
[Bl.] Stated another way: prediction markets are not demonstrably better than any other similar institutions at predicting the same events. Derivitives? Hmm. Do not want!
On the subject of "which risks should matter" I think it ought to be taken into consideration that the Doomsday Clock (a perfectly reliable, if we believe what we are told, facsimile of a predictive market institution) is at about 5 to 12 right now. We are therefore 95% certain of destroying ourselves sometime quite soon. So, we are almost certainly doomed to extinction but the possibilty exists that contact with a superior intelligence might help save us from ouselves. What to do? What to do?
On the subject of divide by 0, in a demonstration nevar before seen on teh Interwebs, Captain Flatulence shows how it is done:
Re:Black Magick Rockets
« Reply #7 on: 2010-11-01 08:14:38 »
[Blunderov]The video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_Jt_g10Jug describes a felching session gone wrong. This not correct. Felching is something else. Those of delicate sensibilities are better off not making further enquiries.
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