2009.04.25 19:00 - Luck

The Guardian for this meeting was Pema Pera. The comments are by Pema Pera.

Pila Mulligan: hi Pema
Pema Pera: Hi Pila and hi Peer!
Pila Mulligan: hi Peer
Peer Infinity hugs you both :)
Pema Pera: :)
Pila Mulligan: and a hug for you also, thanks
Peer Infinity: :D
Pila Mulligan: an excellent campaign (free hugs)
Peer Infinity: I agree :)
Pema Pera: :-)

Peer Infinity: so... what's the topic for today?
Pila Mulligan: so far there is not onoe ... yet
Pema Pera: we don't normally have a fixed topic, Peer
Peer Infinity: ok
Pema Pera: a few times a week we have what we call a "theme session
Pila Mulligan: is there a topic you wouldl ike?
Pila Mulligan: would like*
Peer Infinity: hmm, I dunno...
Peer Infinity: I guess we could talk about PaB itself...
Pema Pera: Hi Steve
Pila Mulligan: hi Steve, hi Rowan
stevenaia Michinaga: hi Pila
stevenaia Michinaga: Peer
Pema Pera: and Hi Rowan, great to see you again !!!
Peer Infinity: hi Steve and rowan :)
Rowan Masala: Hi all :)
stevenaia Michinaga: still rezzing
stevenaia Michinaga: Hi Pema
Rowan Masala: not trying to be anti-social
Pema Pera: sure, Peer, that would be fine!
Rowan Masala: just need a brown cushion
Pema Pera: Do you have any questions about Play as Being?
Peer Infinity gasps at the number of google results for "play as being"...
Pema Pera: and have you tried the 9-sec pauses?
Peer Infinity: well, um... I already have answers for the three main questions that the 9-second pauses are supposed to be for...
Peer Infinity: and no, I haven't done the pauses
Pema Pera: it may be fun to try, you know, it takes only 9 seconds :-)
Pema Pera: yes, rowan, I also prefer the brown cushions :)
Pila Mulligan: actually, in a few more minutes, there will be a 90 second pause here
Pema Pera: yeah, we are going overboard now :)
stevenaia Michinaga: Strange... the moments I do meditate, which aren;t regularly... usually result in interesting insights
Peer Infinity: (we already talked about my answers in a previous session: http://playasbeing.wik.is/Chat_Logs/2009/03/2009.03.27_19%3a00_-_Free_will_and_squidgy_carbon_water_things

Pila Mulligan: I have a topic :)
Rowan Masala: and no evolution in your answers since then?
Peer Infinity: no, my answers are pretty much as far as you can go...
Pila Mulligan: topic idea: luck
Pema Pera: I yes, I remember now, upon rereading: Peer Infinity: the questions were: "What is reality?", "What is the meaning of life?", and "Who am I?"
Peer Infinity: yes :)
Pema Pera: what about luck, Pila?
Pila Mulligan: luck is a nice not quite metaphysical topic that can be discussed from several angles
stevenaia Michinaga: luck=fate?
Rowan Masala: or fortune
stevenaia Michinaga: they do relate to time as well
Rowan Masala: when was the last time you all felt lucky, or fortunate?
Pila Mulligan: just luck :)
Pila Mulligan: one evening here, at this time as I recall, Threedee and Pema were debating, and the idea occurred to me then that luck may be a common ground topic for people coming from such different views of things

Peer Infinity: the question I wanted to ask was: why doesn't the PaB wiki have pages about specific concepts? You have all these great conversations about deep philosophical topics, but you just dump the chat logs onto the wiki, rather than creating article pages summarizing your findings so far... you don't even have pages about the definitions that people keep debating here!
Pema Pera: (PaB bell: 90 seconds of silence . . . .)
Pila Mulligan: ahh, Peer, are you volunteering?
Rowan Masala smiles quietly
Peer Infinity: hehe... I'm already helping to do exactly that on the Less Wrong wiki... :)
Pila Mulligan: how's it going?
stevenaia Michinaga: there are the chronicalers and the scribes which can do that
Pila Mulligan: it is a big task, I bet
Peer Infinity: http://lesswrong.wikia.com
Peer Infinity: we're just getting started, actually...
Peer Infinity: and yes, it is a big task...
Pila Mulligan: topical organization is very rational
Pila Mulligan: but is rationalism the *only* art of obtaining beliefs that correspond to reality
Peer Infinity: and reality is overrated? :P
Pila Mulligan: :)
stevenaia Michinaga: wonders how much rationality there is in reality
Pila Mulligan: about half I'd say
stevenaia Michinaga: :)
stevenaia Michinaga: have for you, half for me?
Pila Mulligan: that's generous in some culutres
Pila Mulligan: my these is premised on the observation that if you approach reality carefully it can improve your luck
Pila Mulligan: theme*
Pila Mulligan: now that is not rational, is it
stevenaia Michinaga: isn;t luck just probability?
Pila Mulligan: that's the rational side of it
Pila Mulligan: on the irrational side, luck is like a well
Pila Mulligan: everyone hopes to draw from it some time
Pila Mulligan: kind of like praying
Pila Mulligan: you at least may try it when you need it
Peer Infinity is tempted to say "luck is an illusion"...
Pila Mulligan: yes, but prabability is not
Pila Mulligan: probability
Peer Infinity: right :)
Pila Mulligan: so to follow my view, you have to step over into the world reason calls illusion
Pila Mulligan: like Alice
Pila Mulligan: and maybe see pink bunnies talking
Peer Infinity giggles :)
Pila Mulligan: :)
Pila Mulligan: have you ever felt lucky?
stevenaia Michinaga: step over it to fraw from the "well"
Pila Mulligan: yep (draw)
stevenaia Michinaga: *draw
Pema Pera: Hi Lelaki!
Pema Pera: feel free to sit down with us, if you like
Peer Infinity sighs... at least you could tag the chat logs to show what topics were discussed...
Peer Infinity: luck
Pila Mulligan: the topics are sometimes reflected in the titles Peer
Peer Infinity: sometimes...
Peer Infinity: but there is no way to browse through the wiki by topic
stevenaia Michinaga: so there is situlational luck.. thike that care missed hitting me and there is life;s luck... Pila is lucky to have lives such a wonderful life, luck viewed by others
Pila Mulligan: but like poems, sometimes the titles are not directly informative
stevenaia Michinaga: that car
Pila Mulligan: Luck (also called fortuity) is a chance happening, or that which happens beyond a person's control. Luck can be good or bad (as in; Good fortune or misfortune).
Pila Mulligan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luck
Pila Mulligan: a force that brings good fortune or adversity
Pila Mulligan: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/luck
Pila Mulligan: so we have defined luck in our language -- it must be something
stevenaia Michinaga: Peer, the wikis's ahve the ability to be taged, anyone can add then
Peer Infinity: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Luck
Peer Infinity: :)
Peer Infinity: steve: how?
stevenaia Michinaga: in the menus the tags reside at the bottom
Peer Infinity finally creates an account for the wiki...
stevenaia Michinaga: there are guidelines in the instructions but given the 28 different sessions, tagging can be random
Peer Infinity: better than nothing
Pila Mulligan: how do the tags work?
Peer Infinity: um... it's not giving me the option to add tags...
stevenaia Michinaga: don;t ahve a clue
Pema Pera: use the option near the top
Peer Infinity: oh, found it
stevenaia Michinaga: :)
Pema Pera: :)
stevenaia Michinaga: fell free to tag those you have read
Peer Infinity: actually, um... I don't bother to read these pages myself...
Peer Infinity: I just sometimes come here for fun :)
Pema Pera: Pila, was there anything specific you would like to discuss about "luck"?
Pema Pera: I know that you have brought it up a few times
Pema Pera: but I'm not sure what direction you would like to go with it

gina Broono: hello everyone
Pema Pera: Hi Gina!
Pila Mulligan: hi Gina
stevenaia Michinaga: is this wasn;t enjoyable, educational or insightful, I;m not sure we would be here
Pila Mulligan: well, I'm not really fixed on any particular aspect of it Pema, it just seems like a fair common ground topic for a group of people with diverse views
stevenaia Michinaga: hello Gina..smiles
Peer Infinity: anyway, the reason why I recommended tagging, or maybe creating articles for concepts that have already been discussed, is so that rather than repeating the same debates about definitions and such, we can just refer to the wiki, and continue with whatever the toopic was before we got sidetracked by a debate about definitions...
gina Broono: Hello Stevenaia
Peer Infinity: though I'm still kinda new here, I don't really know how often that happens
Peer Infinity: or how much stuff is repeated
Pila Mulligan: i suspect everyone has had at least a few occsions where they felt lucky or unlucky
Peer Infinity: or even if you have anything against repeating stuff...
Pema Pera: it would be an option, Peer, but as we said, someone has to do it, and to do it reasonably consistently
Pema Pera: and nobody has volunteered so far
gina Broono: that is quite an undertaking
Pema Pera: we talked about it more than half a year ago
Peer Infinity: how hard would it be for whoever posts the chat log, to just spend a few extra seconds tagging its main topics?
Pema Pera: some people do, I believe, most don't I think, Peer
Pila Mulligan: how does tagging work?
Peer Infinity: also, there should be an easily accessible list of all tags somewhere in the wiki, but I haven't found it yet...
stevenaia Michinaga: deciding the words to used in the tag isn;t always as easy as it looks
Pila Mulligan: so it becomes an index then?
Pema Pera: yes
Pila Mulligan: thanks (non-geek)
stevenaia Michinaga: is ahving 200 listing for being going to help anyone
Pila Mulligan is tech challenged
gina Broono: it will be too much reading material to rummage through
gina Broono: let's just live in the present, is that OK?
Peer Infinity: I'm not insisting that someone must go through all the old logs and tag them...
Peer Infinity: just that... I think the wiki desperately needs some way to browse through it by topic...
Pila Mulligan: themes seem to develop in the existing scheme, and then recognized theme sessions are set up and announced -- that seems to be as close as we have gotten so far
stevenaia Michinaga: I ahve tried to search the wiki for some specific known items, and found it's search abilities very limited
Pema Pera: yes
stevenaia Michinaga: its
Pila Mulligan: yes, the search returns too many things at once
Pema Pera: and the search is not time ordered either
stevenaia Michinaga: and limits you to 250 sessions
stevenaia Michinaga: or so
Pila Mulligan: only :)
Pema Pera: btw, RL is calling, I'll have to get going
Pila Mulligan: bye Pema
stevenaia Michinaga: bye pema
Peer Infinity: ok, bye Pema
Pema Pera: bfn!

Peer Infinity: who is in charge of the wiki, by the way? who set it up originally?
stevenaia Michinaga: it was selected by a Guardian, Sylectra as being better than the Blog we started with
Pila Mulligan: it is a nice tool
stevenaia Michinaga: as a better way to post and present the logs
stevenaia Michinaga: eventually the early blogs were moved to the wiki but remain in the blogs as well
Peer Infinity: would Sylectra have any idea how to add an index of all tags?
stevenaia Michinaga: don;t know
stevenaia Michinaga: I know there were tagging guildelines somewhere
stevenaia Michinaga: in the guardian instructions
Peer Infinity: heh...
stevenaia Michinaga: I;m sure some clever programer can scan the tags and post them somewhere (hints to the more adept in the group)
stevenaia Michinaga: but it would be far from complete
Peer Infinity: the wiki should have a built-in tool for that...
stevenaia Michinaga: ome would think, ther emust be a reason for having tags
Peer Infinity: I'm used to MediaWiki. I haven't used this MindTouch wiki format before...
gina Broono: see you later, have a nice evening all
stevenaia Michinaga: bye gina
Pila Mulligan: bye gine
Pila Mulligan: gina*
stevenaia Michinaga: hi Sophia
Pila Mulligan: does MediaWiki make tag indexes?
Peer Infinity: MediaWiki has a whole lot of useful features :)
Pila Mulligan: hi SophiaSharon
Peer Infinity: and yes, tag indexes is one of them :)
Peer Infinity: actually, MediaWiki calls them Categories, not tags
Pila Mulligan: maybe PaB should use it instead
Peer Infinity: maybe
stevenaia Michinaga: votes for Pila to move the wiki entries
stevenaia Michinaga: :)
Peer Infinity googles "import MindTouch to MediaWiki"...
Pila Mulligan could not import email from Outlook to Thunderbird
Peer Infinity: though, um... for all I know, MindTouch could be a better format than MediaWiki, I'm not very familiar with it yet
stevenaia Michinaga: if we are lucky, the tags will appear and the searching can begin
stevenaia Michinaga: that kind of luck Pila?
Peer Infinity: hehe :)
Pila Mulligan: here's an interesting artcile: "head of a psychology research department at the University of Hertfordshire ... for the past eight years, he and his colleagues at the university's Perrott-Warrick Research Unit have studied what makes some people lucky and others not ... conducting thousands of interviews and hundreds of experiments..." http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/...litycheck.html
Pila Mulligan: "Unlucky people are stuck in routines. When they see something new, they want no part of it. Lucky people always want something new. They're prepared to take risks and relaxed enough to see the opportunities in the first place."
stevenaia Michinaga: I would assume those with a positive utluck would tend to appear lucking (accepting) in their circumstances
stevenaia Michinaga: lucky
stevenaia Michinaga: lucky of one may not be so for another
SophiaSharon Larnia: that is interesting, so lucky people have a higher tolerance for risk, at least in the view of this reseacher
Pila Mulligan: "They practice "counterfactual thinking." The degree to which you think that something is fortunate or not is the degree to which you generate alternatives that are better or worse."
stevenaia Michinaga: oh.. he already knew that...smiles
SophiaSharon Larnia: I agree with you Steve
Pila Mulligan: "In the sense of organizational culture and identity, I think that some organizations will be seen as lucky and successful and others will be seen as unlucky, in the same way that individuals are."
SophiaSharon Larnia: (the accepting circumstances part)
stevenaia Michinaga: nods
Pila Mulligan: well, there you have a university research department head's view of a rational study of luck
SophiaSharon Larnia: awesome
Pila Mulligan: for 8 years no less :)
Pila Mulligan: really
stevenaia Michinaga: probably as long as he could make the grant last
Pila Mulligan: :) probably
Pila Mulligan: but then he wrote a book to keep up the cash flow
Pila Mulligan: he was lucky I guess
SophiaSharon Larnia: I dont get the term counterfactual, the difinition seems counterintutive for it ;p
Pila Mulligan: yes, I did not follow that one well either
Pila Mulligan: academic language perhaps
SophiaSharon Larnia: but for any 'new' field of study like this, you'd have to come up with anew language
SophiaSharon Larnia: like most I thinhk of as a result of these sessions lol
SophiaSharon Larnia: (typos, sorries)
Pila Mulligan: here's how he explained that Steve: "Unlucky people say, "I can't believe I've been in another car accident." Lucky people go, "Wonderful. Yes, I had a car accident, but I wasn't killed. And I met the guy in the other car, and we got on really well, and there might be a relationship there." What's interesting is that both ways of thinking are unconscious and automatic. It would never occur to the unlucky people to see it a different way."
stevenaia Michinaga: yes
stevenaia Michinaga: welcome to my world
Pila Mulligan: so he's kind of psychoanalyzing people's views
stevenaia Michinaga: so luck is just another way of looking at the world
Pila Mulligan: in this fellow's work it seems to be aprtly that, at least
Pila Mulligan: partly*
stevenaia Michinaga: or nothing more than that
Pila Mulligan: but what i was thinking about actually was how, if you can say you have expereinced luck, it oculd relate to the topic wu wei, something that comes up here from time to time
Rowan Masala nods
Pila Mulligan: then it could be more than a point of view
Pila Mulligan: more subatnative
Pila Mulligan: substantive
stevenaia Michinaga: some underlying substance?
Pila Mulligan: :)
stevenaia Michinaga: like, oh no, I;m stuck in luck
stevenaia Michinaga: why aren;t you?
Pila Mulligan: well, wu wei suggests being in harmony with nature, and if there is a natural flow of things, and if you are in harmony with it, then things may be naturally smoother
Peer Infinity: ok, after some basic research, it turns out that trying to convert the PaB wiki to MediaWiki would be a massive job...
Peer Infinity: not worth the effort
Pila Mulligan: thanks for looking into it Peer
Pila Mulligan: save some headaches
Pila Mulligan: one result of things being smoother could be called luck
Pila Mulligan: so trying to convert the PaB wiki to MediaWiki would not yet be in harmony with wiki nature
Peer Infinity: right
Pila Mulligan: = bad luck
Pila Mulligan: :)
Pila Mulligan: maybe
stevenaia Michinaga: lol
Pila Mulligan: probably
Pila Mulligan: I recently learned about word clouds -- maybe we could do a massive word cloud of the PaB wiki, and set up tags accordingly
Pila Mulligan: with links from the word cloud
stevenaia Michinaga: some blogs ahve that built in
Pila Mulligan: :) cool
Peer Infinity: I found the tagging guidelines page:
Peer Infinity: http://playasbeing.wik.is/Informatio...ing_Guidelines
Pila Mulligan: I think that if I cold get a grant to study luck, I would study farmers
Peer Infinity: it has an index of the tags used on the wiki
Pila Mulligan: they seem to have stories about luck relating to harvests
Pila Mulligan: wow, Peer -- someone has done a lot there already
Rowan Masala: and then of course, there are the pagan rites for bringing luck with harvests
Pila Mulligan: yep
Peer Infinity: yes, and noone knew about what was done already because it was poorly integrated with the rest of the wiki
Pila Mulligan: harvets seem to be strongly associate dwith luck -- as well as with the ordinary skills of agriculutre there seems to be an expectation of unexpected factors
Peer Infinity: I strongly recommend making a tag index page more easily accessible, maybe put the tag index in the wiki's main navigation bar?
Pila Mulligan: looking at the tag page links, it looks like they ran out of steam
Pila Mulligan: they cover only a brief time
Pila Mulligan: it seems
Pila Mulligan: nice to see what tags are anyway, and how they wrok :)
Rowan Masala: ,mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm3eccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc/8
Peer Infinity: ?
stevenaia Michinaga: or only those that tag their posts
Rowan Masala: my cat says hello
Peer Infinity: hehe :)
stevenaia Michinaga: thought that was pan
Pila Mulligan: hi kitty
Rowan Masala: yes, he has a very clear personal diction
Pila Mulligan: but there seems to be a typo :)
Rowan Masala: ah, yes
Pila Mulligan: or is /8 feline code?
Rowan Masala: I'm afraid he's been spending too much time with Steven
Pila Mulligan: :)
stevenaia Michinaga: hehe
Rowan Masala: impossible to know about feline codes - so mysterious
Pila Mulligan: well, time for Pila to do some rl -- nice session, and good luck to everyone at harvest time :)
stevenaia Michinaga: well I think I will be going now
stevenaia Michinaga: yes, thanls Pila
Rowan Masala: Goodnight, Pile, Peer
Rowan Masala: be well
Peer Infinity: hmm... I was undecided about whether to love or hate DekiWiki... after trying to edit a page, I decided that I hate it. It's like Microsoft Word - you have to wrestle with the editor. I suppose that's the price of WYSIWYG editing...
Pila Mulligan: thanks, bye bye
stevenaia Michinaga: I may be late tomarow, will you be around Pila?
Pila Mulligan: I'll try to be Steve
stevenaia Michinaga: I should be here by the end to clam the log
Pila Mulligan: ok
stevenaia Michinaga: night
Pila Mulligan: aloha