Scott Alexander gave a 90% probability that UNSONG would get fewer hits than Slate Star Codex in 2016.
Unresolvable The public record could not settle it.
Prediction: Statements about events outside the person's control, checked once they fell due: did they come true?
What would count as true or false
This is judged on the outcome. TRUE if the total 2016 page views (hits) of the UNSONG website were lower than those of Slate Star Codex for the calendar year 2016. FALSE if UNSONG's 2016 hits equalled or exceeded SSC's. With no direct traffic data, Scott Alexander's own scoring of this prediction in his end-of-2016 review, in which he reports the result from his site statistics, counts as the record. MOSTLY TRUE or MOSTLY FALSE apply only if the comparison is reported for a period that differs slightly from calendar 2016, and then follow the direction of the result.
Set before the research began.
Evidence (4)
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E1 2016 Predictions: Calibration Results Slate Star Codex (Scott Alexander) · 31 December 2016 Own record
“Strikethrough’d are false. Intact are true. Italicized are getting thrown out because I can’t decide if they’re true or not.”
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E2 2016 Predictions: Calibration Results Slate Star Codex (Scott Alexander) · 31 December 2016 Own record
“Of 90% predictions, I got 16 right and 1 wrong, for a score of 94%”
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E3 Yearly Archives: 2016 - Slate Star Codex Slate Star Codex · 31 December 2016 Own record
“Strikethrough’d are false. Intact are true. Italicized are getting thrown out because I can’t decide if they’re true or not.”
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E4 Scott Alexander's Self-Evaluations - Econlib Econlib (Liberty Fund) · 6 April 2017
“I just learned that blogger Scott Alexander starts ends the year by scoring the accuracy of his numerous annual predictions: here are the results for 2014, 2015, and 2016.”
Reasoning
The criteria name Scott Alexander's end-of-2016 scoring post as the record for this prediction. In the fetched text of that post (E2, E4), the strikethrough and italics that show which predictions were true or false were lost, so the result for the UNSONG item can't be read. E3 gives only the total for all 90% predictions (16 right, 1 wrong), which doesn't show whether this one was right. E6 confirms that he scored his 2016 predictions but says nothing about the UNSONG traffic item.
Cite this claim
Scott Alexander, “Scott Alexander gave a 90% probability that UNSONG would get fewer hits than Slate Star Codex in 2016.” (said 25 January 2016). Verdict: unresolvable. Reliability API, claim c_06a7450459c8, method 0.1.0+8bea457b, dataset release v1.1.2. https://epistacklabs.com/claims/c_06a7450459c8
This claim is in dataset release v1.1.2, with the same verdict.
Reply to this claim
More prediction claims by Scott Alexander
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Resolved true
“I actually remember and grade these predictions publicly sometime in the year 2023: 90%”
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Mostly true
“Our scenario focuses on coding in particular because we think coding is what starts the intelligence explosion.”
The authors of the scenario think coding is what will start the intelligence explosion.
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Mostly true
“We expect that as the AI labs become more capable, they tell the government about this because they want government contracts, they want government support.”
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Mostly true
“In our scenario, that starts with cyber warfare, the government sees that these AIs are now as capable as the best human hackers, but can be deployed at humongous scale.”
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Resolved true
“So they become extremely interested and they discuss nationalizing the AI companies.”
Verdicts are made automatically; how verdicts are made.