Where is Nāgasena?

King Milinda asks the monk Nāgasena his name. “Nāgasena,” he answers, but that is only a conventional designation; no person is to be found behind the name.

The king is scandalized. If there is no person, who receives alms? Who meditates? Who is responsible for what is done?

Nāgasena asks how the king arrived. By chariot, says Milinda. Is the pole the chariot? The axle? The wheels?

No part is the chariot. Yet “chariot” is a perfectly useful name for those parts assembled in a certain way. Nāgasena says it is the same with him.

Goodhart’s law

When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

Humans reward-hack. Models reward-hack.

Maybe reward hacking is not psychology, but maths. Optimization finds and exploits gaps between a measure and what it is meant to measure.

When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

What’s a sigil
For a mind