Silas Barta

Time to take a chance to (re)discover the rationalist virtues! Check out Yudkowsky’s original Twelve Virtues of Rationality, and talk about which ones feel meaningful to you. Related, you also might want to check out this recent Substack piece on intellectual humility by Gena Gorlin. *** The meetup is at Central Market, 4001 N. Lamar, […]

We’ll use this meetup to have fun with ChatGPT. Bring your own experiments with ChatGPT or related projects and have fun testing out new ideas with the group! *** The meetup is at Central Market, 4001 N. Lamar, in the cafe area. Look for the LW and SSC signs. People start arriving at 1:30 pm,

We’ll have another group debugging session. Bring your problems, your solutions, and your willingness to listen! *** The meetup is at Central Market, 4001 N. Lamar, in the cafe area. Look for the LW and SSC signs. People start arriving at 1:30 pm, and the main activity will begin at 2:30 pm. Please follow posted

In place of the usual meetup, Nicole has invited us to attend her baby shower! Amazon registry link. Time: May 6, 2:00 pm Location: Contact someone you know in Austin LW. Nicole’s invitation message: Please join us for a nontraditional baby shower by celebrating the upcoming birth of our second son Connor and all of

This time we’ll talk about self-determination in the context of rationality: specifically, how do you stay focused on doing what is the rational thing to do against outside influences? How do you fight akrasia? A few of us will be missing this for Eeyore’s birthday, an Austin tradition. However, Nicole will be present to lead

We’re going to try a new activity this time! We’ll try to answer (rationalist-themed) questions as a group, but where each person only gives three words of the answer at a time. This will test both our knowledge and our ability to coordinate — plus, probably, give a new appreciation for generative language models. ***

Time once again to play the Schelling game! We’ll take turns announcing a category and then try to pick the member of that category that everyone else did. I hope you’re good at reasoning about common knowledge! *** The meetup is at Central Market, 4001 N. Lamar, in the cafe area. Look for the LW

This time we’ll have a more casual discussion, sharing times that we made a deep connection with someone or formed close friendships. We’ll also talk about what circumstances favor or disfavor these kinds of connections. Take some time to think of past examples from your life, and consider checking out the LW section on relationships.

Time again for group debugging! Share what problems you’re running into in life, and see who can help with them. Refer to the guidelines for background on this activity. I will be gone at the online rationalist organizers’ conference, but Kyle will be there to facilitate. *** The meetup is at Central Market, 4001 N.

Note: We’re back to the Central Market on North Lamar for meetups. See footer. One importation rationalist skill is being well-calibrated: accurately gauging your confidence levels in your beliefs. Using numerical trivia questions drawn from a board game, we’ll each guess a confidence interval (range of possible values) on the answer, in an attempt to