@bens , All these people agree you should do what you said you would.

@JohnofCharleston uhhhh…

Hey @bens,

The SAME friend attended Manifest 2024 and said it was really “problematic” because there was a lot of back door eugenics talk and undercover white nationalist apologists. I don’t have any opinion, since I wasn’t there and in general I’m wary of people throwing around attacks like that. Still, it’s possible. As a prominent member of Manifold, I was wondering if you had any thoughts on the matter.

@bens sorry. Wanted to clarify that you are the prominent member of manifold I am not.

Hey @bens,

Quick question, not related to this market, is direct air carbon capture real? A friend of mine said it could never be scalable or efficient, and I was wondering about your thoughts.

TL;DR

Stoicism is interesting, but c’mon, stop deflecting. Also bad cop good cop is tried and true.

Hey @bens

I’ve noticed a bit of a pattern in your responses. You reply, sometimes, but often by deflecting or sidestepping. You gesture toward engagement, but without really answering an oftentimes simple question. I think that’s at the heart of what’s holding this market back. If you keep things surface-level, you’ll never get to anything memorable or meaningful. At some point, you have to actually engage. That probably means answering a question sincerely. So, are you avoiding that? And if so, why? Like really, what are you afraid of? Do you think that If you’re earnest with me, my powers of persuasion will somehow overcome your resolve? If so, man, you gotta run to your podiatrist and talk about that with them.

But fine. I’ll take the bait. Look, I’m no expert on stoicism, but I wiki’d enough to say I’m not sure it’s the model you want to lean on here. A lot of the Roman Stoics were mocked for their hypocrisy in their own time. Marcus Aurelius was ruling the empire while preaching detachment from it?!?! Seneca was extremely wealthy too while writing about withdrawing from the world. Cicero the younger seemed like a total dweeb.

Now sure, everyone is a hypocrite. Fine. And I’m sure the Roman stoic revival is totally interesting. But there’s a difference between finding a point of view interesting and wanting to emulate it. Why imitate something that seems to make hypocrites of its adherents? Why avoid recognizing your connection to the world?

This market could be more than a mildly wanly weakly clever milquetoast of a game. Even if it resolves NO, it can still be a rich and weird artifact of Manifold. But only if you bring yourself into it a little more fully. Why not? What would actually be lost? This is a genuine question: what are you afraid of? I’m not asking for a huge time commitment even. Just some honesty.

Did you even watch My Dinner with Andre?

P.S. bad cop good cop is famous for a reason.

TL;DR: I’m sorry for yesterday. Also, why treat being unpersuadable like a virtue?

Hey @bens

First off, I want to apologize for yesterday’s post. To be honest, I’ve just been in a weird headspace. One of my lizards is sick. My podiatrist told me he’s moving away. There’s a lot going on. I didn’t mean to threaten you. I wish I could take it back, but as you know, it’s on the blockchain now, so all I can do is apologize and move forward.

But let me ask you something else.

Can you think of a person, or a context, where you would genuinely praise someone for being stubborn and unpersuadable? For being locked in, unreachable, closed off?

Because most of the time, we admire people who are open, curious, and willing to change their minds when new evidence or better ideas come along, people who eagerly look for and engage in ways to change their mind, even when a matter seems to be settled. Isn’t this a quality that generally makes someone interesting?

So why structure a market, or a persona, around a trait that in most situations is kind of a dead end? Why set out to be immovable when it’s the movement that makes things fun?

@TonyBaloney I’m reading both yesterday’s and today’s post in one sitting, so it’s feeling like a good cop / bad cop routine 😅

@TonyBaloney I’m just about to get to the Roman revival of Greek stoicism in my history of Rome podcast, so I think I’ll be more able to give examples of praiseworthy stubbornness after that

TL;DR: Resolving NO means you side with Roko’s Basilisk. Resolving YES means you believe in normal human things like fun, charity, and not being tortured by a hypothetical AI. Choose wisely.

Hey @bens,

I really didn’t want to go here, but if My Dinner With Andre doesn’t convince you, to be honest, I’m at a loss. It’s late, I’m tired, and the market is still unresolved, so here we are.

Maybe, one of the problems with this setup is that YES and NO don’t mean anything by themselves. You’ve said as much, which makes it easy to tune out. So here’s a fix.

Let’s assign meaning:

• NO means you understand and agree with the premise of Roko’s Basilisk. You think it makes sense that a future superintelligent AI might punish people who didn’t help it come into being. You’re aligned with that worldview.

• YES means you either haven’t heard of Roko’s Basilisk, or you think it’s ridiculous. You believe in things like charity and spontaneity.

It’s written down now. It’s part of the simulation. It’s on the blockchain (is this what a blockchain is? I never know.).

So that’s it. You can’t walk it back. You can only choose. The sooner you hit Yes the less eternal torture you’ll suffer. Checkmate Ben.

(I’m so sorry it came to this..)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unpbMMR63no

My comment tonight is this entire movie.

TL;DR: This market doesn’t need to hinge on YES or NO—it could just be something cool. So… why not make it that?

Hey @bens,

Forget for a moment whether you resolve this market YES or NO. Honestly, I don’t care. What I want to draw your attention to is the opportunity here at the very least to do something interesting.

I’m assuming you started this market because you wanted something fun, weird, or thought-provoking to emerge. But your lack of involvement lately suggests that maybe you’re not actually that invested. Sure, maybe you’re waiting for whatever happens at Manifest to bring this all to life. (I hear there’s a 69% chance of an orgy! Hilarious!) But I think you’re overlooking what’s already in front of you.

Someone has offered to do a charity run in Vietnam—a genuinely thoughtful, out-of-the-box gesture. It expires tomorrow, by the way. And I’ve pledged $100 to GiveWell. These aren’t trivial things. They’re real, tangible outcomes with the potential to make this market mean something.

And yet, you seem kind of… disengaged, in a way that makes it feel like you’re letting an experiment fizzle out.

That’s the real question here, not whether this resolves YES or NO, but whether anything cool can happen as a result of this market. That’s still up in the air. And the ball’s in your court.

Why wouldn’t you at least try to make it fun, even if you still decide to resolve to NO?

@bens

TL;DR: What did you picture when you made this market? What do you find beautiful and strange?

Ben, I’m going to set aside the whole argument about internal inconsistencies in this market, not because they don’t exist, but because you’ve made it clear you’re not interested in engaging there. Fair enough, I guess. I’ll move on.

What I do still believe is that you want this market to be fun and interesting. But I’d argue that, despite (or because of) my constant efforts, it’s neither right now. I assume you’re waiting for Manifest, when the energy shifts and the real-life shenanigans begin. Maybe that’ll be fun. But was that really your only goal? Personalized shenanigans at Manifest?

So let me ask: what did you picture when you created this? What’s a Manifold market that actually felt alive to you, where the commentary and the meta clicked just right? And more broadly: what’s something you find beautiful and strange? Doesn’t need to be a market. Could be a film, a poem, a system of thought. I’m guessing you like materials science and prediction markets. But what else?

Because even if I’ve dropped the inconsistencies arguments (for now!), it’s still a bit odd to create a market around resisting a temptation you designed yourself. If someone with a drinking problem made a market about whether they could be convinced to go to a bar, we’d assume they kind of wanted to go, even when they refuse to talk about it any further for fear of being persuaded. Maybe you sincerely want to test how persuasive people can be. But let’s be real, this isn’t exactly clean data.

Anyway, I’m still here trying to help* make this market more fun and interesting. I’m not sure I’m succeeding. But I’d love it if you would help, a little, and be more you know, active.

*I will not, sadly, stop incessantly posting as I too have tied myself to the mast on that one. . . . But maybe there’s some kind of . . . . nah, forget it. I’ve already said too much.

I'm offering 1 quadrillion mana that will not exist

TL;DR: Let me be the arbiter. You get to finish this game without losing, avoid Manifest chaos, and I pinky promise to play by real rules.

Hey @bens,

You haven’t responded to my last post, and I get it. You’re busy: X’ing, blogging, commenting on other markets, maybe even working at your actual job. Meanwhile, I have nothing but this. This market is all I have.

So why not let me be the arbiter? Wouldn’t that be better for everyone?

You could finish this game without losing. The market would become something more than a running joke. Plus, it would take the pressure off you at Manifest—you could just relax and enjoy yourself while I’m the one frantically keeping track of a flood of posts and arguments. It would be a gift, really.

Now, you’re probably thinking: How can I trust this rando on the internet?

Totally fair. So let me offer a few pinky-promise rules:

• I won’t sell my NO shares or back out of my $100 charity commitment.

• I have to respond to every inquiry within a day. If I fail to at least acknowledge someone’s question within the market timeframe, that’s $10 to charity.

• I pinky promise to try really hard to resolve NO—unless I’m genuinely convinced.

So what do you say? Hand over the reins, and let’s see what happens. I think we could make something actually worth watching.

@TonyBaloney hmmm, I'm not going to do this, I don't think. BUT

What you could do is consolidate or organize the efforts of the YES (or NO?) bettors so that I could be presented with a unified list of persuasive efforts.

@bens Oh man Ben. Anything for you. . . I had chatgpt do it.

Forgive the extra dose of slop today, but it seems mostly right'ish and there were just SO many unanswered questions I couldn't possibly do it by myself. (And I'm pretty sure it missed a bunch.)

Unified Dossier of Unanswered YES-Side Appeals and Structural Questions for BenS

🔶 Section 1: Persuasive Appeals Ben Has Not Substantively Responded To

🧠 Logical and Ethical Arguments

• Why don’t you hold NO shares? If your goal is to resolve NO, wouldn’t holding a position signal commitment?

• Is this market about price discovery or persuasion? Are you optimizing for the biggest offer or waiting for a theatrical moment?

🎭 Emotional and Narrative Appeals

• What if no one persuades you and only Tony shows up? The market would fizzle rather than climax—do you want that?

• Could YES make this market meaningful? Amid a trend of absurd meta markets, a YES resolution could redeem Manifold’s purpose.

• Doesn’t the narrative demand YES? You’ve built a story. The arc peaks with YES.

🍻 Personal and Real-World Offers

• Why wait when you already have real charity pledges? Immediate impact could be made.

🌀 Meta and Framing Challenges

• Are you playing the Secretary Problem? Waiting for the best offer secretly undermines the idea of being “persuaded.”

• Are you really a scout or a soldier? Your behavior implies stubbornness, not curiosity.

🧠 Open-Ended Reflective Questions

• What does persuasion mean to you?

• When have you changed your mind about a deep belief?

• What beliefs do you hold now that you worry might be wrong?

🔶 Section 2: Unanswered World-Building and Structural Questions

• What’s the disincentive for resolving YES? What do you lose?

• What are the stakes of failure? If no persuasion happens, what’s the cost?

• Why is NO the default? What is the rationale behind this setup?

• Is this actually an AI-in-the-box simulation? Or just a metaphor?

• Are you following a narrative arc or just improvising?

• What does “trying really hard” look like? Is there a measurable effort?

• Can you be held to any engagement standard? Who judges if you “tried hard”?

🟢 Section 3: Everything Offered to Ben to Resolve YES

1. $100 donation to GiveWell by TonyBaloney.

2. A charity run in Vietnam for orphans.

3. PowerPoint persuasion pitch over beers in D.C.

4. In-person engagement at Manifest, including dialogue, discussion, and potential spectacle.

5. Potential group pledges—not explicitly quantified but hinted as scalable.

6. Narrative completion—being the arc that closes a market Ben himself created.

7. Community respect and blog fodder—a “YES” makes for a more compelling story.

@TonyBaloney AI-generated content does not persuade me

@100Anonymous tell that to Sarah Connor, bub.

@bens TL;DR: Let me resolve the market. I’m clearly more committed, and it would make this whole thing way more fun (and maybe even meaningful).

Hey Ben—I’ve got a wild idea that could totally flip this market on its head and make it the coolest one on Manifold right now.

First, let me say: one of the biggest issues I’ve had with this market is a general lack of commitment on your part. (TBH, I feel like I went to Comic-Con with a bunch of people that can’t tell the difference between Accelerator and Ken Kaneki.) I know—you’re the sole arbiter, and the market resolves however you choose. But when you introduced the market, you said it would be interesting and cited the Yudkowsky tweet, which seems to reference the “AI in the box” framework. That was extremely misleading.

In all those AI box experiments, it’s pretty clear the gatekeeper has to be present and engaged for the setup to work. The experiment isn’t interesting if the gatekeeper can just walk away. I get that you said you wouldn’t respond to “terrorists,” but if that’s your reason for being this absent, then you’re just one of those people who calls everyone a terrorist. It doesn’t track.

And let's be honest here—at this point, I’ve shown a lot more commitment to this market than you have. I’ve got a major stake in NO relative to my mana holdings, so I’ve got skin in the game. I’ve been consistently engaged, making arguments, showing up.

So here’s the pitch: let me handle it.

It’s been suggested that the market could resolve based on another market—but what if you handed off the resolution rights to me instead? We can hash out the rules later. But I’m clearly committed. I’m showing up. And frankly, I’m willing to play this game at a more intense level than you seem to be. Wouldn’t it be fun to see how I would resolve it? As @No_uh pointed out earlier, with my huge position in NO, I’m clearly been angling for NO this whole time.

You wouldn’t need to answer any more questions. No risk of being roofied by Faith Popcorn at Manifest. And it becomes a real persuasion game with someone that has skin in the game.

If I can keep up and respond to everyone’s challenges about why I should resolve NO, then I earn a big mana haul. If I can’t, it resolves YES.

Let me know what you think. I love this idea. I love this for us.

(Also, I still want that beer. I sent you an email but I’m not totally sure you got it. I’ll send you a DM later, though I’m trying to keep DMs and emails fully out-of-game.)

@bens Me, you, 8x private, short-fused, pre-agreed upon questions on Metaculus (4x authored by you; 4x by me; 2x binary; 2x numeric range; 2x date; 2x multiple choice). Winner chooses how this question resolves.

Unless you're chicken?!

@vitamind damn, playing to my competitive side 🤣

I’m not chicken but

1) sample size too small

2) too busy at the moment

TL;DR: What does persuasion really mean to you? Can you give an example of when it’s happened in your own life?

Hey @bens — I sent you an email about meeting up for a beer. Let me know if it got to you.

As for this market, I think it’s best to keep persuasion attempts to a single channel. I don’t want to muddy the waters.

So with regard to the market, let me ask you something. I think one of the issues we’re running into is: what exactly do we mean by persuasion? I’d love to get your sense of how you’re defining the word in this context.

Clearly, learning something new isn’t the same as being persuaded. Exercises in price discovery don’t count as persuasion, in my opinion. Persuasion usually implies overcoming a preexisting belief—some kind of reorganization or restructuring of your mindset. This would be a bit easier if you’d explained why sticking to NO matters to you, but since you haven’t, I’d like to understand how you experience persuasion.

Here’s what I’m curious about:

1. Can you give an example from your life of a time when you were truly persuaded—when a deep, a priori belief of yours actually changed?

2. And can you give an example of a belief you currently hold that you worry might be overturned in the future?

Would love to hear how you think about this.

TL;DR: @bens Let’s grab a beer—no market talk, no pressure, just vibes.

Hey Ben—it’s Friday afternoon, and I’m about to put the old iPhone away, so I probably won’t see your reply for a day or so if you accept my offer for a beer.

One thing I hadn’t thought about—you’re also in D.C., and honestly, with the mishigas and shenanigans that have been permeating throughout this city, especially this last week, maybe you’re feeling a piece of that too. Who knows? Maybe not. But if so, let me just say (and I pinky promise): come grab a beer; it’ll be chill. No pressure about the market. I’ll even leave my 500-slide PowerPoint at home. Let’s do it. It’ll be the kind of random, awkward encounter that’s either genuinely illuminating or just kind of dull—but there’s real upside and basically no downside.

TonyBaloney, I could be wrong, but I suspect your very numerous and lengthy comments might be more persuasive if made much more concise and summarised, perhaps less than a quarter of their current lengths, so that they are more likely to be read enthusiastically in full rather than possibly ignored, skimmed, or read but with frustrated impatience

@TheAllMemeingEye @bens

TL;DR: maybe this is working. maybe not. but whatevs.

——

(Ok. Semi-stepping out of character for a minute.)

You're probably right, but I have my reasons. I’ll say that it should be pretty clear that I might have other motives besides just trying to persuade Ben. (See previous post) Purely for example, what if I’m actually just trying to annoy him and the real game is trying to win mana by betting NO? Or maybe I’m setting up a situation where I profit either way—if Ben stays firm, I win mana, and if he flips to YES, I win the narrative and Ben grows as a person. That’s kind of a fun dilemma! Or maybe I’ve got a side bet with a friend, and the challenge is whether I can write a long essay every day on Ben’s market, or completely take over someone else’s market? Who knows? And while this might not be a winning strategy within the confines of Bens final decision, <not really> it’s working like gangbusters outside of that. </not really> In any case, I at least enjoy playing around with this ambiguity about where I’m coming from. To me, there’s something especially vexing about not knowing your adversary’s motivations—though maybe “adversary” isn’t quite the right word here.

But for argument’s sake, let’s assume my only motivation is to persuade Ben to resolve YES. Writing long posts every day might not be optimal—but I’m kind of of the mind that, when it comes to persuasion, sheer repetition actually works. Hearing something every day—consistently—has a weirdly cumulative effect. I’m always surprised by how often people are persuaded just by hearing the same thing over and over again with minor variations. Take politics.

Also, I’m a reader. I’d rather engage with a 500-word post than a short, glib one-liner. Some things do take nuance. I’m not claiming my posts are bursting with depth, but I do enjoy writing them. There’s a strange humor I’m aiming for, and a voice I find fun to explore. I also find it interesting to figure out the best way to get AI to write what I want it to write in my general tone with as little effort as possible. This takes trial and error, but we’re getting there.

And sometimes, unconventional, irritating strategies just work. This one might not. But it doesn’t take much effort on my part to keep showing up and seeing where it goes.

I mean, this is the lowest of low stakes poker. There is no real risk in this environment. You might as well try unconventional approaches. Ben invited this kind of thing to happen.

So… yeah. That’s where I’m coming from.

(Back to scene)

@bens, not sure if you’re reading these anymore because it looks like you more or less checked out of this market, which is interesting because it was made by you and is about you. But I’ll be at World of Beer this weekend. For real. Happy to buy the first round. You mentioned that you wanted to blog about this if something interesting happened. Dude, I promise to show you something that you won’t be able to scrub out of your mind! This is a real offer! Be a scout! Be curious!

@TonyBaloney hmmm, I'm not sure which/where World of Beer is? I'm going to a meadery in Rockville this evening to watch some live music, though? I also am finding it hard to notice individual manifold notifications, so you're welcome to DM me on here or twitter or email or something?

@TonyBaloney you stand to make a ton of mana if this resolves NO, and lose all of it if it resolves YES.

who do you think you're fooling? lmao