Conditional on me or any associate actually carrying out the experiment described here, will we find preliminary evidence of violation for at least one compound, by the end of 2026?
"Carrying out the experiment" means that either I or a collaborator (including citizen scientists if they end up actually being involved, as long as they do report back) compares the period of at least 100 pendulum pairs whose bobs have been filled with at least 10 different compounds overall. If this does not happen by the end of 2026 I will resolve NA.
"Find preliminary evidence of violation" means that the period of at least two couples of pendulums differ in such a way that compound A has a significantly shorter/longer period (to 5 sigma of statistical errors however estimated) than compound B in one couple and, independently, compound A has a significantly shorter/longer period (again to 5 sigma) than compound C in a different couple.
This obviously does not mean that a real anomaly was found (it may be due to systematics), but is enough to resolve YES.
If no such repeated 5-sigma differences are found, I will resolve NO.
Edit: check out the 100x amplified version of this market here
Update: I did not win an ACX grant to do this. I still plan to test a reasonable number of compounds with my own pendulum rather than with a citizen science setup. Meanwhile I am going to try to publish a paper describing the planned citizen science project plus the results of my own tests and see whether I can get funding elsewhere for that. Running tests on my own is very cheap compared to the full citizen science setup, so I will most likely do it.
Related questions
@mariopasquato threw in a YES bet; let's go crazy! Btw, how do you add a subsidy? I used to see a prominent place to do that but haven't been able to find it recently.
@AlQuinn Click Boost, then click on Show more. There you will find Feed Promo, Subsidize, Analytics
M5 bet is not really going crazy, LOL :-D
@mariopasquato thanks, I think "Subsidy" used to be a separate option, so didn't check "Boost" for it, or maybe I misremember. No offense, but 5M on having some internet rando overturn General Relativity etc., is as crazy as I get!
@AlQuinn It used to be a separate option, yes. Btw I agree with you, I am not betting but I still think 3% is too much.
@mariopasquato agreed on the odds, but can you imagine the glory I will feel with my name in the NY Times when I am used as one of the sources that never doubted your project?
@AlQuinn Would be ironic to end up in the NY times thanks to a grant by Scott, given how the NYT behaved shittily with him
@mariopasquato I can imagine their bagel-stuffed faces held with mouth agape, and the mealy masticated dough plopping onto the newsroom floor
@mariopasquato interest rate issues. Betting something down from 5% when it won't resolve for a while is usually not a good return compared to other options.
@mariopasquato Honestly I have not participated because the premise seems so crazy that I'm concerned it won't be adjudicated correctly for some political reason I don't know about. The risk of that from my perspective is above 4%
@mariopasquato It seems about right since systematics are included in this rate. Maybe the kit is subtly wrong, maybe people colludes to troll,... If it were about "Will there be new physics discovered, excluding systematics", would go to sub 0.5% IMO.
@mariopasquato Isn't only a single systematic error required for it to resolve yes? Maybe I'm misreading the resolution criteria, but it seems to me like if there was some error that made one pendulum's period seem longer/shorter than the others, it would meet the criteria. (Since that pendulum would certainly be found to have a significantly longer/shorter period than at least two other pendula).
@PlasmaBallin Yes, but I will do my best to weed out obvious systematics first. Right after getting a response about my ACX grant application I will try running the experiment with a few test pendulums and will post about possible systematics. If, after this preliminary phase, the whole experiment indeed does take place and we find that the period of e.g. a magnesium stearate filled bob is 5-sigma or more shorter than that of a silver filled bob and independently it is also five sigma shorter than that of a potassium chloride filled bob then I will resolve yes. Before starting the actual experiment (the one that counts for this market) I will try to give you as much details as possible about 1) known systematics 2) statistical error bars