Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

newyorker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–56 of 56 posts

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#51

Post by theoh »

dwd wrote: post #45
theoh wrote: post #22

Could have been a lot more about Bostrom's ideas in this article, given the title. But my hunch is that the kind of philosophy enthusiast who writes for the New Yorker doesn't want to dwell on Bostrom's ideas (or those Less Wrong guys) in any way; it's a question of seriousness.

Good way to make your article about games and AI (fun and cool stuff) very depressing. The AI does not hate you, nor does it love you, but you are made out of atoms which it can use for something else. The AI runs on a different timescale than you do; by the time your neurons finish thinking the words "I should do something" you have already lost. - Eliezer Yudkowsky

I don't think the omission is because discussing Bostrom or Yudkowsky's ideas would genuinely be depressing. It's because the writer is a snob, or at least doesn't rate them as intellectuals. I kind of agree with him.

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#52

Post by Benjammer »

angel_j wrote: post #15

My friend and I played at the same time. Unplanned, they invested in heavily Marketing, and I in Research. They beat it much more quickly, and I had to "cheat" or give up. I exploited Quantum Computing by writing a function in the console that clicked rapidly when the QC was primed, at which point it became quite easy to finish.

If you really want to cheat, you can open your dev console and just type clipClick() to instantly make that many paper clips, up to the amount of wire you have.

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#53

Post by dwd »

theoh wrote: post #51
dwd wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good way to make your article about games and AI (fun and cool stuff) very depressing. The AI does not hate you, nor does it love you, but you are made out of atoms which it can use for something else. The AI runs on a different timescale than you do; by the time your neurons finish thinking the words "I should do something" you have already lost. - Eliezer Yudkowsky

I don't think the omission is because discussing Bostrom or Yudkowsky's ideas would genuinely be depressing. It's because the writer is a snob, or at least doesn't rate them as intellectuals. I kind of agree with him.

I would have to agree with you there - after flicking through Bostrom's latest "work in progress" thesis I came away thinking it was quite underwhelming.

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#54

Post by falcor84 »

arkades wrote: post #33
jawns wrote: post #4

I remember starting this game at mid-day and having no idea that I would end up building paperclips well into the night. What impressed me the most was how the "secret" gradually unfolded, so that you were already hooked and felt a compulsion to continue game play, even after it became clear that this wasn't the innocuous game you thought it was at first. It led me to build a clicker game that also has more to it tha…

I played for 30 seconds before my screen got plastered by a long and heavy handed essay. I prefer games not be so heavy handed but, If it must, I’d rather the message be part of the game (eg, papers please) than an essay on top of it. It just immediately turned me off, hard.

This was my impression as well. I don't feel the game explores the moral status of people who exist in a simulation at all. The game mechanics themselves don't have anything interesting to say, particularly given the false losing state of the people recognising that they're in a simulation.

It would've been much more interesting to play a game where the characters are aware. An interesting inspiration could be the characters in the old testament who are generally aware of the existence of a deity that can change their world as will, but continue about their lives and even occasionally willingly disobey the deity. And an even more interesting scenario to play through could be inspired by Eliezer Yudkowsky's "That Alien Message"[0], which I don't want to spoil.

[0] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/5wMcKNAwB6X4mp9og/that-alien...

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#55

Post by westpfelia »

comboy wrote: post #50
westpfelia wrote: post #49

As someone who has a real problem with addiction to idle/clicker games this thread is not good.

Right, right. So which ones do you recommend the most? Seems a bit hard to find something comparable to paperclips, most even deny advantage of understanding exp growth.

My reply is super late. BUT I highly recomend this one:

http://www.glaielgames.com/succubox/

Re: The Unexpected Philosophical Depths of the Clicker Game Universal Paperclips

#56

Post by [deleted] »

dragontamer wrote: post #11
kbenson wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never got past the later stage... "competition". I should look up to see if there was much more after that and what I missed, since I doubt I'll go through it all again.

There's a bit after "competition" comes into play. And for me, that was the hardest part of the game. You had to grow faster than the competition, which is pretty difficult. I've done two playthroughs. The 1st playthrough was pretty lucky and I had no issues... but the 2nd playthrough of mine was "deadlocked" behind those Drifters for a long time. Its very punishing to fall behind the drifters: it takes a lot of effo…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN