𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc

Philosopher of computer science, software engineer, artist, musician, meta-specialist, exotericist, panoptimist. Advocate of Progress. 🇺🇸

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

I write about the overlap between David Deutsch's scientific worldview and some of the oldest views in the world.

I reconcile them wherever possible, constructively criticize what isn't, and always seek better explanations of our world.

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

But a person’s agency is sacrosanct, insofar as it isn’t abused in order to violate anyone’s agency.

The ethical path is to share explanations so good they cannot be denied.

[Brivael Le Pogam @brivael]

Dans le manifeste "techno-optimiste" de Marc Andreessen, il y a une phrase qui m'a marqué :

"Our enemies are not bad people – but rather bad ideas."

Nos ennemis ne sont pas des mauvaises personnes. Ce sont des mauvaises idées.

Prenons Jancovici. L'homme est brillant, sincère, travailleur. Il ne se lève pas le matin en se disant qu'il va nuire à l'humanité. Mais l'idée qu'il porte la décroissance, le rationnement, la frugalité érigée en horizon civilisationnel est une idée profondément destructrice. Elle prend des esprits brillants et les transforme en commissaires politiques d'un futur appauvri.

Et le plus fascinant, c'est ce que cette idée fait aux gens qui l'adoptent.

Dans mon entourage, une grosse partie de mes amis est sur cette ligne décroissantiste, avec tout le package qui va avec. L'argent c'est mal mais ils en veulent. Il faut moins prendre l'avion mais ils rêvent de voyager partout. Il faut consommer moins mais ils ne renoncent à rien de ce qu'ils aiment vraiment.

Et tous ont un point commun : ils sont déprimés. L'un d'eux m'a même confié qu'il était sous antidépresseurs.

Ce n'est pas un hasard. C'est mécanique.

Quand tu crois que ton désir de vivre, de créer, de t'élever est moralement suspect tu te détruis de l'intérieur. Tu passes ta vie à t'excuser d'exister. Tu vis dans la dissonance permanente entre ce que ton corps veut (plus, mieux, plus loin) et ce que ton idéologie t'ordonne (moins, sobre, immobile).

D'où ma théorie :

Quand on pense quelque chose de fondamentalement faux décroissance, communisme, extrémisme religieux (de tout ordre) ce n'est qu'une question de temps avant que ça devienne vraiment destructeur.

D'abord pour soi. Puis pour les autres.

Les mauvaises idées tuent. Lentement chez ceux qui y croient, brutalement chez ceux qui les subissent.

C'est pour ça que la bataille des idées n'est pas un luxe d'intellectuel. C'est la bataille la plus importante de notre époque.

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

@sharbel There’s an infinity of possible trading strategies…

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

@elonmusk @wavetossed Prediction merely comes from explanations, and those impart understanding, not intelligence.

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

@PeterDiamandis We are entering the singularity

[Rothmus 🏴 @Rothmus]

🎯

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

@Math_files Bayes’ Theorem is just a statement about conditional probabilities.

It says if you have P(A), P(B), and P(B|A), here’s how P(A|B) relates to them. Full stop.

It’s as much “about belief” as the Pythagorean theorem is about carpentry.

[Claude @claudeai]

Introducing Claude Opus 4.6. Our smartest model got an upgrade.

Opus 4.6 plans more carefully, sustains agentic tasks for longer, operates reliably in massive codebases, and catches its own mistakes.

It’s also our first Opus-class model with 1M token context in beta.

[Prof. Brian Keating @Briankeating]

The Quantum Theory No One Dares Explain! @DavidDeutschOxf

Timestamp:
02:15 – David Deutsch introduces the idea that infinity is not just a mathematical abstraction but a physical reality.
06:42 – He emphasizes that understanding infinity is central to progress in both science and philosophy.
11:03 – Discussion on how infinity challenges human intuition and traditional explanations.
18:29 – Deutsch argues that good explanations must account for infinity, not avoid it.
23:51 – He contrasts finite vs. infinite models of the universe.
30:14 – Infinity as an unavoidable aspect of quantum mechanics and the multiverse.
37:40 – Practical implications: infinity changes how we view knowledge, discovery, and human progress.
45:22 – He warns against simplistic or “bad” explanations that ignore infinite possibilities.
53:09 – Closing: infinity should be embraced as part of reality, not feared or reduced.

[𝔸𝕫𝕒 r/acc @Azaeres]

The fact that facts have been used to hurt people does not mean our best strategy is to abhor the facts.

Drifting further from understanding our world only hurts people.

[Anthony @Catholicizm1]

Might be the greatest clip I’ve ever seen.

[Brett Pike @ClassicLearner]

Slavery had been the norm throughout all of history, for thousands of years, impacting all people, including millions of Europeans enslaved in the Ottoman Empire - which had institutionalized the sexual slavery of European women. Yet children are led to believe that slavery was a uniquely American activity.

Now why do you think that is?

[Rock Chartrand @RockChartrand]

The chart is real. Your conclusion is not.

The split between productivity and worker pay after the 1970s doesn’t show “the death of capitalism.” It shows the rise of everything that isn’t capitalism:

• Fiat money and inflation after the end of the gold standard
• Payroll taxes and benefit mandates that hide compensation in non-cash costs
• Licensing laws, zoning, and regulation that kill competition and wage mobility
• Union protection of incumbents at the expense of new workers
• Corporate lobbying for regulation that blocks smaller, rival firms
• Government-run education producing workers who can’t bargain for value

Hourly wages appear flat because compensation was shifted into healthcare, payroll taxes, and compliance overhead. Total compensation has continued to track productivity far more closely. The problem is that the state forced compensation to flow through bureaucratic bottlenecks rather than the worker’s hands.

What you’re calling “the death of true capitalism” is actually the triumph of government-managed markets.
When the state rigs the rules, prices signal politics instead of value.

Capitalism didn’t fail. It was replaced.

If productivity rises but your paycheck doesn’t, the first question is: Who inserted themselves between you and the value you produce?

The answer is never “capitalism.” It’s always “the people who claim to be protecting you.”

[Knowledge Theorie @TOKphysics]

Justificationism is false. In science, we cannot justify our knowledge as true because no amount of evidence ever shows something might not be shown false, no matter how confident or close you think you might be to getting to absolute certainty. @ToKTeacher

[Deutsch Explains @DeutschExplains]

"When we succeed in solving a problem, scientific or otherwise, we end up with a set of theories which, though they are not problem-free, we find preferable to the theories we started with."
@DavidDeutschOxf

[Brett Hall @ToKTeacher]

A creative person to have the idea.

A dumb AI to translate it into code.

A Universal Constructor to build it.

[Arjun Khemani @arjunkhemani]

If you take pride in being an “expert” in your knowledge, you may find it harder to improve upon it.

Meanwhile, an outsider – unburdened by the structure of your knowledge – might come up with a novel idea that pushes your entire field forward.

“It is important that students bring a certain ragamuffin, barefoot, irreverence to their studies; they are not here to worship what is known, but to question it.” – Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man

[Thibault @thib_boi]

LLM are simultaneously an incredible technology (I used them everyday) and somehow overrated by some people.

[Thibault @thib_boi]

I like this new axis of political divide: futurism vs. primitivism.

The axis I personally use is: antihuman vs. pro-human.

I'm also fine with anti-Enlightenment vs. pro-Enlightenment.

[Thibault @thib_boi]

@bayeslord Because utopia implies a state where no more progress can be made. This is of course impossible.

Also in that state it does not make sense to question or criticize. That’s a very dangerous thing to accept.

[Prof. Brian Keating @Briankeating]

Enjoy this rare @DavidDeutschOxf interview with a fellow physicist. We covered a tremendous amount of intellectual terrain from his epochal book, The Beginning of Infinity, to the flaws of philosophy, to the future of quantum computing.
📺: https://t.co/eJERpCzksi

[Brett Hall @ToKTeacher]

Rather than “predicting the future” *explaining the present, the past and the timeless* is a better metric.

And that is a binary. People do it: but no other system can (chatbots *seem to* in the same way books do: by reproducing ideas created in the minds of living people).