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The least impactful way to spend $300M?

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Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#251

Post by Eisenstein »

ly3xqhl8g9 wrote: post #168
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #64

I like the idea of Effective Altruism (EA), but it’s ironic to use EA to call out ineffective charitable spending in the wake of all the Effective Altruism ridiculousness of recent years. EA was a key part of SBF’s cover story to make his frauds appear to be coming from a philanthropic angle. An EA figurehead recently spent multiple millions, some of which was FTX donations, on a castle/chateau to “host events”, whic…

"Effective Altruism" (centered around William MacAskill), the "Rationalist Movement" (centered around Eliezer Yudkowsky), the general billionaire philanthropism (most prominent being Bill Gates), the "Universal Basic Income" crowd (of which apparently OpenAI and Sam Altman are spearheading a research project), miss the greater context in which charity takes place: all charity is fundamentally ineffective, charity is…

> charity will never bring revolution and even worse charity will actively suppress revolution.

...

> Revolution used to mean pitchforks and guillotines (the French especially loved them), but today, funnily enough, that would be ineffective even if the people would be able to close their favorite streaming channel and wake up.

This strikes me as a strange way to say 'people are too happy to lead a violent revolt'.

> We could probably try today this idea, but (i) there is no coagulated we to make it work after at least 158 years of divisiveness and

What was before those 158 years? Unity? Until we get rid of nationalism, racism and religion divisiveness is going to be the rule, not the exception.

> A revolution today would take completely other form from the past.

Because the French revolution with guillotines was the same as the ones before it?

> we can learn to programatically interface with the cells and just say, top-down, "you, the cells, already know how to build an eye, you did it once, rebuild one here", don't scar, regenerate [1]. 1,000 year lifespan is achievable with 100% organ, tissue regeneration, and then the revolution begins, hopefully.

What? This could be on a sandwich board worn by the guy who in 2013 had to remove those Apocalypse 2012 stickers from his blacked out panel van.

What strange, hollow rhetoric that post is.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#252

Post by a4a4a4a4 »

bheadmaster wrote: post #225
a4a4a4a4 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the most brilliant minds in the world are researching best ways to make internet advertisements as addictive as they can be. They're doing a great job, ads are so addictive I've even turned off my Ad blocker so I can get more of them! Won't someone save me!

I assume you're saying that ads are irrelevant because we have AdBlock? Ads would always exist, but think about how many great (even lifesaving) solutions we're missing out on because market decided they aren't worthy of pursuit.

I'm saying ads aren't "addictive", because they're pretty despised. They might be effective, when people see them, but I don't think anyone is "addicted" to ads.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#253

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

eru wrote: post #218
socialist_coder wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/01/09/trends-... US has the worst income inequality of all G7 nations and has been on the rise since 1980.

'Consultants, hedge fund managers, architects' etc don't just restrict themselves to the US, and neither should we. UnAmerican people have moral value, too.

and yet, the problem remains that the US has the worst income inequality of all G7 nations and has been on the rise since 1980, regardless of what happens elsewhere

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#254

Post by ly3xqhl8g9 »

Eisenstein wrote: post #251
ly3xqhl8g9 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Effective Altruism" (centered around William MacAskill), the "Rationalist Movement" (centered around Eliezer Yudkowsky), the general billionaire philanthropism (most prominent being Bill Gates), the "Universal Basic Income" crowd (of which apparently OpenAI and Sam Altman are spearheading a research project), miss the greater context in which charity takes place: all charity is fundamentally ineffective, charity is…

> charity will never bring revolution and even worse charity will actively suppress revolution. ... > Revolution used to mean pitchforks and guillotines (the French especially loved them), but today, funnily enough, that would be ineffective even if the people would be able to close their favorite streaming channel and wake up. This strikes me as a strange way to say 'people are too happy to lead a violent revolt'. >…

158 years ago was the First International [1]. More of a tongue-in-cheek joke.

Watch the video I linked in order not to put your ignorance in front of you and don't cower behind the guise of rationality to expunge heterodoxical worldviews.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Workingmen%27s_A...

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#255

Post by thfuran »

x-complexity wrote: post #146
thfuran wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't do the foundational research. They licensed a patent that came out of research from University of Pennsylvania and applied it to COVID.

> They didn't do the foundational research. They licensed a patent that came out of research from University of Pennsylvania and applied it to COVID. Incremental research is still research. Application research is still research. The over-emphasis on foundational research from the media & the general public has led to a myopic view of "revolution"-ism, wherein incremental progress in science is considered to be worth…

Moderna spent a few months on it before they had a vaccine ready for trials. The lab spent just under a decade building on decades of prior research. It's pretty clear who did the bulk of the work when it comes to the mRNA discoveries, and it wasn't Moderna or its shareholders.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#256

Post by Eisenstein »

ly3xqhl8g9 wrote: post #254
Eisenstein wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> charity will never bring revolution and even worse charity will actively suppress revolution. ... > Revolution used to mean pitchforks and guillotines (the French especially loved them), but today, funnily enough, that would be ineffective even if the people would be able to close their favorite streaming channel and wake up. This strikes me as a strange way to say 'people are too happy to lead a violent revolt'. >…

158 years ago was the First International [1]. More of a tongue-in-cheek joke. Watch the video I linked in order not to put your ignorance in front of you and don't cower behind the guise of rationality to expunge heterodoxical worldviews. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Workingmen%27s_A...

Do you write like that on purpose or does it come naturally? It isn't a style conducive to clear communication.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#257

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

nonethewiser wrote: post #56
crazygringo wrote: post #24

I definitely don't think the big schools like Harvard/Yale/etc. need any more money, but I will play devil's advocate here. > "he donated $300 million in such as a way as to do as close as possible to zero good with it." Oh there are a lot worse ways to spend it with the best of intentions. The Turkana frozen-fish plant is a classic example, a charitable project where back in around 1975 around $150 million (in today…

But what? What would be lost without the 300 million? If you can’t be specific then I think it’s to the authors point. I mean, just consider that he spent 300 million and the impact isn’t obvious. At least in your fish example they used it for the intended purpose for some period of time and there is still some low utilization for dried fish. It’s also half of 300 million so it seems they did more with less despite i…

heya, you say that if they spent the money on helping more people vs. on vanity, "they wouldn't be a better person", but in fact they would be a better person

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#258

Post by ly3xqhl8g9 »

Eisenstein wrote: post #256
ly3xqhl8g9 wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

158 years ago was the First International [1]. More of a tongue-in-cheek joke. Watch the video I linked in order not to put your ignorance in front of you and don't cower behind the guise of rationality to expunge heterodoxical worldviews. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Workingmen%27s_A...

Do you write like that on purpose or does it come naturally? It isn't a style conducive to clear communication.

Just wanted a zinger in as few words as possible, rhetoric got the best of me, sorry.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#259

Post by adrianN »

coldtea wrote: post #247
blackshaw wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that ticket has an expiration date tied to the 19th century. Eventually those free spaces will run out. They're already starting to in the western world I'm sorry but I genuinely don't understand what you're saying here. What will expire? Which "free spaces" are running out where?

Huge impact technologies like the steam engine, the factory line, electricity, and so on, that are not just incremental steps, things nobody asked for with minimal utility ("smart fridge") or glorified stupidification engines (the social web).

Steam engines existed in ancient greece. It took a couple of incremental steps until they were good enough to kickstart the industrial revolution.

Re: The least impactful way to spend $300M?

#260

Post by adrianN »

a4a4a4a4 wrote: post #252
bheadmaster wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume you're saying that ads are irrelevant because we have AdBlock? Ads would always exist, but think about how many great (even lifesaving) solutions we're missing out on because market decided they aren't worthy of pursuit.

I'm saying ads aren't "addictive", because they're pretty despised. They might be effective, when people see them, but I don't think anyone is "addicted" to ads.

Every influencer is basically an ad on two legs.
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