[HN Gopher] Anthropic Bias (2020)
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Anthropic Bias (2020)
Author : atulvi
Score : 62 points
Date : 2021-08-28 06:46 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.anthropic-principle.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.anthropic-principle.com)
| opwieurposiu wrote:
| I am not convinced the universe actually is that well tuned for
| intelligent life. There are quite a few problems I experience on
| a daily basis.
|
| Speed of light is too slow, making communication difficult.
|
| Reactionless thrusters seem to be impossible, making travel slow
| and noisy.
|
| Over unity power generation impossible, making power expensive.
| Tenoke wrote:
| I guess the comment is in jest but the argument is that it's
| finetunned for life to be possible not comfortable.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| By definition, within Earth's evolutionary history, we are
| about the dumbest possible animals to achieve sapience.
| Perhaps similarly, our universe is one of the dumbest
| possible configurations to support our kind of life?
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Over unity power generation could result in some planet-
| destroying runaway accidents. Maybe we're better off without
| that one.
| baking wrote:
| The universe is obviously not tuned for space faring
| intelligent life. What the Anthropic Principle or Self-Sampling
| Assumption actually says is the universe is tuned to include
| our form of intelligent life, maybe others too, but not
| necessarily all forms of intelligent life. I haven't read the
| book, but basically we could not observe a universe that was
| not tuned for us, so it should not surprise us to see that it
| is.
| Sil_E_Goose wrote:
| Nick Bostrom, the author, also wrote "Superintelligence: Paths,
| Dangers, Strategies" [1], which HN readers may be more familiar
| with. If you enjoyed that book, I would highly recommend this one
| as well.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superintelligence:_Paths,_Dang...
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| This is a link to a 240 page book without any further context.
| Hard to have a discussion on something like that, since most
| people not already familiar with this book would have a hard time
| writing a meaningful comment about it.
|
| For things like this, it would be neat to institute a "HN Book
| Club," where readers informally schedule a (bi)weekly discussion
| on each chapter. I think that would help keep the discussion
| focused and easier to approach.
| scandox wrote:
| Discussion can be good, but I sometimes find that I'm happy to
| see no comments under something that is just of interest and
| doesn't really require comment.
| scythe wrote:
| Not (2020), (2002):
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_Bias_(book)
| WillDaSilva wrote:
| This digital copy of the book was released in February 2020
| julienchastang wrote:
| The print edition is available at AbeBooks for about $50. The
| publication date is listed as 2010, FWIW.
|
| https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?cm_sp=SearchF.
| ..
| grlass wrote:
| Another related view on this, especially Chapter 6, is Chapter 18
| of Scott Aaronson's "Quantum Computing since Democritus" [1],
| that discusses some interesting stuff you can do with SSA.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_Computing_Since_Democr...
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