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Notes -
I was considering writing a post on this exact topic, but I refrained, because I wasn't sure how to press my vague discontent into a substantive thesis.
I'll be happy when we can go back to weekly threads that don't contain the term "prediction market". I've always found the LW/SSC fascination with monetary betting to be somewhat crass. (I'd be inclined to speculate that "make all your beliefs pay rent" is only a few steps away from "make all people pay rent".)
It's sometimes claimed that intelligence just is pattern matching. So, trying to successfully predict a major one-off event like a presidential election could then be seen as the ultimate IQ test, the ultimate test of one's ability to reason in an uncontrolled and data-scarce environment. And I can see why that would be an intriguing challenge to take on. But pattern matching has its limits, and ultimately it just feels obvious to me that there's not much that can be said in terms of election forecasting besides "well, we'll see when we see".
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