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Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

economist.com

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Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#61

Post by plorkyeran »

skavi wrote: post #13
glitchc wrote: post #3

Read the bio. Found it (emphasis mine): > While at Columbia, he co-founded the university's effective altruism (EA) chapter.[5] Just another smart, yet ethically challenged, individual. Nothing to see here.

why does involvement with EA imply being ethically challenged? i’m personally not involved, but on its face it seems better than not doing any kind of charitable work.

EA has a few branches of thought. One of them is "I am going to donate $X to charity each year. How do I maximize the good this brings to the world?" This group is sometimes less effective than they'd like to think, but there's no moral problem with it.

Another branch is "I make lots of money at a job that's probably making the world a worse place. How do I reframe this to not feel like a bad person?" They do some math and conclude that it's net more good for them to earn a bunch of money and donate some of it than it is to volunteer or it is to work at a job that isn't making the world a worse place. This is an awfully convenient conclusion as it means that all they have to do is pay a tithe and make no real changes to their life.

The notion of making money specifically for the sake of funding good things isn't a completely terrible one, but a vocal portion of the people who espouse it are very obviously not primarily motivated by maximizing the good they do.

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#62

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

openquery wrote: post #11

I don't understand the point of this piece. There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know. Mind you I don't particularly care about Aschenbrenner or his fund but it feels to me like typical journalists reporting on hindsight without any sort of skin in the game. "Hhm, how could you be so dumb so as to trust your money to a 22 year old". Peter Thiel did the same with Zuck and like him…

"I don't understand the point of this piece."

Its purpose is entertainment

It highlights the age of the Situational Awareness founder and what he was doing before he started the fund

"There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know."

It's a weekly column not "breaking news"

The column author shares his perspective on current events and usually reflects on the past. It's unlikely that readers "already know" which current events the columnist will select, what he will write about them, including which comparative history he might reference. As such, it does provide something readers "don't already know", namely, the columnist's views on the current event he has selected. As for "remotely interesting", that's an opinion. Surely this column has a readership that finds the author's writing "remotely interesting"

The Economist does at times try, incorrectly, to predict the future

But that's not what is going on in this column. It's looking backward, not forward

If the parent comment is coming from a 20-something recipient of Silicon Valley VC funding and hoping to profit from an "AI" startup, then perhaps a bias disclosure is in order

If, hypothetically, no predictions were ever shared with the public over the internet, what would that do to Silicon Valley. What would happen to the volume of HN submimssions/comments

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#63

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #62
openquery wrote: post #11

I don't understand the point of this piece. There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know. Mind you I don't particularly care about Aschenbrenner or his fund but it feels to me like typical journalists reporting on hindsight without any sort of skin in the game. "Hhm, how could you be so dumb so as to trust your money to a 22 year old". Peter Thiel did the same with Zuck and like him…

"I don't understand the point of this piece." Its purpose is entertainment It highlights the age of the Situational Awareness founder and what he was doing before he started the fund "There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know." It's a weekly column not "breaking news" The column author shares his perspective on current events and usually reflects on the past. It's unlikely that re…

What would happen to "AI" startups if there was no "AI" hype, including endless predictions about the future

Of course there is no way to know unless and until it occurs

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#64

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #62
openquery wrote: post #11

I don't understand the point of this piece. There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know. Mind you I don't particularly care about Aschenbrenner or his fund but it feels to me like typical journalists reporting on hindsight without any sort of skin in the game. "Hhm, how could you be so dumb so as to trust your money to a 22 year old". Peter Thiel did the same with Zuck and like him…

"I don't understand the point of this piece." Its purpose is entertainment It highlights the age of the Situational Awareness founder and what he was doing before he started the fund "There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know." It's a weekly column not "breaking news" The column author shares his perspective on current events and usually reflects on the past. It's unlikely that re…

*submissions

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#65

Post by [deleted] »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #63
1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I don't understand the point of this piece." Its purpose is entertainment It highlights the age of the Situational Awareness founder and what he was doing before he started the fund "There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know." It's a weekly column not "breaking news" The column author shares his perspective on current events and usually reflects on the past. It's unlikely that re…

What would happen to "AI" startups if there was no "AI" hype, including endless predictions about the future Of course there is no way to know unless and until it occurs

[deleted]

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#66

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #62
openquery wrote: post #11

I don't understand the point of this piece. There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know. Mind you I don't particularly care about Aschenbrenner or his fund but it feels to me like typical journalists reporting on hindsight without any sort of skin in the game. "Hhm, how could you be so dumb so as to trust your money to a 22 year old". Peter Thiel did the same with Zuck and like him…

"I don't understand the point of this piece." Its purpose is entertainment It highlights the age of the Situational Awareness founder and what he was doing before he started the fund "There is nothing breaking or remotely interesting which we didn't already know." It's a weekly column not "breaking news" The column author shares his perspective on current events and usually reflects on the past. It's unlikely that re…

It's like asking what is the point of Matt Levine's column as it contains no breaking news, nor anything readers don't already know nor anything remotely interesting

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#67

Post by yorwba »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #58
YetAnotherNick wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What doesn't make sense? I thought expected wealth optimization was the most controversial thing by far.

> What doesn't make sense? Well, for one, the frequency of its members committing mass fraud. Like, if a church preaches kindness and love but its preachers and members are constantly out there murdering people, it's a bit silly to point to the text alone when evaluating the organisation.

What do you think the frequency of EAs committing mass fraud is? How many cases are you basing that on? What does that imply about the size of the EA movement? Does that number make sense?

Like, if a church had 100,000 members, you would indeed expect them to commit a few murders each year. And GiveWell alone claims to have induced 150,000 people to donate... https://www.givewell.org/default/citations#Number_of_donors

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#68

Post by yorwba »

TimorousBestie wrote: post #37
skavi wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can you support those claims?

It’s the “tractability” part of the ITN framework: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/topics/itn-framework In practice, it can be used as a fully-general counterargument to supporting most charities, since decisively and completely solving problems in this space is rare. It’s harder to split a problem into component parts than it is to throw up one’s hands and say, “well, this isn’t tractable.”

"tractability = % of a problem solved / % increase in resources" does not sound like "you have to decisively and completely solve a problem or it's not worth supporting." You can only throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" if tractability is 0, i.e. the charity doesn't help at all, no matter how much money you spend on it.

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#69

Post by TimorousBestie »

yorwba wrote: post #68
TimorousBestie wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the “tractability” part of the ITN framework: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/topics/itn-framework In practice, it can be used as a fully-general counterargument to supporting most charities, since decisively and completely solving problems in this space is rare. It’s harder to split a problem into component parts than it is to throw up one’s hands and say, “well, this isn’t tractable.”

"tractability = % of a problem solved / % increase in resources" does not sound like "you have to decisively and completely solve a problem or it's not worth supporting." You can only throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" if tractability is 0, i.e. the charity doesn't help at all, no matter how much money you spend on it.

I’m describing about how the term is used by EA folks, which may not match its formal definition. (“In practice, it can be used as. . .”)

> You can only throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" if tractability is 0, i.e. the charity doesn't help at all, no matter how much money you spend on it.

Even I don’t believe this. You’ve gone too far in the other direction and made tractability a useless metric.

Re: Investors in Situational Awareness deserved to lose their shirts

#70

Post by yorwba »

TimorousBestie wrote: post #69
yorwba wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"tractability = % of a problem solved / % increase in resources" does not sound like "you have to decisively and completely solve a problem or it's not worth supporting." You can only throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" if tractability is 0, i.e. the charity doesn't help at all, no matter how much money you spend on it.

I’m describing about how the term is used by EA folks, which may not match its formal definition. (“In practice, it can be used as. . .”) > You can only throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" if tractability is 0, i.e. the charity doesn't help at all, no matter how much money you spend on it. Even I don’t believe this. You’ve gone too far in the other direction and made tractability a useless metric.

If tractability could only be used to filter out literally intractable charities, it would indeed not be very useful. But you can also use it to compare different approaches and pick the best ones. Then you don't throw up your hands and say "this isn't tractable" but you throw up your hands and say "why are you wasting money on this when a much more tractable approach exists."
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