4 ms·

>If the death note can manipulate odds to an arbitrary degree, you're thinking way too small right now. Right, what I feel might be the case is that the target

>If the death note can manipulate odds to an arbitrary degree, you're thinking way too small right now. Right, what I feel might be the case is that the targeted output needs to at least be verifiable (hence see my second proposal). An argument could be made that unless the person has a way of verifying their action, there is no way to ensure that the desired outcome is achieved, so the instruction is invalid. (Separately, at least in your written example, it is possible for the person to be mistaken about the validity of their method!) On the other hands, actions that are (machine) verifiable fall right within the scope of the Death Note (insofar as the verification instruments are also reliable, and verification happens within 23 days). I emphasize machine verifiable because the Death Note has various rules concerning other people, which I won't wade into. If "X starts his car and his car engine explodes" is valid, then so should "X keys a random string of inputs into a machine, machine returns True, then X dies." So no we've limited the scope of DN-solvable problems to 23-day machine-verifiable problems. Now we just need to know what set of problems are 23-day machine-verifiable...

danShumway 7y ago
> it is possible for the person to be mistaken about the validity of their method That's a good point. > are 23-day machine-verifiable Here's a followup question. Can a person be part of the machine? For example, I might rephrase my earlier entry to be: "X closes their eyes and types random keys, such that they form an algorithm for quickly factoring large primes. They email that algorithm to light.iskira@gmail.com and receive a confirmation that their algorithm is sound. At which point, they become so excited that they run into the street and are hit by a bus and killed." My worry with that is that if there is some kind of force behind the death note, it might decide to just manipulate me instead of the person writing the algorithm. I don't want an evil genie scenario where I just accidentally write "yes, it works", instead of "no, it doesn't." By extension, if we have a 23-day machine-verifiable problem, am I allowed to specify that the machine is not glitching or producing errors? In some cases, that might be more likely than finding the correct answer. Shinagami picking the most likely scenario that technically fits the criteria might be an effective way for them to reduce some abuse of the system.

danShumway 7y ago

> it is possible for the person to be mistaken about the validity of their method That's a good point. > are 23-day machine-verifiable Here's a followup question. Can a person be part of the machine? For example, I might rephrase my earlier entry to be: "X closes their eyes and types random keys, such that they form an algorithm for quickly factoring large primes. They email that algorithm to light.iskira@gmail.com and receive a confirmation that their algorithm is sound. At which point, they become so excited that they run into the street and are hit by a bus and killed." My worry with that is that if there is some kind of force behind the death note, it might decide to just manipulate me instead of the person writing the algorithm. I don't want an evil genie scenario where I just accidentally write "yes, it works", instead of "no, it doesn't." By extension, if we have a 23-day machine-verifiable problem, am I allowed to specify that the machine is not glitching or producing errors? In some cases, that might be more likely than finding the correct answer. Shinagami picking the most likely scenario that technically fits the criteria might be an effective way for them to reduce some abuse of the system.