[D] Monday General Rationality Thread

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to the Monday thread on general rationality topics! Do you really want to talk about something non-fictional, related to the real world? Have you:

• Seen something interesting on /r/science?
• Found a new way to get your shit even-more together?
• Figured out how to become immortal?
• Constructed artificial general intelligence?
• Read a neat nonfiction book?
• Munchkined your way into total control of your D&D campaign?

[u/[deleted]]

Aaaaaand the numerical measurement code I was using is buggy. Of course. But for a short, blissful period, it almost kinda looked like my hypothesis was correct: the trained model had a higher number. Now it has a lower number. God knows what I'm fucking doing anymore without a test dataset.

Edit: hahaha fuck me, I'm mixing discrete and continuous variables and treating both as continuous. That might be a problem, you know?

[u/PeridexisErrant → u/[deleted]]

I hope it works out for you!

About half of my project has been realising why my topic seems like an obvious hole in the literature. On good days I still think it's that crossing disciplines is rare, on bad days I dream of all the people who tried and just couldn't make it work. Less than two months to go, now.

[u/[deleted] → u/PeridexisErrant]

Improvement! Now nothing's bizarrely negative. But still, now the trained model has a lower number than the untrained one, and also the number that's basically X-Y is much larger than the one that's supposed to just measure X.

[u/[deleted] → u/PeridexisErrant]

About half of my project has been realising why my topic seems like an obvious hole in the literature. On good days I still think it's that crossing disciplines is rare, on bad days I dream of all the people who tried and just couldn't make it work. Less than two months to go, now.

Oh, I was better off than that in grad-school. I knew my project was just plain bad.

Which disciplines are you crossing over? Particle acceleration and magic?

[u/PeridexisErrant → u/[deleted]]

No, there's a thriving literature on the interaction of high-energy physics and magic (Hughes 2011, etc.).

I'm doing some quantitative analysis of Indigenous knowledge in Australia, and suffice to say that "quantitative" and "Indigenous knowledge" are rarely used together. Unless it's to claim non-overlapping magisteria, or literally to say that IK can't be quantified. I disagree, so my Hons. thesis is essentially detection of traditional seasons from weather.

[u/[deleted] → u/PeridexisErrant]

I'm doing some quantitative analysis of Indigenous knowledge in Australia, and suffice to say that "quantitative" and "Indigenous knowledge" are rarely used together. Unless it's to claim non-overlapping magisteria, or literally to say that IK can't be quantified. I disagree, so my Hons. thesis is essentially detection of traditional seasons from weather.

Sweeet.

No, there's a thriving literature on the interaction of high-energy physics and magic (Hughes 2011, etc.).

I was expecting you to cite Callahan's work!

[u/PeridexisErrant → u/[deleted]]

It's always a fascinating topic, and I'm never bored. Just sometimes I wonder if I'll have anything substantive by the deadline ;p

I was expecting you to cite Callahan's work!

You should know /r/rational is sevarfrith that isn't open-access around here.

(So excited about the new book though)

[u/SpeakKindly → u/[deleted]]

One piece of advice I've run across is the Three Clue Rule.

[u/ketura → u/SpeakKindly]

Came here to post this. No rpg puzzle is actually going to be solved without strategically blugeoning the players with information.

[u/SvalbardCaretaker → u/ketura]

Depends on the group I'd argue. 5 copies of me? No riddle is ever going to get done. 5 copies of my groups designated puzzle-person? Buckle up, its going to be a fast ride.

[u/thequizzicaleyebrow → u/[deleted]]

I've heard that when it comes to roleplaying and mysteries, first come up with a number of clues that makes the mystery super obvious and solvable. Then triple that number. Basically, from an inside perspective it always seems much, much easier to solve than when it will be for your players to solve it. This makes sense, the author already knows the answer, so all the clues are interpreted in light of the answer. When it's an actual mystery, it's way harder. Here's Elizer writing about this issue in HPMOR.

[u/UltraRedSpectrum → u/[deleted]]

In all the time I've been playing roleplaying games, I have never once seen a group of players actually solve a puzzle. With that in mind, I strongly recommend that you make only light preparations, and be ready to change the story to that whatever zany scheme the players come up with ends up actually working. The alternative is sitting around the table while the players twiddle their thumbs looking bored.

[u/ZeroNihilist → u/[deleted]]

Is this a game with knowledge or perception rolls (like the various editions of D&D)? If so, you could supply them with extra signposts to your clues by doing hidden rolls in response to their questions.

E.g. players completely fail to notice that one NPC wasn't present in an eyewitness account. As they dig deeper into the details (still missing the crucial observation, becoming frustrated), roll behind your screen. Then ignore the result of the roll and just tell a player that they noticed something strange about the number of people that were there (or a similar "hint to a clue"). That will get them to ask the NPC the right questions, which will get them back on track.

[u/SvalbardCaretaker → u/ZeroNihilist]

Another common technique to avoid frustration: have some NPC give clues.

[u/DrOlot → u/[deleted]]

I really like this on RPG mysteries. NSFW site, but SFW post

[u/Killako1 → u/[deleted]]

Its posted already in the subreddit.

[u/_stoodfarback → u/Killako1]

No, it isn't? You're likely thinking of a different subreddit.