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Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

futureofhumanityinstitute.org

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Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#41

Post by hollerith »

goodcanadian wrote: post #34
exo-pla-net wrote: post #18

Seems the incompetent and curiously hostile Philosophy Faculty at Oxford killed FHI. > While FHI had achieved significant academic and policy impact, the final years were affected by a gradual suffocation by Faculty bureaucracy. The flexible, fast-moving approach of the institute did not function well with the rigid rules and slow decision-making of the surrounding organization. (One of our administrators developed a…

Curious use of the word faculty . . . I would say the problem is the administration and bureaucracy and not the faculty (which usually refers to the academic staff). I guess they mean the word in the sense of the administrative unit of the university. Regardless, this is not a problem confined to Oxford; it seems to have proliferated throughout academia in the last couple of decades. The sheer amount of utter bullshi…

Why not assume that the OP knows the definition of the word "faculty" and that when the OP writes, "suffocation by Faculty bureaucracy", he meant suffocation by academic staff?

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#42

Post by n4r9 »

johngossman wrote: post #22

Bear with a digression. CS Lewis was a professor at Oxford. His novel “That Hideous Strength” is about an organization that wants to use science to save humanity. “It’s a little fantastic to base one’s actions on a supposed concern for what’s going to happen millions of years hence; and you must remember that the other side would claim to be preserving humanity, too.” — That Hideous Strength: (Space Trilogy, Book Thr…

I doubt that the philosophy faculty would take CS Lewis' opinion seriously into consideration. He was a decent storyteller, but not much of a philosopher.

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#43

Post by neilv »

The HN headline, "Future of Humanity Institute shuts down", sounds cynically funny, in context of current problems/challenges.

The grandiose name Oxford chose now sounds like they've determined the situation is hopeless.

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#46

Post by MisterBastahrd »

exo-pla-net wrote: post #23
Maro wrote: post #11

This 2023 incident around founder Nick Bostrom may have something to do with it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Bostrom#1996_email_contro... From the wikipedia article: > In January 2023, Bostrom issued an apology for a 1996 email where he had stated that he thought "Blacks are more stupid than whites", and where he also used the word "niggers" in a description of how he thought this statement might be perceived…

This is a smear taken out of context. What Bostrom actually had to say is both accurate and mild: > “I have always liked the uncompromisingly objective way of thinking and speaking: the more counterintuitive and repugnant a formulation, the more it appeals to me given that it is logically correct,” the quoted excerpt begins. “Take for example the following sentence: Blacks are more stupid than whites. I like that sen…

It isn't a smear. His qualifying remarks indicate that he's either too stupid, arrogant, or bigoted to understand or care how context works, and thus has no business running a hot dog stand, much less an institute. Even disregarding that, publicly revealing his thoughts and framing them in such a fashion shows he has no common sense.

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#47

Post by woopsn »

exo-pla-net wrote: post #23
Maro wrote: post #11

This 2023 incident around founder Nick Bostrom may have something to do with it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Bostrom#1996_email_contro... From the wikipedia article: > In January 2023, Bostrom issued an apology for a 1996 email where he had stated that he thought "Blacks are more stupid than whites", and where he also used the word "niggers" in a description of how he thought this statement might be perceived…

This is a smear taken out of context. What Bostrom actually had to say is both accurate and mild: > “I have always liked the uncompromisingly objective way of thinking and speaking: the more counterintuitive and repugnant a formulation, the more it appeals to me given that it is logically correct,” the quoted excerpt begins. “Take for example the following sentence: Blacks are more stupid than whites. I like that sen…

What Bostrom said is that he completely repudiates these remarks and that they were disgusting. Leave it at that.

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#48

Post by beezlebroxxxxxx »

exo-pla-net wrote: post #23
Maro wrote: post #11

This 2023 incident around founder Nick Bostrom may have something to do with it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Bostrom#1996_email_contro... From the wikipedia article: > In January 2023, Bostrom issued an apology for a 1996 email where he had stated that he thought "Blacks are more stupid than whites", and where he also used the word "niggers" in a description of how he thought this statement might be perceived…

This is a smear taken out of context. What Bostrom actually had to say is both accurate and mild: > “I have always liked the uncompromisingly objective way of thinking and speaking: the more counterintuitive and repugnant a formulation, the more it appeals to me given that it is logically correct,” the quoted excerpt begins. “Take for example the following sentence: Blacks are more stupid than whites. I like that sen…

An academic would need to be incredibly stupid to think that that's a good thing to say in writing or out loud. The idea that you can "just" say these things is almost entirely the purview of people who coincidentally just so happen to not say or refer to all of the contextual and explicative ideas around them, making pointing to IQ without them essentially meaningless at best and racist at worst.

It's also not really "accurate or mild", as Bostrom himself stated in his apology for the email that:

> I completely repudiate this disgusting email from 26 years ago. It does not accurately represent my views, then or now. The invocation of a racial slur was repulsive. I immediately apologized for writing it at the time, within 24 hours; and I apologize again unreservedly today. I recoil when I read it and reject it utterly.

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#49

Post by levocardia »

polygamous_bat wrote: post #37
exo-pla-net wrote: post #18

Seems the incompetent and curiously hostile Philosophy Faculty at Oxford killed FHI. > While FHI had achieved significant academic and policy impact, the final years were affected by a gradual suffocation by Faculty bureaucracy. The flexible, fast-moving approach of the institute did not function well with the rigid rules and slow decision-making of the surrounding organization. (One of our administrators developed a…

Surely it was Oxford, the institute older than most nations, being incompetent, and nothing to do with the easy money tap called Sam Bankman Fraud being thrown in jail. Oxford just seems like a easy scapegoat as they can’t just say “our biggest donor is in jail for the foreseeable future and we have no money left because we used it to buy a mansion [0]” [0] https://twitter.com/paulmainwood/status/1600433194691502081

Center for Effective Altruism is different from FHI

Re: Future of Humanity Institute shuts down

#50

Post by empath-nirvana »

helboi4 wrote: post #36
myko wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this helps his case, but I do appreciate seeing the email in question

Every time race comes up on HackerNews i am shocked at how horrifyingly racist (some) users of this site are. Not only did a user somehow think that this context would exonerate this very racist man, both you and I are getting immediately downvoted for disagreeing. There was a post last week or so that was so full of racist comments it just got taken down. I wonder what on earth brings together HackerNews and racism…

It's because the people who run the site tolerate it and ban/warn people for making comments like yours.
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