LessWrong posts by zvi

No more burying the sex stuff under an avalanche of other stuff so no one notices. Use the break while we have one. Let's go.

You’re Single Because You Suck At Kissing

Luckily this is first one is fixable and Critter is here to help. I find the advice here highly plausible. Like many skills, there are a lot of subtle skills, but a handful of basic principles matter a lot, especially paying attention and responding to what you’re getting back. Critter's theory is that a basic kiss is a bell curve of intensity, done at a slight angle. First kiss style is elongated with less pressure. French kissing is trickier and less structured, see the thread, and the big mistake is to try to force it.

It's not that simple, but like most things, there are some basic mistakes to avoid and first principles, then if you are genuinely paying attention and engaged you’ll be fine, and improve with practice. Seek deliberate practice and clear feedback, iterate.

I get the same sense with dancing. Yes, you need specific knowledge and practice, but if you use your human racial bonuses the remaining ‘cognitive core’ from [...]
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Outline:
(00:20) You're Single Because You Suck At Kissing
(01:25) You're Not Single But You're Sexually Incompatible
(02:56) You're Single Because You Aren't Into BDSM
(08:14) You're Single Because You Didn't Do The Work
(16:34) You're Single Because Being a Dominant Is Too Much Work
(23:41) You're Single And Would Rather Be Free Use
(26:35) You're Single Because You Wouldn't or Did Choke Her
(28:15) You're Single Because You Have Very Particular Preferences
(30:06) You're Single Because of Polygyny
(31:00) You're Single Because Polyamory Isn't Right For You
(35:11) You're Single And Call It Solo Polyamory
(38:49) You're Single Because You Didn't Go To Slutcon
(46:41) You're Single So Let's Marry Aella
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First published:

May 18th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/znzZyvxAvSSkep4tL/dating-roundup-12-sex-and-violence

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At least we probably won’t have another pandemic. And we still have a partial Jones Act waiver. For now.

Small victories.

Table of Contents


Hanta Hanta I Don’t Wanta.

Bad News.

Predictions Can Be Easy Even About The Future.

Good Advice.

The Efficient Market Hypothesis Is False.

There Are Four Skills.

While I Cannot Condone This.

Good News, Everyone.

For Your Entertainment.

Gamers Gonna Game Game Game Game Game.

The Spire Sleeps And So Shall I.

I Was Promised Flying Self-Driving Cars.

Government Working.

Jones Act Watch.

Technology Advances.

I Said Woo Hoo.

Variously Effective Altruism.

The Lighter Side.

Hanta Hanta I Don’t Wanta

We have learned so much less than nothing from Covid. We’re actively stupider.

It's 2026, and here we are again, lying about the virus because we are worried that people exposed to it or from the wrong place might face stigma otherwise.

Envidreamz: A local news story highlights passengers on the hantavirus stricken MV Hondius cruise ship who are more worried about facing stigma and rejection back home than [...]
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Outline:
(00:22) Hanta Hanta I Dont Wanta
(04:25) Bad News
(08:45) Predictions Can Be Easy Even About The Future
(08:55) Good Advice
(11:52) The Efficient Market Hypothesis Is False
(13:58) There Are Four Skills
(16:27) While I Cannot Condone This
(20:57) Good News, Everyone
(21:42) For Your Entertainment
(22:14) Gamers Gonna Game Game Game Game Game
(24:09) The Spire Sleeps And So Shall I
(29:13) I Was Promised Flying Self-Driving Cars
(31:53) Government Working
(35:40) Jones Act Watch
(41:10) Technology Advances
(42:12) I Said Woo Hoo
(43:36) Variously Effective Altruism
(44:07) The Lighter Side
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First published:

May 15th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/gZHNLmHkQ7GjnWsYh/monthly-roundup-42-may-2026

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This is what a lull looks like at this point. The government is having internal arguments. The models are getting improved internally. The coding agent improvements are all what we would expect. There's still a lot happening, including a bunch of cool papers, but I feel able to relax and to take care of some other work while I have the chance. You never know when that chance will be over.

Table of Contents

From yesterday: Cyber Lack of Security and AI Governance.


Language Models Offer Mundane Utility. Fix everything now.

Language Models Don’t Offer Mundane Utility. Travel is harder than it looked.

Huh, Upgrades. Opus 4.7 fast mode, Claude Code /goal and agent view.

Levels of Friction. AI for tax avoidance.

On Your Marks. PrinzBench, ProgramBench and faster harmfulness checks.

Get My Agent On The Line. Mona tries to run a cafeteria. Mistakes were made.

Deepfaketown and Botpocalypse Soon. Soon. But not quite yet.

Fun With Media Generation. Monet does not seem that great.

On AI Writing. AI is a hack writer using hack techniques.

A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. How to make AI [...]
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Outline:
(00:36) Language Models Offer Mundane Utility
(02:25) Language Models Dont Offer Mundane Utility
(03:26) Huh, Upgrades
(04:02) Levels of Friction
(05:11) On Your Marks
(06:38) Get My Agent On The Line
(09:42) Deepfaketown and Botpocalypse Soon
(11:11) Fun With Media Generation
(12:49) On AI Writing
(16:05) A Young Ladys Illustrated Primer
(18:35) You Drive Me Crazy
(19:23) They Took Our Jobs
(21:31) The Art of the Jailbreak
(21:49) Introducing
(22:29) Claude Has Its Limits
(23:28) Show Me the Money
(25:15) Show Me The Compute
(26:58) Quiet Speculations
(28:33) Quickly, Theres No Time
(29:32) Chip City
(30:37) Pick Up The Phone
(31:15) The Week in Audio
(31:41) Rhetorical Innovation
(36:13) Not Leading the Future
(42:24) Elon Musk v OpenAI
(43:21) People Just Say Things
(43:47) People Just Publish Things
(44:37) OpenAI Endroses Kosa And SB 315
(48:08) The LLMs All Believe Roughly Similar Things
(50:45) I Learned It By Reading YOU
(01:08:22) Aligning a Smarter Than Human Intelligence is Difficult
(01:18:45) People Are Worried About AI Killing Everyone
(01:20:34) Messages From Janusworld
(01:22:31) People Worried About AI For Other Reasons
(01:23:06) The Lighter Side
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First published:

May 14th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/E4uEiMSpnYRotfzJX/ai-168-not-leading-the-future

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The real recent story of AI has been the background work being done on Cybersecurity, as we process the Mythos Moment along with GPT-5.5, and figure out both how to patch the internet and what our new regulatory regime is going to look like.

The Trump Administration is being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the era of at least some situational awareness, and acknowledgment that catastrophic risks are very much a real risk and they need to have a role in supervising frontier model releases. Now that they’re there, Commerce is deciding who gets access to the most powerful model in the world, and they are fighting Intelligence and the national security state over who should be in charge.

Another question is, exactly how strong is Mythos, both compared to past model and to GPT-5.5 and also in absolute terms? We got multiple new reports on that, as well as the METR graph results. There's little question Mythos is a big deal, but there's a wide range of big deals out there.

Part of the new report from UK AISI is learning that there is a substantial gap between the abilities of the early Mythos Preview [...]
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Outline:
(01:28) On Your Marks
(05:24) How Good Is Mythos?
(11:11) Cyber Lack of Security
(14:36) Greetings From The Department of War
(16:13) The Prior Restraint Era Begins
(20:59) Commerce Versus Intelligence
(27:43) The Quest for Sane Regulations
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First published:

May 13th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/pzjGXSKrkHGdGbtrW/cyber-lack-of-security-and-ai-governance

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We did reading yesterday. Now we do the math. Math is hard.

It does not have to be this hard.

A large part of the reason math is hard, or boring, is that education studies, especially in math, are worse than you know. It goes beyond the studies failing both math and statistics forever and into what I’d basically call fraud. Various people are at war with math education, and will do what it takes to stop it in its tracks. We must fight back.

Education Research Is Worse Than You Know

Kelsey Piper lets her title, ‘Education research is weak and sloppy. Why?’ completely downplay the level of utter awfulness she is reporting finding.

You know that whole thing where the entire Bay Area school system stopped teaching kids Algebra? That was motivated by criminal levels of fraud. I want Jo Boaler in jail doing hard time for this if it is accurate.

Here's the part before the paywall:

Kelsey Piper: Jo Boaler is a professor of education at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, with an enormously influential body of work arguing that students learn math faster and more effectively [...]
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Outline:
(00:42) Education Research Is Worse Than You Know
(04:23) The War on Math
(06:59) University of California San Diego
(15:01) Beyond UCSD
(15:57) New York Cant Do Math
(16:43) The Academic Standards Seem Low
(19:34) New Math
(21:32) Math Anxiety Is Often Due To Knowledge Gaps
(23:52) Calculus By Eighth Grade Is Highly Practical For Many
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First published:

May 12th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ZGGgxy6SNPAy9Hj7v/childhood-and-education-18-do-the-math

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