7.3 KiB
The Hero With A Thousand Chances
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Author: u/traverseda With dread but cautious optimism*
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URL: http://lesswrong.com/lw/14h/the_hero_with_a_thousand_chances/
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Score: 23
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Created: 2015-06-19T20:18:33
Post:
Comments:
u/Kishoto [+9] *
So...if I'm reading this correctly, [ ](#s "the "Counter Force" doesn't actually exist right? It's just that this particular instance is the world that had the 1/2^some large number chance of being lucky enough to have each previous hero destroy the Dust, and there are actually an infinite number of worlds that have already been destroyed by said Dust? And the people only believe in the Counter Force because they were, unknowingly, exceedingly, lucky?") Or am I missing some bigger point here?
u/redrach [+3] *
That's my interpretation of it, yes.
u/notmy2ndopinion [+2] Concent of Saunt Edhar*
I thought it was another version of the Black Pill's fight against the enemy in SlateStarCodex's short story: http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/06/02/and-i-show-you-how-deep-the-rabbit-hole-goes/ I guess that's what I get for not sounding out the phonetics of the last line correctly.
u/Sylocat [+1] Canterlot Campaign*
I assumed Until I got to the pun at the end.
u/DCarrier [+1] *
Your spoiler tag doesn't seem to be working right. Also, the pun would still work, given what that interpretation of the Counter-Force is called.
u/Sylocat [+1] Canterlot Campaign*
Oh... I forgot this sub used a different spoiler tag system.
u/alexanderwales [+8] Time flies like an arrow*
I enjoyed this story, but felt that the hero was a little too quick in jumping to his conclusion, and while it's a good tag to add onto the end, it's not necessarily right. It's that moment of clear insight into a problem that's sometimes wrong?
u/Sparkwitch [+10] *
Indeed, this seems to be a case of Sherlock happening to know exactly which details are important and knowing precisely what they mean. For those who haven't read it, here is Conan Doyle's very shortest story. It requires only the devotion of a minute or two.
u/Kishoto [+9] *
Can't remember the term or trope name for it, but most of Sherlock's Holmes' deductions are either perfectly easily caught by your average police investigation or so blatantly coincidental it's only through his protagonist powers that he's correct.
u/Chronophilia [+2] sci-fi ≠ futurology*
The impossible leap of logic is more common in Batman stories than in Sherlock Holmes - at least Doyle was a good writer, while Batman has passed through the hands of more than a few hacks over the decades. So the trope name is the Bat-Deduction.
u/notmy2ndopinion [+1] Concent of Saunt Edhar*
Abductive reasoning, or "Inference to the best explanation'" as it is also termed, is essentially "jumping to an elegant conclusion." http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/abduction/
u/None [+7] *
I cannot be the only F/SN fan on here reading "Counter Force" over and over and going "Oh, shit, don't bring her into this!"
^^^^^I ^^^^^know ^^^^^Alaya ^^^^^is ^^^^^genderless, ^^^^^but ^^^^^still...
u/traverseda [+2] With dread but cautious optimism*
I know eliezer is a f/sn fan, so probably not.
u/elevul [+1] Cyoria Observer*
Yep, same, lots of confusion reading the comments.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+3] Emergency Mustelid Hologram*
My issue with this matches Psy-Kosh's - unless there's some reason that summoning a hero is something they can only do once per cycle, or the failure of the hero immediately destroys the world, there should be more worlds where they remember heroes failing and new heroes having to be summoned than ones where the hero always succeeds.
u/Empiricist_or_not [+2] Aspiring polite Hegemonizing swarm*
Considering the hint about Einstein it might be that the Hero is Fienmen, or the comparable quantum physicist who put forth the man worlds hypothesis.
u/None [+2] *
There are more, sure, but this is the particular one where every hero has succeeded. Because of the nature of many-worlds, that one particular world does exist, and this is a story about it. My particular issue is that the hero doesn't even do any experiments to make sure that, indeed, it's the anthropic principle rather than an actual counter-force. This guy was just summoned with magic - it's time to at least verify your assumptions about known quantities before making any decisions based off of them.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+3] Emergency Mustelid Hologram*
I understand that this is that particular world. I'm just pointing out that his conclusion that he's in that particular world because of the anthropic principle doesn't make sense, because that would probably not be the only surviving world, and the majority of surviving worlds would probably not be ones in which every hero has succeeded.
u/rrssh [+1] *
That was incredible. And it was inspired by a dream! Thank you so much for linking.
u/DCarrier [+1] *
u/Kishoto [+2] *
The anthropic principle explains why they believe in a Counter-Force at all. In this story, the hero just believes that this particular world is one of the lucky few that's been able to find a new Dust solution each time so far. There is no Counter-Force. They've just been extremely fortunate. That's the conclusion he comes to (And it could be wrong, for all we know, he comes to it fairly hastily and with little empirical evidence)
u/DCarrier [+2] *
They don't believe in a Counter-Force because of the anthropic principle. They either do because there's a Counter-Force, or because large amounts of evidence just happen to point to it. It's no different than trying to explain why the guy you just ran into won the lottery five times in a row with the anthropic principle.
u/Kishoto [+1] *
Who's to say there isn't?
u/Transfuturist [+1] Carthago delenda est.*
The protagonist, who's wrong.
u/Kishoto [+2] *
The protagonist believes there are alternate realities as such. But for the sake of simplicity, he's explaining it as if the current reality is the only one. Because, as far as they're concerned, it is. And to be fair, he states "many other worlds like this one are already destroyed.". Pretty sure that's an indication he believes there are other worlds out there.