The Bayesian Conspiracy
Episodes
Bayes Blast 20 – Blue Pill/Red Pill in Roko’s Blender
15 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Kill yourself for no reason, or save others? Lisatomic’s Poll Roko’s Poll Eneasz’s annoyance Scissor’s Statements origin
Bayes Blast 19 – Musicgen and Audiogen
10 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Musicgen lets anyone make a quick music snippet and Audiogen is surprisingly good at generating non-confusing sounds! These tools are currently free a...
193 – Building Baileys with Yassine Meskhout
09 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We speak with Yassine Meskhout of The Bailey about… a whole bunch of things actually. LINKS Yassine’s Substack The Motte The Bailey podcast Yassin...
192 – Absurdism and the Meaning of Life, with Alex
26 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Alex joins us to smile as we push some boulders up some hills. LINKS Effective Altruism As A Tower Of Assumptions The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus...
Bayes Blast 17 – Gay Pride is White Liberal Pride
14 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Me and Wes exchange hot takes. Mine is stolen shamelessly from Based Camp, go listen to the original source material there, it’s good!
191 – What is Post-Rationalism, with Arielle
12 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Seriously though, what’s going on here? Arielle dives in with us. LINKS Arielle’s substack – Analog Futures Bayesian Conspiracy episode #5(!) on...
Bayes Blast 16 – Holding PRNS (Present Rate, No Singularity)
03 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
How to talk about the future From On “Present Rate No Singularity” at Thing of Things
Bayes Blast 15 – Technological Overemployment
30 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Mo’ productivity, mo’ money, at last Zvi’s The Overemployed Via ChatGPT
190 – How to be Human Together, at VibeCamp, with GPTBrooke
28 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We talk with Brooke, creator and driving force behind VibeCamp. We talk about VibeCamp 2, being human, and the post/rats corner of twitter. LINKS Broo...
Bayes Blast 14 – Reddit Sucks
27 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Steven blasts Eneasz with the latest news about how Reddit is doing it’s best to ruin everyone’s good time. Reddit post from Apollo’s developer ...
189 – AI Bloomer David Youssef
14 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
David Youssef from The Guild of the Rose has great ways to integrate ChatGPT into your work, and also thinks AIs will keep humans around. Links: ChatG...
188 – Living in the Early Singularity, with Matt Freeman
31 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Matt Freeman joins us to discuss life in changing times. Major take away for Eneasz: Be the kind of person your post-singularity descendants will be p...
187 – GitLab & Review Bounties to Save Science, with Richard Acton
17 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Acton returns to denounce pre-publication peer review, and propose a replacement building off the open source software ethos, and review bount...
Bayes Blast 13 – GPT-4 maps every neuron in GPT-2
16 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Blast with Matt re OpenAI using GPT-4 to automatically write explanations for the behavior of neurons in GPT-2, and what this means for Doom (spoiler:...
186 – Why We Aren’t Technically EAs But Totally Would Be, Unlike This Guy
03 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Eric Hoel’s Why I Am Not An Effective Altruist Other Links: EA Forum – Comments on Hoel’s Essay EA Forum – What actually is the a...
Bayes Blast 12 – AI White Pills
25 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
One of these white pills is more realistic than the other. Which one is which is left as an exercise to the listener. 😉 Roko’s White Pill AXRP re...
185 – The Rise and Fall of Peer Review, with Adam Mastroianni
19 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss The Rise and Fall of Peer Review, with Adam Mastroianni from Experimental History We also touch on The dance of the naked emperors and Idea...
Bayes Blast 11 – Exposure to Lizardman Is Lethal
15 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
With Wes from The Mind Killer we discuss Exposure to Lizardman is Lethal
Bayes Blast 10 – Shoggoth Tongues
10 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Speaking in GPT tongues with Matt MUDsim Respectful Criticism Lambda Calc? gfodor’s take Eliezer take + followup
Bayes Blast 9 – The salt in pasta water fallacy
07 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The salt in pasta water fallacy
184 – The Cultic Milieu
05 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Rationalists and the Cultic Milieu by Ozy Brennan Other Links: Doocy asking about AI doom at the White House 0:00:38 – Feedback/Thanks DC...
Bayes Blast 8 – An AI risk argument that resonates with NYTimes readers
02 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
An AI risk argument that resonates with NYTimes readers
Bayes Blast 7 – Chatbot convinces Belgian to commit suicide
29 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Probot joins to discuss Chatbot convinces Belgian to commit suicide De Standaard
Bayes Blast 6 – The Parable of the King and the Random Process
28 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Matt comes on to blast Eneasz with his LW post The Parable of the King and the Random Process
183 – Let’s Think About Slowing Down AI
22 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Matt and Eneasz discuss Katja Grace’s Let’s think about slowing down AI Other Links Bayes Blast 1 – In Defense of Chatbot Romance The Bayesian C...
Bayes Blast 5 – Importance Hacking
19 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Steven blasts Eneasz with Spencer Greenberg’s description of a huge problem in science publication. Links The short post Steven took his notes from ...
Bayes Blast 4 – The Waluigi Effect
17 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The Waluigi Effect
Bayes Blast 3 – Dynamics Can Arise If You Nudge
14 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Duncan Sabien on dynamics [can] arise if you have people nudging in that direction (also thanks to Liam from 2 Rash 2 Unadvised podcast for intro)
Bayes Blast 2 – Logan’s Model of EA Burnout
13 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
My Model Of EA Burnout
182 – The Birth and Death of Sydney (Bing AI)
27 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Microsoft’s new Bing search chatbot – Sydney. It received a wave of media coverage due to erratic behavior, before being neutered by Mi...
181 – How To Read The News With Bounded Distrust, with Wesley Fenza
22 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Zvi’s How to Bounded Distrust with Wesley Fenza. Wes is from The Mind Killer! Other links: Bounded Distrust On Bounded Distrust The Media...
Bayes Blast 1 – In Defense of Chatbot Romance
18 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In Defense of Chatbot Romance
Bonus preview – YIMBY follow-ups and Vulgar EA
15 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We have some follow-up questions to Brian, including how to weigh utils, how moral claims to an area can be adjudicated, crime, use of home ownership ...
180 – YIMBY in CA with Brian Hanlon
08 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss the YIMBY movement in California, and how Brian Hanlon & co. got real legislative change happening. Primary Links CA YIMBY Contact Brian –...
179 – The Plan (to align AI), with John Wentworth
25 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Worried about AGI running amok in the near future? John Wentworth thinks we can align AI. In 10-15 years. With greater than 50/50 probability. And he ...
178 – Out To Get You
11 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Out To Get You by Zvi. A lot of clouds get yelled at. 2:55 – Main Topic: Getting Got 1:08:48 – LW posts 1:18:55 – Thank the Patron ...
177 – Decision Trees and Butlerian Jihads with Matt Freeman
14 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Matt Freeman gives a primer in how to uses Bayesian decision making in normal life, via decision trees. We also discuss utilitarianism, the Guild of t...
176 – Circling with Aella
30 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Aella comes on the show to tell us what the heck Circling is and why we should do it. 0:01:21 How Many Rationalists Are There? 0:04:40 Circling 1:09:4...
175 – FTX + EA, and Personal Finance
16 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
David from The Mind Killer joins us. We got to talking about the FTX collapse and some of the waves it sent through the Effective Altruism community. ...
BREAKING – FTX collapse & EA shockwaves
13 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
While recording the next episode we got to talking about the FTX collapse and some of the waves it sent through the Effective Altruism community. We d...
174 – Jon Stewart, The Consensus Emancipator
02 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Wes and David from The Mind Killer show up for a special cross-over episode. We discuss How Stewart Made Tucker Listen to The Mind Killer 🙂 Hey loo...
173 – Oh Lawd, Strong AI is Comin’
19 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Matt Freeman returns to discuss General Artificial Intelligence timelines, and why they are short. Our primary text is: Why I think strong general AI ...
172 – Virtue Ethics
05 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Kerry discusses virtue ethics with us, and how one is to live. After Virtue, by Alasdair MacIntyre Pareto efficiency at Wikipedia, slightly less dense...
171 – All About AGP
21 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Tailcalled gives us the down low on a variation of the popularly discussed (if not that widely liked) transgender typology – autogynephilia (or AGP)...
170 – By George, The Rent Is Too Damn High!
07 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Eneasz drops a primer on Georgist Land Value Taxes. All increases in productivity will be capture by rising rents for as long as mankind exists, unles...
169 – S&E BS re AGI
24 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Steven and Eneasz discuss the latest timeline shifts regarding the advent of superhuman general intelligence. Then in the LW posts we got greatly side...
168 – Unions Are Governments
10 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We speak with Levi/Ferb, learning about labor law in the USA. Turns out it’s not what we thought. Links: What would a general strike look like today...
167 – Jugaad Ethics
27 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A Jugaad is like a hack that combines a new thing that doesn’t work anymore with an old thing that sorta worked, as a temporary solution. Now do it ...
166 – Getting Lucky
13 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Luck is the most power force in the universe, and leaving power untapped is not very rational. Searching for Outliers How to Get Lucky Also mentioned:...
165 – DREAM: Dunbar Rules Everything Around Me
29 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dunbar’s Number is both the cause of and downfall of Human Civilization Low-Status degrades your health Your Book Review: The Dawn Of Everything Men...
164 – Pregnancy is Body Horror
15 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Katrina is back!! We talk about how pregnancy isn’t super easy, and is borderline body horror. War In The Womb Expecting Better book Pregnant Women ...
163 – Effective Aesthetics
01 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Étienne Fortier-Dubois argues that Effective Altruism has an Aesthetics problem But first! Some extended listener feedback Nuclear War is A-OK if you...
162 – Roe No Mo’
18 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Roe v Wade is going away. This sucks, but it’s not the end of the world. Polls show most Americans support allowing abortion in the first weeks, ban...
161 – Restoring the Kingdom of Hawai’i
04 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Not long ago, Hawai’i was a constitutional monarchy. A lot of Hawaiian residents want that restored. Travis Don Kailikea Paradea takes us through wh...
160 – GAI is Imminent
20 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Four Major AI Advancements In One Week! New Scaling Laws for Large Language Models – essentially everyone has been training large language models wi...
159 – Cryonics Concerns, and Theses On Sleep
06 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We address theoretical cryonics concerns, and discuss Guzey’s Theses On Sleep 3:15 Cryonics Concerns 49:21 Theses On Sleep 1:23:01 LW posts 1:...
Monarchy Reactions – post Episode 158 discussion (Teaser)
27 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Conspirators regroup to discuss if/how their views on monarchy have changed. The full episode is available for our Patrons Mentioned: List of Curr...
158 – Can Monarchy Save Us From Fascism?
23 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We speak with Cornelius about this idea that Monachy is good because it can save us from populist fascism. 1:44:50 LW posts 2:14:45 Thank the Patron C...
157 – A Fistful of Topics
09 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We catch up on stuff and hit a few wandering targets. 0:01 Jace on Lithium 21:10 Feedback 26:05 LW posts 50:06 Nuclear Ukraine 59:43 Nuclear Us 1:05:3...
156 – A Chemical Hunger
23 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss A Chemical Hunger – the paper presenting the hypothesis that the modern obesity epidemic is due to enviromental contamination causing wid...
Trailer For Bonus Aella
14 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This is a trailer for a bonus Patrons-only episode. It’s 45 minutes chatting with Aella about various things that struck Eneasz’s interest. Aella’...
155 – Normal Predictions, and Change is Bad
09 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Conspiracy comes out strongly in favor of switching to Normal Predictions, which is safe and easy when you use the Jan Christian Refsgaard method!...
Trailer For Wirehead Extras
04 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A few days ago I asked Wes a couple follow-up questions on wireheading, and later chatted with Emilio from the Discord on-record. I thought it wouldn’...
154 – Two General Thinkers Discuss General Thinking
26 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Jace and Steven cover this one since Eneasz is busy drinking cocktails out of a coconut in a beach in Hawaii. Robin Hanson (probably correctly) thinks...
153 – Values and Wireheading with Wes Fenza
12 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We beef with Wes over how important values may or may not be, and why Wireheading is awesome and/or evil. Wes is the head of The Mind Killer podcast! ...
152 – Frame Control with Aella
15 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We speak to Aella about her post on Frame Control Aella’s Twitter & LSD post National Domestic Violence Hotline The Categories Were Made For Man no...
151 – Don’t Make This Your Everything
01 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Sasha Chapin’s “Your Intelligent, Conscientious In-group Has Bad Social Norms Too” Main Topic begins at 45:46 Other items mentioned: ...
150 – The Procrastination Equation
17 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss the book The Procrastination Equation as summarized by Luke in How to Beat Procrastination The audio is rough at first, we fixed it after 8...
149 – The Roots of Progress, with Jason Crawford
03 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We speak with Jason Crawford (twitter), from The Roots of Progress. Interview begins at 44:25. Posts discussed include: Iron: From mythical to mundane...
148 – Decisions, Decisions
20 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Matt Freeman returns to talk about Decision Theory, and the discusion ranges far afield. Matt is from The Guild of the Rose, which we had a recent epi...
147 – Newcomblike Problems Are The Norm
06 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
How Newcomb’s problem applies to real-life. We discuss Newcomblike problems are the norm (LW crosspost). Also mentioned: Replacing Guilt Audiobook! ...
146 – What Is A Rationalist?
22 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We settle the ultimate question once and for all. also discussed: Julia Galef’s quick video on Bayesian Thinking Bulletproofing deters warlords Stev...
145 – You Are In Newcomb’s IQ Shredder
08 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss You Are In Newcomb’s Box and The IQ Shredder also touched on – Why Does Singapore Have Such A Low Birthrate? Hey look, we have a disco...
144 – The Guild Of The Rose (beta)
25 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss The Guild of the Rose with Matt Freeman. This is somewhat of a follow-up, we first did a show about them when they were called The Guild of...
143 – Crazy Like Us
11 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss the review of the book Crazy Like Us Also the highlights from the comments of the review Quick single-line spoiler for ep 3 of Loki occurs ...
142 – Do This
28 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Dan Sivers Do This Directives Mentioned: Dan’s interviews The Scout Mindset book Jace’s Funny Dance video An Alien God audio Hey look, ...
141 – Raising Younglings
14 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Velcro from the subreddit and discord joins us to offer a much-valued parent’s perspective on child rearing from the perspective of someone who’s ...
140 – Trigger Warning: Old Men Yelling at Clouds
30 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
There’s too many clouds, and they’re ruining stuff that’s good! Mentioned in this episode: Do This. Directives. A very early episode of ours abo...
139 – Kids These Days
16 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Running with the theme of childhood/adolescent responsibility, we start off with a brief live-feedback section from esteemed guest Charlie and then mo...
138 – Are Teens People?
02 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We discuss Robert Epstein’s “Teens 2.0” as he makes the Case Against Adolescence. Eneasz’s Highlights from Teens 2.o The Banned Goods Store Ho...
137 – Can You Consent to Listening to this Episode?
19 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Who can be allowed to choose their sex partners? 0:00 – 37:00 — Less Wrong Posts Discussion 37:03 – end — Main Subject Discussion Mentioned in...
136 – Obviously (and Legally) Murder
05 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The Conspiracy is minus one Jace but plus one Justin (a defense lawyer) this episode! We discuss the legalities surrounding the convictions of Derek C...
135 – Live Episode #2
21 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
This is the recording of the live episode we held on 4/18/2021. Things mentioned: Amazing Man 2: Love Conquers All BBC receives 109,741 complaints ove...
Live Episode Announcement
15 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The Live Episode will be in our Discord this Sunday (April 18th) at 12:00 Noon Mountain Time (which is UTC -6). Anyone can join the audio channel and ...
134 – We’ve Got Class
07 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The gang discusses class in America, and Scott Alexander’s Modest Proposal to destroy American politics. Source posts: Fussell On Class, and A Modes...
133 – Is Libertarianism a Gateway Drug to Anarcho-Capitalism?
24 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
David is back for us to pester him with questions about Libertarianism, and he tries to turn us all into Anarchists!! (not really (but he wouldn’t m...
132 – Mind Killed by Libertarianism
10 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The trio unites with the Mind Killers to get mind killed on Libertarianism! Not mentioned in the episode, but worth putting here – SSC’s Anti-Libe...
131 – Feedback Grab Bag
24 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We catch up on some feedback and address a handful of items that have been banging around. “We Change Our Minds Less Often Than We Think” How to e...
130 – The Cause of the Hate Revolution (or: Hate is the New Sex)
10 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
2/3rds of the Conspiracy discusses “Hate is the New Sex” What You Can’t Say, by Paul Graham – audio at Second Ennumerations Scissor’s Statem...
129 – Sympathy For The Devil
27 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We talk with Lucien Greaves, co-founder of The Satanic Temple. We discuss seperation of church & state, abortion rights, and the value of federal reli...
128 – The Q-Coup
12 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We had a topic for this week, but it was prempted by the spectacle of a headlong collision between a delusional mob and harsh reality. Footage from in...
127 – All About Aging with Richard Acton
30 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Acton answered our plea for an expert in the field of aging science! He’s Post-doctoral researcher and bioinformatician at CECAD, A Cluster...
126 – LessWrong 2.0 and Books
16 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The conspirators are joined by Ben and Oliver from the LessWrong team. In addition to standing up a new and improved platform for LessWrong and revita...
125 – Hacking Away at Careers
02 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The conspirators share potential weaknesses in the career-distribution system that too many people don’t exploit. With the usual amount of meanderin...
124 – Longevity
18 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
A listener wants to know if we can reach life extension escape velocity. LessWrong open thread on “true” life expectancy, and post on Three Open P...
123 – Stuff Has Been Weird Lately
04 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The trio, like the rest of the country, has been under a bit of stress lately. We spend some time venting and talking about framing devices to cope wi...
122 – EARN IT vs America
21 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The EARN IT Act was introduce in March, it’s a disgusting censorship policy, and no one is talking about it. But wait it gets worse, because the LAE...
121 – Crony Beliefs
07 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The trio sits down to discuss Kevin Simler’s essay “Crony Beliefs“. It’s awesome and absolutely worth reading the whole thing. Ignore all the ...
120 – Why Can’t We Brain Good?
23 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We address frustration with how hard it is to wrangle these brains. Wikipedia on Cognitive Distortions Spamming Mirco Intentions Richard Wiseman’s b...
Episode 119 – If You’re A Human, You’re Already Losing To GPT-3
09 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
GPT-3 wrote the title of this episode! Join us as we talk with an expert insider and an expert enthusiast about GPT-3! The technology has come a surpr...