Simulation theory
I suspect simulation theory runs into infinite regress. If we live in a simulated world, then how is the outer world, in which our creators live, created?
I don’t have sound understanding of simulation theory, but I suspect, since it proposes simulation as the basis of our world, it reduces evolution along time axis deterministic from some function. That is, state at timestamp t+1 follows, through a function, from state at time t.
This, I think, makes simulation theory similar to Laplace’s demon, which is mistaken. Both cannot explain the observed expansion of the universe, which as I understand is the reason why information exists ( as per 2nd law of thermodynamics, entropy of a closed system always increases. If universe is a closed system, then max. entropy should be reached and, hence, information cannot exist. However, if universe expands, at a faster rate than entropy increases, then information can exist - the gap between max. allowed entropy and the current entropy is information.
Theory of types
I came across a mention of Russell’s “theory of types” in Popper’s conjecture and refutations. Popper called it similar to Russell’s idea of classifying statements as either True, False, or Meaningless
TODO: study theory of types
Brief on (logical) classification of statements into True, False, and Meaningless
Recall, negation of False is True and vice versa, but negation of a meaningless statement is meaningless. To illustrate, both statements: “I’m cat years old” and its negation “I’m not cat years old” are meaningless.
I should caveat that statements that are meaningless, in the sense of logic, may not be meaningless overall. For instance, “cat” can be a reference of my cat or something other. Another example: “all animals are equal but some are more equal than others” (from Orwell’s animal farm) is logically meaningless but meaningful in the context of animal farm. Orwell’s example highlights that logically meaningless statements can be employed creatively in language.
Thought on GFT 2020 manuscript
In reference to subheading “People impact the world through institutions they build” page 13 GFT 2020 manuscript
Samo makes two key claims: the first, impact of people follows a Pareto distribution and the second, creating functional institutes is the means by which people are impactful.
Although I agree that founders of functional institutes are very impactful (for instance, napolean was very impactful), I disagree that creating a functional institute is the only means - I believe it’s one of the means.
Samo defines an institute as a company, government, organisation and excludes things such as “an idea”. But I think many (scientific) ideas/theories from certain people have had far greater impact than many of the functional institutes.
Newton’s theory of gravity, albeit being a fantastic approximation, was very important the industrial revolution and later sending men to moon. His theory inspired multiple generations, of the false belief, that certain knowledge is attainable. Descartes’s optimistic theory of knowledge (i.e. men can know, thus men is free) inspired multiple social/political revolutions, the remnants of which are still felt in the world.
Neither newton nor Descartes built an institution in Samo’s sense but they probably built an instiution, or a framework, of ideas. These two are just two counterexamples among many.
Samo further claims that analysing the great founders (the ones that create functional institutes) provides insight into the future. Here, I disagree again. No analysis of any great founder of pre-scientific revolution era would have predicted the revolution in physics, medicine, astronomy, and mathematics during the scientific revolution. Nor an analysis of great founders in pre-1900s would have predicted the revolution of world view caused by theory of relativity and invention of quantum theory. Both of which are immensely impactful (both in terms of practice and theory) in the world today.
I think great founders of functional institutions are very impactful, and par-take in shaping the coming generations, but I believe they form only one component of the complex system that shapes the future. I believe knowing this will help any great founder further their impact.
Data privacy, hospitals, KYC, and India
I was curious of data protection laws in India, especially in the medical sector. And as it turns out, India does not have a proper framework for consumer/patient data protection. Privacy was recognised as a fundamental right only very recently in 2017. Leveraging which some in the government accumulated enough strength to finally recognise the need of digital privacy protection. Hence, DPDP (digital personal data protection act) was drafted. But who knows when it will be implemented.
Chat with CC, eth governance, and nation states
Yesterday I was chatting with CC about multiple topics: rumors that China,Russia are damaging under-sea cables, his experience at IETF conference taiwan (it’s funny that the conference was full of laywers and not developors, especially given that Taiwan has many open source developers), ethereum governance, and why is crypto relevant to the world.
I wonder why crypto is relevant? Why is it really relevant? I thought for while. Started to blabber a few words and transitioned to the following claim: it’s relevant because it provides an alternate (credibly neutral) system, one that is independent of nation states. I’ve a choice now. I can make the choice of using crypto instead of physical banks for financial transactions, or any other life essential. This reduces the power of my state, which at the moment holds arbitrary power and bestows arbitrary powers to banks, insurance provides, etc. etc1.
Since crypto is credibly neutral, I find it a better system to rely on than existing governments. The fact that it’s more efficient and is capable to provide more innovative solutions than traditinal system can, is probably a side effect of being “credily neutral” (no-one’s stopping you, etc etc.).
But then CC asked what would the transition look like? Would nation states completely dissapear? Or would we co-exist? I think we will co-exist. Or I should say, I prefer to co-exist than one system suddenly taking over the other like a revolution. I prefer for transation to happen overtime.
But what exactly will the transition look like? Would we pollute the existing states from within and gradually replace each one of their troops with one of ours? Or would we build a new system and gradually force nation states to change by accumulating power. The former sounds interesting, but I bet is very hard to do. I find it quite difficult to poison these states from within and change their color 2. The main reason is: there are very few agentic people in the government and almost all the non-agentic ones don’t want things to change. Most care about maintaining their office in a moderate state. Because in government you’re never awarded for new things but penalised when something goes wrong.
I expect there will exist (many) small “physical” islands of which the governments are crypto-native (not just in words but also in principles - that is, power to the people, no censorship, etc. etc.). I expect society in these islands to have much better life, much innovative businesses, and way more (compared to nation states) functional institutes. In the beginning these islands will be small and will require key political connections to shield themselves from other nation states. In this aspect, these islands will have to be strategic. But, then, I expect these islands to gradually start commanding more power than existing states (as no. of inhabitants increase). And eventually the power needle will tip over. Some nation states will realise and start to become more like these islands. Some will not change but adapt to the new power dynamic and others will gradually disappear.
Crypto onramp India
I was searching for a way to onramp to crypto in India and surprised to find that there exists none. Probably there exist a space for player that provides compliant on-ramp and is trusted. At the start, it should only provide onramp - i.e. act as a money transmitter, build some trust and then add other products.
Make lima spit ssh config for default instance:
limactl show-ssh –format=config default
Helpful thread for “mental model of borrow checker in rust”