Search Ideas

This sounds true but does it add anything new to saying that "AGI is an attempt to program Darwins theory of evolution"? 🤔

Hmm, I'll try to formulate in another way what I was getting at, not sure if you still disagree with this:

• My guess is that the selection mechanism can't be specified at all in the evolutionary algorithm, because every such specification is a restriction of universality. Reality has to do the selection.

This sounds true but does it add anything new to saying that "AGI is an attempt to program Darwins theory of evolution"? 🤔

Hmm, I'll try to formulate in another way what I was getting at, not sure if you still disagree with this:

• My guess is that the selection mechanism can't be specified at all in the evolutionary algorithm, because every such specification is a restriction of universality. Reality has to do the selection.

In biological evolution, the landscape itself never changes directly. It only happens as a consequence of evolving genes.

Guess: The same is true in the "landscape" of the mind: Individual ideas mutate and evolve in relation to problems, and that's what constitutes the landscape.

Sure, but those cash flows are still downstream of what consumers subjectively value though?

So the estimation of "intrinsic value" is ultimately a guess of what people will subjectively value in the future?

I was careful to say "It is important to buy assets for significantly less than you think they are worth". Value is certainly subjective (in the sense that things are valued differently by different people).

It can't only be about what I think an asset is worth though right?🤔 Isn't the important thing to buy assets that people will value higher in the future? And in the process try to explain what people will subjectively value?

It is important to buy assets for significantly less than you think they are worth. The cheaper you buy something, the more margin you have for things to go worse than anticipated.

According to Austrian economics, all value is subjective. How can we then know what an asset is intrinsically worth?

Always, because of the underlying uncertainty about the future. Please criticise!

Yes, here's a new version:

Some minds with one coercive memeplex are more like dictatorships.

Just as nations can have different forms of governance, minds can too.

For example: Most probably have that CEO-sense of self.

• Some minds with lots of coercive memes are more like dictatorships.

• People with "smaller egos" (less anti-rational memes) are more like libertarian societies.

• But people with set preferences for less self are more like communist societies. That's a kind of coerced decentralisation.

Split personalities would be akin to a highly polarised society that switches governance back and forth.

Cool, would you say then that it is only in empirical fields we can deduce facts/truth?

If so: In what way is this different from Wittgenstein saying we can't reach any truths in philosophy (which makes it meaningless)?

I see, interesting. If only empirical fields can correspond to facts/truth, isn't that a form of empiricism?

The part that is easy to vary is that an arbitrary amount of different cryptos can be made with the same features.

There's never an arbitrary amount of solutions to a specific problem. In this case, the problems are the centralisation and the lack of privacy of our current money. They may not be problems for you specifically (e.g. if you live in a high-trust jurisdiction), but I'd like to hear arguments as to why nobody in the world would consider them problems.

Thanks for the criticism. New argument: Utility (besides usefulness as money) is not strictly necessary, although it may be nice to have. The value of a currency is set by supply and demand.

Supply: A limited supply (scarcity) may increase the value.

Demand: Demand is set determined by how well people percieve the currency's features as a store of value, medium of exchange and unit of account. Important factors include: Durability, Portability, Divisibility, Fungibility, and Stability. Gold has had most of these features (importantly scarcity, only 2% inflation from mining). However, it severely lacks in portability due to being a metal, compared to hard digital assets.

So the value of a currency is mostly determined by its perceived usefulness as money, not its utility for other things.

The reason to back a currency with gold or some other commodity is that the commodity has other utility aside from being used as money. This sets a floor on the price, making it a store of value.

Utility is not a necessary aspect of money. Only 5-10% of gold's value is tied to its industrial use (https://www.statista.com/statistics/299609/gold-demand-by-industry-sectorshare/#:~:text=The%20jewelry%20industry%20accounted%20for,China%2C%20Russia%2C%20and%20Australia). Another 40% is used for jewellery.

This floor is not so reassuring if the asset were to plummet 50%. Other commodities, such as silver, have a greater industrial utility. That makes it less suitable as money since its value becomes tied to commodity cycles.

The reason to back a currency with gold or some other commodity is mainly due to its scarcity, which puts a limit on money creation (done through fractional reserve banking).

In a gold standard society, gold doesn't need to be backed by anything. The same would be true for Bitcoin and Zcash. The US Federal Reserve Notes used to be backed by gold to prevent excessive money creation, gold itself, Bitcoin and ZCash won't need to be backed by anything due to their inherent scarcity.

The reason to back a currency with gold or some other commodity is that the commodity has other utility aside from being used as money. This sets a floor on the price, making it a store of value.

• Utility is not a necessary aspect of money. Only 5-10% of gold's value is tied to its industrial use (per chatgpt). This floor is not so reassuring then if the asset would plummet 90-95%. Other commodities, such as silver, have a greater industrial utility. That makes it less suitable as money since its value becomes tied to commodity cycles.

The reason to back a currency with gold or some other commodity is mainly due to its scarcity, which puts a limit on money creation (done through fractional reserve bankning).

Thanks. Do you think there's correspondence for abstractions as well (such as mathematics, as DD seems to suggest)? As I understood, you only think we need it to explain progress in science.

In a gold standard society, gold doesn't need to be backed by anything. The same would be true for Bitcoin and Zcash.

Zcash will become the next money. That's because it contains bitcoin's solutions to fiat, and also solves bitcoin's lack of privacy.

They are the same knowledge in terms of encoding knowledge about the environment, and possible transformations based on that. That knowledge can differ in reach (context independence/how fundamental it is).

Their mode of replication differs, as each new guess in genes must be neutral or positive for the vehicle. This makes genes slower, but that's IMO a quantitative difference, not a qualitative one. Pure genetic knowledge could colonise the galaxy, it'd take much longer than with memes.

They are the same knowledge in terms of encoding knowledge about the environment, and possible transformations based on that. That knowledge can differ in reach (context independence/how fundamental it is).

Their mode of replication differ, as each new guess in genes must be neutral or positive for the vehicle. This makes genes slower, but that's IMO a quantitative difference, not a qualitative one. Pure genetic konwledge could colonize the galaxy, it'd take much longer than with memes.

Memes and genes are the same type of knowledge. Since we can "let our theories die in our place", we can make faster iterations and expand the environment to which the idea is adapted (including potentially the whole universe). There's no need for correspondance, just more reach and adaptation across contexts.

Memes and genes are the same type of knowledge. Since we can "let ideas die in their place", we can make faster iterations and expand the environment to which the idea is adapted (including potentially the whole universe). There's no need for correspondance, just more reach and adaptation across contexts.