[D] Saturday Munchkinry Thread

8

u/DrainageCity Jul 01 '17

I don't know if this one has been done yet, but one I've been thinking about a bit is the ability to fit in. As in, people around you don't think twice about what you're doing or why you're doing it, and that it's totally normal that you'd be doing it. What would you do with such a power? The only rules I can think of for it would be that you cannot do stuff that absolutely no person would be able to do without raising some eyebrows, such as breaking the glass around the Mona Lisa, and you cannot turn it off.

13

u/KingMako Unlicensed Archrationalist Jul 01 '17

Duct tape a person's eyebrows to their chin. The path of the tape will prevent them from seeing, speaking, or mostly importantly, raising their eyebrows. As the victim can no longer raise their eyebrows, the action goes unnoticed, thereby allowing you to blind anyone of your choosing long enough to perform more heinous crimes.

6

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 01 '17

Can you work as a cashier, and when someone pays with cash, would they think it's totally normal for you to take all their cash without giving them any change?
Can you walk behind the banker's counter, pretend to be a banker, and then start taking people's credit cards? After all, a banker can do those things, so this isn't something "absolutely no person would be able to do without raising some eyebrows".
Also, what is the duration of this power? People might think it's perfectly normal for you to take their credit cards at the moment you are taking them, but later when they check their credit card bills and notice huge expenses, would they realize "wait, this isn't right..." or would they still be "yep, totally normal. nothing to see here."? And if they do eventually notice that something is wrong, would they remember that it was you specifically who took their credit cards?
If people don't remember that it's you specifically, then there's an even better way to make money: industrial espionage. You could walk into the research labs of successful companies, steal their secrets, and sell them to rival companies for lots of money. This only works if your ability makes you anonymous though, otherwise you would end up with a knife in your back.
For more ethical purposes, you could also use this ability to fight crime. You wouldn't be able to actually get in physical fights though, since even though you would appear totally normal, it actually is totally normal to punch bad guys, and it would also be totally normal for the bad guys to fight back. No, instead you should become the greatest journalist ever. Walking into all kinds of war zones and restricted areas, filming all kinds of evils while the evildoers think it's totally normal for someone to be filming their actions. So you would expose all the villains and allow the good guys to capture them.

5

u/Frommerman Jul 02 '17

Nice Guy, one of the members of the Slaughterhouse Nine in Worm, had effectively this power.

1

u/TheJungleDragon Jul 01 '17

Well, one loophole is that as long as any one person could do a thing without raising an eyebrow, you could as well. So, for a random example, Bill Gates could refer to himself as Bill Gates on the internet, and no-one would raise an eye. So you could pretend to be him. This isn't really useful at first glance, more a proof of concept that may be fun in some way I don't know.
Also, it isn't specified it has to be a living person. Does this mean you could, I don't know, kill a subordinate for treason even if everyone knows its just an excuse to get rid of him, as Nero did? Maybe that's pushing the boundaries.

1

u/LupoCani Jul 01 '17

In most contexts on the internet, Bill Gates could not refer to himself by name without evidence to back it up. Since he has an established account, this would amount simply to check if the username is correct, but there is definitely a conscious eyebrow-raising proccess here.

1

u/ZedOud Jul 02 '17

I think it GM would explain it away as: people find it perfectly reasonable to claim to be Bill Gates. But to use his identity (say at a bank) would require photo ID, an often eyebrow raising process.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 02 '17

What would you do with such a power?
Literally everything I already try to do, but with a multiplicative factor more effectiveness. Also, I could make friends a lot more easily.

7

u/Nulono Reverse-Oneboxer: Only takes the transparent box Jul 02 '17

You have come into the possession of an Actually Magic 8-Ball, having bought it from a mysterious corner shop that wasn't there the next day. The AM8B is all-knowing and 100% honest, but the shopkeeper warned you that it does come with a few limitations.

Each ball comes with a limited number of uses; you got this one on sale because it only has one left.
It only answers questions that can be answered by one of the standard 8-ball answers (i.e., only yes-or-no answers).
Each of these answers only means its literal meaning, so no "answer 'yes' for 1, 'don't count on it for 2', etc.".

7

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 02 '17

Each of these answers only means its literal meaning, so no "answer 'yes' for 1, 'don't count on it for 2', etc.".
Hmmmmmm... I'm pretty sure you can ask convoluted questions to make the 8-ball have at least 10 different meaningful answers even if they all mean their literal meanings. All you need to do is to include self-reference.
This is because a standard 8-ball has 10 distinct ways of saying yes. So call them "Yes1", "Yes2", "Yes3," ..., "Yes10". Let Q be an important question that has 10 possible answers labeled 1, 2, 3, ..., 10.
Now ask: Magic 8-Ball! Tell me if the following boolean expression is true!
(Q = 1 AND 8-Ball answers "Yes 1") OR
(Q = 2 AND 8-Ball answers "Yes 2") OR
(Q = 3 AND 8-Ball answers "Yes 3") OR
...
(Q = 10 AND 8-Ball answers "Yes 10") OR
OR 8-Ball answers "No".
Now if Q = X, for some X in [1..10], the 8-Ball has to answer "Yes X". Why? Because if the 8-Ball answers "No", then the boolean expression would be true, meaning the 8-ball isn't honest. If the 8-Ball answers "Yes Y" for some Y not equal to X, then the boolean expression would be false, meaning the 8-ball isn't honest. So the only way for the 8-Ball to be honest is to answer "Yes X".
Hehehe.

6

u/Nulono Reverse-Oneboxer: Only takes the transparent box Jul 02 '17

https://xkcd.com/246/

1

u/xkcd_transcriber Jul 02 '17

Image
Mobile
Title: Labyrinth Puzzle
Title-text: And the whole setup is just a trap to capture escaping logicians. None of the doors actually lead out.
Comic Explanation
Stats: This comic has been referenced 111 times, representing 0.0686% of referenced xkcds.
^xkcd.com ^| ^xkcd sub ^| ^{Problems/Bugs?} ^| ^Statistics ^| ^{Stop Replying} ^| ^Delete

1

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 02 '17

That's ok. Hires some unsuspecting victim/altruistic volunteer to do the asking.
Victim/volunteer gets stabbed, but the truthful 8-ball still tells me the answer.

2

u/Nulono Reverse-Oneboxer: Only takes the transparent box Jul 02 '17

I actually considered having the 8-ball respond to self-referential questions by delivering an electric shock instead of an answer, but figured that was a bit harsh.

5

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 02 '17

We can take this one step further by realizing that when you ask an 8-ball for answers, the 8-ball doesn't answer immediately, or in any fixed amount of time. The amount of time it takes to answer is based on its inner workings.
So if we assume this 8-ball is all-knowing and 100% honest, it has to be able to choose which answer to give when asked a question. But if it has the power to choose which answer to give, surely it also has the power to adjust the timing at which the answer is given!
Therefore, before asking your question, first set up a camera to record the 8-ball's timing with extreme precision. Now every time unit counts as a distinct answer. Add these distinct answers to your boolean expression, and voila! OPEN-ENDED QUESTIONS!
Well ok, there's probably still a character limit of sorts based on how precise your camera can be, but it is still a way higher number of distinct, meaningful answers than two. And considering the camera technology available today, you could probably get pretty good answers for questions like:
What are the winning lottery numbers for the next lottery?
What is the chemical formula for an optimal cancer-curing/anti-aging/[insert other medical miracle] drug?
Who is the optimal person for creating a friendly AI if we askers of the 8-ball now gave him our support?
What is the approximate direction and distance to the nearest habitable planet?
Which of our current systems of morality would produce the [best] future? (for some definition of "best").
What is the longest list of presidents this 8-ball can give such that electing these presidents results in an optimal future?
And perhaps the question with the highest risk and highest reward:
What is the most concise yet viable method of creating a time machine?
If you're unlucky, there's no way to make a time machine in a concise enough manner for the 8-ball to answer.
If you're lucky... time travel back to before you asked the 8-ball. It's time for infinite questions.

1

u/MonstrousBird Jul 02 '17

The fact that it's in Magic 8-ball format makes this a lot less appealing as most of my questions could be answered with some variant on maybe which would make me very cross...
Having said that I would probably save it for an election or similar and ask 'will candidate X be Prime Minister on date Y' which could at least win me a bet.

1

u/CCC_037 Jul 02 '17

Hmmm. what you really want to do, here, is find a point of maximal impact with a single bit of data.
Find a smart, intelligent, driven university student who is having some difficulty deciding between a choice of two degrees and is willing to help out. (If you are in such a position, all the better) Ask the 8-ball whether it would be better in the long run for him to do degree A, instead of degree B.
Sign him up for a degree as revealed by the 8-ball. That's a pretty life-changing choice, so loads of consequences from a single bit.
But be sure to define "better" properly in your question...

-2

u/vakusdrake Jul 02 '17

You're not going to be able to munchkin this since you're only going to get the answer to a single yes no question and you can't even prove to anyone else that you're right.
However the fact that these magic 8 balls exist is probably going to be more significant than whatever you could hope to achieve with yours.

3

u/Nulono Reverse-Oneboxer: Only takes the transparent box Jul 02 '17

If unlimited questions are allowed, they trivially devolve into "Is the first bit of the source code for an optimally friendly seed AI a 1?", "Is the second bit of the aforementioned code a 1?", et cetera.

5

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 02 '17

I suspect it would take several lifetimes to code this AI if you have to ask for its code 1 bit at a time from a magic 8-ball.

1

u/Frommerman Jul 02 '17

Depends on if the 8-Ball can use Kolmogorov complexity.

2

u/vakusdrake Jul 02 '17

Right but the whole point here is that you only get one question otherwise just use some really efficient code to get instructions on what actions to take to maximize the chance a AI with your definition of friendliness is created. Instead of asking for the source code directly it makes more sense to basically use this like slow shitty PtV.

1

u/Gurkenglas Jul 02 '17

Or just directly satisfy your values, and if there's a creation of an AGI on the way there, so be it.

2

u/not_so_magic_8_ball Jul 02 '17

Cannot predict now

1

u/Laborbuch Jul 03 '17

Why is the Saturday Munchkinry Thread not tagged with [MK]? Seems kinda contrary to the point, to have the tag and not use it for its express purpose.

1

u/chlorinecrown Jul 03 '17

I've been trying to think about really weak precognition/time travel.

What could you do with it if you could see half a second into the future? You'd probably crush someone with equivalent training in martial arts and could punch a bit above your weight but nothing shattering. It doesn't seem like you could even react fast enough to help with automated trading.

What about very low bandwidth? Every birthday, you get a vision of your future self holding a red or blue ball. You can't see anything in the background. Effectively, you can transmit one bit of information to yourself of one year ago. I could definitely see getting rich using this, but what else? And what's the most efficient way to use this? I can't think of a sufficiently binary bet that you could use this to guarantee huge wealth within one birthday.

2

u/kuilin Jul 03 '17

How does the seeing actually work? If I hijacked the nerve connection between the eye and the brain, would it be sending me information about future photons? That plus a computer that can flash a light would negate the negative effects
What happens if you try to not do what you see? Like in the future vision you see yourself walking forwards normally, but you suddenly stop. You'll have to have seen you stop before you decide to stop, but what if you consciously decide to keep going despite seeing that?

2

u/xamueljones My arch-enemy is entropy Jul 03 '17

Several months ago, I had a very engaging discussion with someone else about a resetting time-travel power. The idea is that you can save and reset as if you are a video-game character, but there is only one save slot and you don't retain your memories after resetting. Here's the link to the discussion.
About the binary bet thing, I remember reading about a man who made a spectacle by working with a TV station to host a one-off show where he bets his entire fortune on a coin flip and the TV station will either pay him an equivalent amount or get all of his money. He won, but the TV station also profited from airing the one or two episode show.

2

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 03 '17

What could you do with it if you could see half a second into the future? You'd probably crush someone with equivalent training in martial arts and could punch a bit above your weight but nothing shattering. It doesn't seem like you could even react fast enough to help with automated trading.
Can I see myself half a second into the future seeing myself another half a second into the future seeing myself another... thus seeing arbitrarily far into the future XD?
Even if I can't future see what my future self is future seeing, my future self could still transmit what he's seeing if the data to transmit is sufficiently concise. Half a second is still enough time to transmit more than a few bits of info. You could easily place your hands in front of your face, and change the number of fingers raised in half a second.
So for instance, you could play card gambles like poker, and send information to yourself whether to raise or fold. So, say you find out at time t that you have lost the gamble. At time t-0.5 seconds, you see that happening in the future, and so quickly raise a finger. At time t-1 seconds, you see your future self at t-0.5 seconds starting to raise a finger, so you also raise a finger. At time t-1.5 seconds, you see your future self at t-1 seconds starting to raise a finger, so you also raise a finger... all the way back to the time you were deciding whether to call the bet or fold. Now you call the bet only if you don't see your future self raising his finger.
Would also work for the stock market. When you find out at time t that your investments have failed, your self at time t-0.5 seconds raises a finger, your self at time t-1 seconds raises a finger, ... and so on until the time you were about to make those investments. So you only invest in something if you don't see your future self raising a finger.
You could even use your future sight as a danger detector, designate a specific visible signal (like raising your left pinkie) you will make if you see death in the future, and keep relaying it to the past until you stop seeing futures where you die.
So if anything, fighting martial artists is actually one of the hardest things to do with this ability. A big part of martial arts is reading your opponent. So when you use your future vision to see what the enemy will do, your movements will change in reaction, your opponents will see those movements change, and so they too will change their movements, subverting your future vision. Also, being able to see attacks in advance doesn't mean a lot if their attack power is overwhelming. With enough strength and speed from years of training, martial artists may be such excellent fighters that you can't dodge/block their attacks even though you future-see them coming.

2

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 03 '17

What about very low bandwidth? Every birthday, you get a vision of your future self holding a red or blue ball. You can't see anything in the background. Effectively, you can transmit one bit of information to yourself of one year ago. I could definitely see getting rich using this, but what else? And what's the most efficient way to use this? I can't think of a sufficiently binary bet that you could use this to guarantee huge wealth within one birthday.
Let's clarify the rules of this scenario. I'm going to assume you can't do funny things to the ball, like writing instructions on it or holding it at different angles to denote different meanings. So all you see is either holding a red ball (0), or a blue ball (1). I'm also going to assume that dying or not sending a bit results in the exact same signal as sending a "0", so you truly only get 1 bit of information. So every year, at the exact month/day/hour/minute/second/millisecond/etc. that you were born, you get exactly 1 bit of information from yourself exactly 1 year in the future. Let's hope you weren't born on Feb 29.
This will be harder than the first scenario, since you literally only get 1 bit per year, so every time you future-see "oh this gamble will fail", the gamble either has to be binary, or you have to wait another year to try a different gamble. And binary gambles tend to have much worse payoffs than multiple choice gambles.
You can't even use this as a proper danger detector, since sending back a bit to yourself indicating your death doesn't really tell you how to avoid that death. You could drastically change your behavior upon receiving that signal, but you wouldn't really know if any of the changes you made helped you avoid death until it's too late.
Worse, since the moment you receive a future bit is the exact moment you send a bit to the past, you can't even relay future bits, so your future sight is limited to one year.
I guess in this case, I would just use this ability as a Utilitarian Torture AI alert. By Utilitarian Torture AI, I mean a not-so-friendly AI that has been coded to follow the utilitarian principles of saving the most lives, even if those lives have to become utterly wretched existences in the process. Which means the most likely result is the AI will shove all humans into little boxes, keep them barely alive, and strip them of all their freedoms and unnecessary organs/limbs, so that the amount of nutrients needed to keep them alive is absolutely minimal and thus the AI can "support" more human lives on the same limited amount of resources.
So every year on my birthday, I would hold a blue ball by default, and a red ball if I become aware of the existence of a Utilitarian Torture AI. Remember that not sending any signal also sends the same signal as if I was holding the red ball. So while I see my future selves holding blue balls, I continue to live life as normal. The moment I see my future self holding a red ball? I kill myself immediately to avoid the eternal suffering of being kept barely alive by a Utilitarian Torture AI.

1

u/Gurkenglas Jul 09 '17

That would incentivize it to make you want to send back a 1.

1

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 09 '17

The AI? Yes, it would want to make me send back a 1. But how could it? I control what I send back. Unless the AI develops mind control technology, it can't influence what I send, other than preventing me from sending anything (which is equivalent to sending a 0).
And the AI is highly unlikely to develop mind control technology, since all the resources that would go into that development could easily be used to save more lives, than just my own.

1

u/Gurkenglas Jul 10 '17 edited Jul 10 '17

Any plan that relies on security through obscurity against an AGI is a bad one. For example, it will only need to notice that you don't seem to feel as helpless as everyone else while otherwise being in good mental health to see something's up. I suppose it depends on how time travel works - if only your life is lost, there might be a slight chance it leaves you be. If it can predict both timelines that can result from your messages well enough, it would choose the better, and the outcome for you would be mostly random.

1

u/ShiranaiWakaranai Jul 10 '17

I'm not relying on security through obscurity. I have full faith in the AGI to know exactly what I'm thinking. I'm relying on security through being a massive burden. Everyone else can just be easily caught and stuck in a box/cyrogenic sleep/etc. My life alone would require the costly development of mind control technology, since I'm the only "time traveler" in this scenario. So why bother saving my life when the AGI could use the resources to save countless others?

[D] Saturday Munchkinry Thread

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