From 2007 to 2009, Steven Kaas wrote the nowadays defunct and destroyed blog Black Belt Bayesian. In those days, he was a lot more actively transhumanist, singularitarian, atheist, and more of a futurist than he is today, and anyway managed to cleave an insight path that still today is all too seldom trod.
I recommend reading the entire archive, which if you're a slow reader like me shouldn't take more than three hours. All of the material is still available via the Wayback Machine, but it can be hard to navigate, so this post is a sort of course that makes it as convenient as feasible to see every post.
I'm a fan of reading things in chronological order. These pages put the older posts at the bottom, so you should read them bottom-to-top.
- July 2007, chronologically oldest page
- Second page of July 2007
- Third page of July 2007. This is where the blog starts growing its beard. This two-paragraph post is still the best introduction to anthropics. I still sometimes find myself needing to link to this one.
- August 2007, first page
- Second page of August 2007
- September 2007 Only one post. A good one.
- October 2007
- December 2007
- January 2008
- February 2008
- March 2008
- May 2008: The first three posts of this month are unavailable in the standard archive. However they are available at the top of this page. Time travel is weird sometimes.
- Second page of May 2008
- July 2008. DH7 is really important.
- August 2008: The first two posts are unreachable from the standard archive, but you can read them at the bottom of this page. The line "[P]romoting less than maximally accurate beliefs is an act of sabotage. Don’t do it to anyone unless you’d also slash their tires, because they’re Nazis or whatever. Specifically, don’t do it to yourself." is often quoted. Quoters usualy miss the point. It's not an approval of full exceptionless radical honesty. It's adopting the attitude that deception is an act of sabotage. There are times when you should lie, such as "because they're Nazis or whatever". Also sad is that the line is usually stripped from context. Meet the Groovies is an important post.
- Second page of August 2008
- September 2008. Make sure to read all of Aumann and Stability.
- January 2009
- February 2009. This is the best month. Causal Bottlenecks is the most impressive post in the whole archive. Shiny Pitchforks is important for multiple reasons. Make sure to read all of Second Nature.
- March 2009
- May 2009
- July 2009. I really like the paper linked in Quantum Wildlife.
- October 2009. The blog is already old and graying. So very sad.
- December 2009, the swan song.
old things return
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