scrape_r_rational/data/cache/4gdpb2.md

[D] Monday General Rationality Thread

Post:

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?

Comments:

• u/elevul:

  Talking about rational fiction ruining normal fiction, Re Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu is sadly way less consistent than I hoped it would be. 
  
  Pity, I love those kinds of time loop/reset/redo stories.
  

  • u/OutOfNiceUsernames:

    Anime\Manga suffer from this in general, unfortunately — I think I would be hard-pressed to name even 10 different titles with actually consistent logic in this aspects. Often it seems like the writers just don’t give a crap about plot consistency and are more interested in building (romantic) character relations, drawing backgrounds, etc. 
    
    I just don’t get the point of things like [basing story’s entire plot on time travel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boku_Dake_ga_Inai_Machi) and then completely screwing up time travel and character motivations both. Urgh!
    

    • u/DeterminedThrowaway:

      I just experienced this myself. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood was my favourite anime for a long time. I've watched it twice now and the first time I didn't even know about modern rationality, let alone rational fiction. After watching it again, I was just... I guess more disappointed than anything. Part of the premise had potential, but it was filled with huge inconsistencies and terrible deathist / anti-progress morals. It killed my enjoyment of the good moments, and I ended up thinking that maybe anime just isn't for me any more.
      

      • u/elevul:

        > It killed my enjoyment of the good moments, and I ended up thinking that maybe anime just isn't for me any more.
        
        Yeah, same thing for me, sadly. On the bright side, I cut my anime-watching time a lot, time I can spend on reddit!
        

• u/None:

  [deleted]
  

  • u/Anderkent:

    Is this a US thing? In the UK all I had to do to get on antidepressants is go see my GP, say ''I think I have depression", and answer some questions like "are you going to kill yourself" (asked a bit more nicely)
    

    • u/FuguofAnotherWorld:

      UK. The problem is, I'm not in danger of killing myself so I suspect I've been put on the slow track. Had a couple months of CBT but it was not sufficient by itself. The rest of the 6 months has been waiting for various appointments.
      

      • u/Anderkent:

        Huh. I'm not in danger of killing myself either and it was very quick and painless - the GP gave me a prescription after a 10 minute consultation and I picked it up at a pharmacy the next day.
        
        Unless I'm missing some context (you've already tried some meds and now are going through some specialist stuff), maybe try a different GP?
        

        • u/FuguofAnotherWorld:

          No additional context apart from maybe I wasn't harsh enough filling in the questionnaire and I'm fairly good at seeming like I'm keeping it together well even when I'm really not, which probably doesn't help. The two GP's I've met so far didn't really seem to believe that I was having problems. Most of them didn't really seem to like the idea of antidepressants at all on some kind of moral level. 
          
          Luckily I had an appointment with a professor of psychology who has sorted all that out, and I now have a piece of paper I can show at the next appointment and things seem to be moving in the right direction. Seeing as they're working with the government I'm assuming my piece of paper will in fact be terribly important, driving forth all before it with its radiant light.
          

  • u/Cariyaga:

    Sad to hear that. I hope things turn out well for you in both the short and long run. 
    
    When you do get on meds, if the ones you get don't work perfectly in the first place, don't be afraid to ask after different kinds. I had issues with that as a kid -- one of the antidepressants I tried out made it really hard for me to get to sleep, and another made me lethargic.
    
    I don't know that it's particularly... relevant to you, but this is the kind of thing I'd rather point out than leave to implication: plenty of folks care about you, even just on this subreddit, and among your readers, so take care of yourself.
    

  • u/None:

    [deleted]
    

    • u/FuguofAnotherWorld:

      > Side effects include memory loss and maybe minor brain damage.
      
      Eeeeeeer... that's quite possibly the worst set of side effects I've ever heard of. Losing chunks of my ability to think is probably my greatest fear, so I think I'll steer a wide berth around that one.
      

• u/TVVEAK:

  Thanks to Yudkowsky's *Rationality: From AI to Zombies*, I am well on the road to recovering from a heroin addiction. 
  
  What better way to combat addiction than a healthy dose of reality?
  

  • u/Green0Photon:

    Huh, would you mind writing more about how you did that? It seems pretty cool. I also want to see if I could apply any of it to my extreme procrastination and related problems.
    

  • u/elevul:

    Were you able to understand it as a stand-alone product? I started it, but after about 50 pages I was just not able to follow him, so I stopped and went on to read some of the works on which he based that book.
    

• u/space_fountain:

  I've been thinking about starting writing more. Nothing of the kind of quality that I would feel comfortable sharing at the moment, but it got me thinking about licensing for online fiction and copyright in general. I have, I think, a decently developed set of views on how I think copyright law should be in the US and I think it would be hypocritical of me if I didn't try to use something similar myself so I've tried to come up a license that would enforce the way I think copyright should work. How does this seem to you folks?
  
  > This work is the exclusive property of ______, unless otherwise stated all rights are reserved.
  
  > |
  
  > **Limited right to copy:**
  
  > Anyone possessing a copy of this license and the accompany work has right to make and use as many copies for their own use as they choose; however, no right is given to publish or distribute publically these copies.
  
  > |
  
  > **Right to derived works:**
  
  >You have the right to make and distribute any derived work you make under two conditions.
  The work must be transformative and require creativity to produce.
  The work must be licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 and be free for everyone to use under those conditions. Farther the created work may not be used for any commercial purpose.
  
  > |
  
  > **Time Limit:**
  
  > This license shall stay in effect until 50 years from the date when a particular piece of this work was published. At that time those works older than 50 years shall be released into the public domain.
  
  I posted this in last weeks thread, but understandable no one saw it as I posted it like yesterday.
  

  • u/Xtraordinaire:

    50 years?
    
    Maybe I'm just a filthy commie pirate, but I feel 14+14 for the work is more than fair. Make it 15+15 because OCD.
    

    • u/space_fountain:

      When you say 14 + 14, do you mean 14 years with the possibility of another 14 year renewal? 
      
      Regardless, I think we can agree lifetime + 70 years is way too much. I've seen arguments that 14 years is ideal, I think there was an economics paper on it, but in the end I think it's quite subjective, there's just too many variable involved to say for sure. If I was saying that all rights should be reserved during that period I think I would agree with you, but with strong protections for fair use or at least stronger protections than what exists with current copyright law I don't think it's that much of an issue.
      

      • u/Xtraordinaire:

        Yes, 14 years and renewal if you haven't kicked the bucket.
        

  • u/PeridexisErrant:

    I strongly recommend just using a creative commons license - many programmers try to write their own, and it's uniformly a disaster. Using a standard licence means you can't make legal mistakes regarding unfamiliar jurisdictions, and users can be confident they understand it. 
    
    Feel free to add a notice explicitly noting fair use rights, declaring you won't prosecute $reasonable_behaviour, and that the work will transition to a CC0 license on $date (or public domain or best legal equivalent).
    

    • u/space_fountain:

      You might well be right, I guess my reason for not wanting that is that I want something closer to standard copyright than most licenses provide. I don't really want an open source license I want something that's closed source with exceptions rather than open source with restrictions.
      
      I realize copyright is complicated, but I'm not trying to do anything too complicated and I feel like if it fails some sort of legal test it would be likely to fail in favor of more restrictions rather than less.
      

      • u/PeridexisErrant:

        In that case, I suggest not using a license!
        
        Most of the rights you claim here are already granted by law, so the main problem is overeager prosecution.  In this case, something like the following (not legal language):
        
        > (c) $me, $year, all rights reserved.
        
        > To protect users of this work, I pledge not to allow prosecution of reasonable non-commercial use for any reason.  I further grant permission to make and distribute transformative works (not exact copies or very similar works) under the CC-BY-NC-SA license.  This work will fall under the CC0 License on $date.
        
        Or something, you should probably get a lawyer to draft it for you.
        

• u/blazinghand:

  Now that the pathfinder campaign I DMed has drawn to a close, I'm gearing up to play in a new Bash campaign. One of the character ideas I was lobbing back and forth with a friend was a brilliant planner, a perfect strategist. From limited information he can perfectly deduce what's going on, or what's likely to go on, and use the tools available or make plans to deal with it. While you can use the Bash chargen system to make mages, psychics, superhumans, mutants, healers, people who have laser eyes, and so on, the actual rules are very flexible, and allow for someone to be made like this.
  
  The basic problem, though, is that *I* am not a perfect strategist. So, how do I make a character whose power is "very good at predicting things and is properly prepared" in Bash? Actually it's fairly simple, and quite hilarious. I take the Conjuring and Summoning powers, with the restriction being mundane things. So, as a player, I don't need to actually explain how I figured things out beforehand. I can just make things up post-hoc! For example:
  
  *Ah, the hapless victim Donnie is actually Dr. Don Hieseldorf the mad scientist? Well... (rolls for conjuration)... you see, Dr. Hieseldorf, I saw through your disguise the moment you walked in. That red dust on your fingers, that only comes form 3 different mesas in the area, and the tear on your cuff would only come from a left-handed man using this kind of saw, whereas you were faking being right-handed. So, naturally, I deduced... etc etc. And that's why I'm now holding a plasma pistol that happens to counter your field effects! I've had it hidden on my person this whole time!*
  
  or, for the summoning....
  
  *Oh, the self-destruct mechanism is triggering a Pietium overload? Well, as it happens.. (rolls summoning)... from your microexpressions, I knew you were going to press a self-destruct button, and I already have a team of Pietium reactor engineers shutting down the reactor as we speak! How did I know it was a Pietium reactor? Simple, elementary even! it was the smell of almonds. which led me to believe...*
  
  Basically roleplaying the character will be "post-hoc explanations and rationalizations: the game" to explain all his mundane summons and conjurations. Spending the entire sessions bullshitting every time my character does something, and having that actually be a mechanic, is going to be a lot of fun.
  

  • u/Empiricist_or_not:

    Nice hack, but GAH you're making a Sherlock Holmes.
    

    • u/blazinghand:

      I know, right??!? It's going to be great, because, just like with Sherlock Holmes, every "explanation" for every "deduction" is going to be 100% pure post hoc retcon bullshit. Like, 
      "now you're standing exactly where i planned - on top of that explosive barrel that's been there *this whole time*" after the villain walks forward. Obviously, I planned nothing, but I can just use my power to generate it, etc and *it will have been there*.
      

• u/Faust91x:

  Any Fate/Stay Night or Fate/Zero fans?
  
  I woke up this morning thinking of how a rational Fate/Stay Night Holy Grail War  would be. I assume either the masters would organize and sacrifice all the servants at the same time in the ritual to open the path to Akasha or grant the wishes without needless bloodshed or have some warfare Punisher style where everyone stays in their haven waiting for information on the other and doing lots of scouting.
  
  I think learning the mystical and psychological weakness of the opponent would be essential and everyone would take measures to learn the enemy's identity without being discovered and procuring artifacts for scrying and mind reading/wiping.
  
  I think as soon as a master was discovered the information would be made public and everyone would nuke the enemy haven to take him out and wait for another to be discovered to minimize exposure.
  
  Either that or it would be about hiding all the time and wait for the other masters to slip and wipe each other although that wouldn't make for much of a compelling story.
  
  Now as for the classes, I think a rational combatant would purposely avoid classes that require high upkeep or frontal assaults as that would expose to danger so no Saber, Berserker or Lancer classes. Probably Rider or Assassin would be the best bets given that most combatants are immune to Casters despite their sheer versatility and Archers have a certain knack for betraying their handlers.
  
  Personally I think I'd choose a Rider given that they have high mobility which would be essential for scouting and hit and run tactics, generally good stats that make them able to hold their own against Sabers and Lancers along with a special and highly powerful ability which would be great as a last-resort/nuclear option in case there was no other escape and that would be a great end game.
  
  Thoughts?
  

  • u/Escapement:

    First of all, it seems to me that if I had knowledge that the previous ~4 times that the ritual known as the Holy Grail War was undertaken, everyone died and got nothing... the real winning move is to go to some city preferably not in Japan and bet that everyone would die again and again accomplish nothing, if the grail war had started up again. It seems like if you want to do something really fantastic with the power of the grail ritual then Counter Guardians etc will show up and kill you, and if you just want something mundane and easy then using another method than the grail war is probably easier. 
    
    That said, as far as rational actions go - if characters just murdered each other without playing the "I'm going to show off how cool I am and how much you suck" game, like 80% or more of the fights would have gone the other way. Waiting for the heroes allies to arrive instead of just killing them instantly, explaining things to your victims, doing really horrible stuff gratuitously for no payoff, giving people a fighting chance for no reason... among the canon cast for either of F/Z or F/SN, anyone who could keep their pride + sadism under control for a couple weeks would have really good odds of winning. Like, if in F/SN any of Caster or Illya or Gilgamesh had read the Evil Overlord's List they could make a pretty good go of winning the whole thing trivially.
    

  • u/scruiser:

    Escapement's answer is the only really rational one for someone with sane human values... but if my reasoning is skewed enough or my motivation is warped enough (i.e. like most Magi) I see some other options.  First, I don't think there is a single right answer, even given a single consistent set of values/goals, because the Meta of the war can change so much...
    
    If you are against six other Magi, proper Magi that is, a seven way geass scroll ensuring that all of you will fight "fairly" or at least to some prearranged terms would make it almost rational to participate in the first place.  The geass would guarantee the kind of fight Kayneth was expecting.  The Magi's servants fight, and each magi fights each other, matching mystery for mystery in a proper duel.  When a loser surrenders, they are allowed to go to the church and actually be safe.  For a no name magi like Waver Velvet its a great opportunity to build reputation (canonically he ended up as one of 12 lords of Clocktower, a pretty high rank for someone with no crest, no OP mysteries or special techniques, no connection).  For an established magi like Kayneth its a resume builder (show some fighting ability, network with your competitors, etc.).  For a serious magi, even if the other 4 times have been a bust, it is still a much closer chance to getting to the root than they would otherwise have.
    
    If the war is like the canonical 4th war, then a ruthless strategy of hiding and trying to catch each other off guard would probably be dominant.  Kiritsugu was really close to winning in canon.
    
    If the war is like the 5th war... if you are fighting to save bystander lives make friends with the other masters and just promise not to fight.  If you are fighting to win, hide and let the other masters kill a few servants, then bomb their school (or workplace, or whatever other public location they are stupid enough to go to in the middle of a war) with powerful conventional explosives.
    
    In general Beserker counters saber (and somewhat knight classes: lancer/rider), saber (and somewhat knight classes: lancer/rider) counters caster, caster with prep time counters anyone except saber, assassin counters any master alone but loses to any servant, assassin is hard countered by caster with territory creation.  Rider strategy depends on NP.
    
    >  I think a rational combatant would purposely avoid classes that require high upkeep or frontal assaults
    
    If you are a powerful intelligent heir to a 8 generation magi family, I think the upkeep cost isn't an issue.  If you possess some good defensive mystic codes, participating in the front line might even be a good trade-off for getting a servant without any kind of independent action.
    
    > Either that or it would be about hiding all the time and wait for the other masters to slip and wipe each other although that wouldn't make for much of a compelling story.
    
    I think this would be the logical dominate strategy.  If all the masters try this though, the ritual will fail because it needs at least some of the heroic spirits to die to even manifest the lesser grail.  If the rest of the master hide but two of them are dumb enough to fight I would try to gank the winner, and then steal the lesser grail while the other masters hide.
    
    > Personally I think I'd choose a Rider given that they have high mobility which would be essential for scouting and hit and run tactics,
    
    If I don't have a catalyst, assassin and try to gank the last surviving master after a week or two hiding.  If I could pick any catalyst... maybe Gilgamesh.  After summoning him, I would use all two or three command seals on a single order "Bind yourself in loyalty and obedience to me with the power of your treasures".  Somewhere in the Gate Of Babylon I bet Gilgamesh has some obedience/loyalty inducing NPs.  If he doesn't... maybe he will kill me quickly, or maybe I can blow the last seal and killing him.  If he does... gg, I can then just have him Enuma Elish any serious competition.  As for other servant choices... Nero can copy any skill, so if this war is jacked up and has more than 7 servants like Extra or Grand Order this might start to pay off in terms of shear number of skills copied.  Emiya is a good choice for sheer versatility in an efficient package.  He has a large array of NPs and can instantly identify other servants based on their weapon.  Zealot Assassin from Strange/Fake has like the ability of all the other hassassins, if I can find some method guaranteed to persuade her not to instant kill me for being an infidel.
    
    One more caveat though, I think the focus on raw power in a servant is only relevant prior to summoning.  After summoning, its about teamwork and compatibility.  
    
    Edit: forgot to give credit that my idea with Gilgamesh was from a one-shoot fanfic snippet where Rin summons Gilgamesh.  Can't remember where I saw it, so if anyone else has seen it and can credit author that would be nice.
    

    • u/Faust91x:

      Really good explanation of the caveats on the war and strategies.
      

  • u/IomKg:

    A few of your speculations come from a lot of knoledge that the characters in the series dont have.
    
    And the rest seem to base around the idea that in a rational Fate the characters themselves will be rational/logical/calculated/etc. Which doesnt necessarily follow. It just means that they will be consistant.
    You can be consistant while beeing prideful of your linage and understimating your oponnents.
    

• u/None:

  I've reached the point where rewriting my code in Haskell, with a monadic EDSL, will probably make it clearer, shorter, and easier to use than the current incarnation in an interpeted language built on Python and a bunch of Python plugins for the interpeter.
  
  Be very, very afraid.
  
  Also, two hierarchical models so far have supported my hypothesis about why hierarchical models work.  I just have to make a learning-curve graph with this second one and then cover the model from the paper by that Harvard guy from last month to show which way the causal arrow runs.
  
  Cower, brief mortals.
  

  • u/TaoGaming:

    Me code purdy some day.
    

    • u/None:

      Me code understandable by humans someday :-/.
      

      • u/GaBeRockKing:

        > Me code understandable by humans someday :-/.
        
        Me code understandable by computers someday :-/.
        

• u/None:

  Can anyone recommend a good site or way to publish original fiction that will let me keep my name on it/my copyright on it? I have no idea what I'm doing. Thanks in advance.
  

  • u/blazinghand:

    If you want to publish a work of original fiction under your name and reserve rights to it, I recommend [Kindle Direct Publishing](https://kdp.amazon.com/help?topicId=A6KILDRNSCOBA). You can make it available for free to Kindle Unlimited users, or charge for sales as with most ebooks. You also retain rights to publishing a physical book-- this would just be for electronic sales. /u/eaglejarl did this for his excellent story, The Two Year Emperor, so you can ask him questions about how to do it.
    

  • u/alexanderwales:

    It depends on what you want to do.
    
    If you want to just publish it, then as /u/blazinghand says, Kindle Direct Publishing is probably the way to go. You can go from raw text, to .mobi file, to having it available on Amazon in about half an hour. However, you can't give it away for free through that platform, which means hoops to jump through for anyone that wants to read what you've written. (On the plus side, possibly there's some profit in it.)
    
    If you want your own website, there are a bunch of options out there. If you want a blog format, Blogger is free and just has the standard "we have an unlimited license to publish your stuff on the website you're making with us". Wordpress is the other heavy hitter, but probably overkill unless you want lots of the other stuff it offers, and then you'd have to find your own hosting. And if you have your own hosting, then publishing online isn't too hard to do even without Wordpress.
    
    Let me know more about specifics. I've published through KDP, published a serial on my website, distributed through Patreon, and have used FictionPress and AO3, so I have some experience with the various ways to get fiction to people.
    

  • u/eaglejarl:

    /u/blazinghand: Thanks for the compliment. :>
    
    /u/elangs88: I'm happy to answer any questions you have about Amazon. If Amazon is more than you're looking for, you could also put it up on a free blog. (Wordpress, Blogspot, etc). And, of course, there's always traditional publishing. 
    
    As to rights...anything you write is automatically under copyright to you, regardless of whether you put a copyright notice on it. I wouldn't worry about it too much; most writing doesn't get stolen.
    

• u/aintso:

  Hello there. I have recently found a dash of self-respect, which, as I retrospectively notice, has been a huge factor in my reclusiveness.
  
  I've been lurking here and elsewhere in the diaspora for years now, but I'm inly now beginning to write something.
  
  I heartily recommend this "getting your shit together and getting out there" stuff to everyone who hasn't tried it yet.
  

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