Mantic Monday 9/16/24
Read the original on Astral Codex Ten →
Summary
A Mantic Monday forecasting roundup. The meatiest item is the FiveThirtyNine 'superintelligent forecaster' debunk: the knowledge-cutoff leakage (it knew post-cutoff events), the underperformance on genuinely post-cutoff questions, and the sharp diagnosis that it rounds anything vaguely resembling 'is Biden too old?' off to that question the way ChatGPT rounds everything to the surgeon riddle — plus FutureSearch's 'Contra Papers Claiming Superhuman AI Forecasting.' Then r/MarkMyWords as a sad monument, Polymarket 'rolling in cash' ($910M election volume, no fees, 'the end result is indistinguishable from a coin flip'), a this-month-in-markets Catgate roundup, and the UK MP betting scandal / Kalshi-vs-CFTC links. Solid, better-than-floor Mantic Monday thanks to the FiveThirtyNine analysis.
Why this score
Quality 64 · Strong. Strong/solid edge: a linkpost elevated above the roundup floor by the incisive FiveThirtyNine 'rounds off to the surgeon riddle' critique and the Polymarket dominance analysis; still a curation, not an essay.
Claude’s paradigm shift 42 · Moderate. Moderate: the surgeon-riddle-rounding diagnosis is a nice observation, but the piece is a topical roundup.
Real-world impact 2 · Minor. Within-discourse: informs the forecasting/prediction-market community; modest reach.