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Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

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Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#761

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon makes a relatively good case in the Dwarkesh podcast. I recall it like this: 1) Energy infra is going to be seriously limited on the production side well, well below demand 2) energy engineering solar for space requires less materials than for gravity-based solar (!) 3) you cut out distribution network needs when you just launch stuff all per-pod in space 4) SpaceX thinks it can create a scalable vertically inte…

>Elon makes a relatively good case in the Dwarkesh podcast. Are we still going to pretend that the man who has gotten every single prediction wrong so far knows what he is talking about?

He has never made a good case only coherent stories people believe.

He has been saying self driving cars are right around the corner 10+ years by using a staged video.

I will never forget this statement; _I don't know anything about EVs so when he talked I believed him. I don't know anything about rockets so when he talked I believed him. I most defiantly know about software development and when he opens his mouth I know he is lying."

Still don't get what people see in him. Deep down he is not a good person and will say anything to pump up his image and stock.

P.S. Number of his fans like to down vote people for calling him a bad person.

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#762

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ethically, if you do not agree with the company you work at, the optimal course of action if you can stomach it is to stay and do a bad job rather than get replaced by someone who might do a good job. I have been in such a situation before, and while I was not able to coast along until the company went under, the time delta between me getting fired and the company going under was measured in weeks. In hindsight I'd p…

> Ethically, if you do not agree with the company you work at, the optimal course of action if you can stomach it is to stay and do a bad job rather than get replaced by someone who might do a good job. What...? In what way is it anything other than highly unethical to sabotage someone you have a contract with, because you disagree with them?

"Don't struggle only within the ground rules that the people you're struggling against have laid down." -- Malcolm X

"If you're unhappy with your job you don't strike. You just go in there every day, and do it really half-assed. That's the American way. -- Homer Simpson

"To steal from a brother or sister is evil. To not steal from the institutions that are the pillars of the Pig Empire is equally immoral." -- Abbie Hoffman

Some might consider it unethical but others might also consider it immoral to not do what you're describing.

I guess you're fortunate enough to have only worked at places where your moral framework matched up with their business practices and treatment of the staff.

That isn't the case for most people. Most people are put into situations at one time or another where the people they're working for don't value them as equals, where the people they work for casually violate reasonable laws like product safety or enivronmental standards laws and what's worse these people will suffer no consequences for doing so.

No White Knight in shining armour is going to come from the government to shut them down. No lightning from heaven will strike them down. No financial penalty to dissuade them from further defection from society and the common man in the game that is life.

So what do you do? Do you do nothing? Just put your nose to the grindstone and keep working for the man? Do you quit, only to end up penniless and jobless, with poor prospects of an alternative, and even if you found one maybe it's 'meet the new boss same as the old boss'?

Nah, you come into work every day and you subtly fuck it up. You subtly fuck it up and you take whatever value you can extract.

They'd do the same to you.

They are doing the same to you.

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#763
There should be a social theory study of jerks and people who continue to work for them. I’d imagine there’s a sort of logarithmic drop off. It takes time for the knowledge of terrible bosses to work through the labor force, but tech is a small community (of hopefully smart people) and people start to catch on.

A story I heard from a Tesla employee was that it’s impossible to hire because musk is mercurial and every time a hire makes it through the pipeline a hiring freeze cancels all offers. Another story that employees were told to avoid his desk because he randomly fires people. Another that he regularly cancels bonuses because he’s feeling petulant. I heard another story that he threw up Nazi salutes on an internationally televised event. No wait, that one I watched happen.

After a while smart people will simply decline to work for him no matter the compensation. Not everyone, but enough to start to matter.

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#764

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's even worse, they should know better

Integrity means understanding when your community if falling into the snares of its own rules. What's the point of formal, nuanced discussion if it's used to empower hate?

I agree. For whatever reason, whether it is a change in community sentiment or something else, I get downvotes talking about this. I can't think of a more useless thing to care about. Even if I cared, I couldn't think of a better way to spend accrued social capital.

The hold that scumbags - influencers, political operatives, narcissists with Messiah complexes - have taken over young men, particularly those inclined to go into the software field, is alarming.

Various former founding members of PayPal, leaders of the companies they've founded subsequently, member of A16Z and some opportunists and hangers on to these wealthier individuals who are beneath the dignity of mentioning separately - they have lost their moral and ethical moorings in the course of accumulating massive wealth and they are corrupting others in doing it.

Even modest startup incubators are be obsequious to the wealth and power of these people in the field and decided that money is more important than morality. Or at the very least there is no pretense of it now.

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#765
post #134

I don't use it myself, but I feel like the way Grok is integrated into Twitter is a pretty good thing for discussions, as it is certainly a more objective and rational voice than most human participants. I think it's good that people tag @grok if they don't understand something or want an opinion, even if it looks pretty silly to see "@grok is this true" repeated multiple times in replies. That said, Musk's attempts…

> Grok is integrated into Twitter is a pretty good thing for discussions, as it is certainly a more objective and rational voice than most human participants

Hard agree.

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#766
post #745

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean...? Plenty to do what? Your opinion of the situation is not enough to justify this course of action in 99.99% of cases and the residual 0.01% should not be enough to fuel your ego to do anything other than quit decently, and look for an employer that is more aligned with whatever your ideals are. I repeat the insane statement that we are arguing over here: "Ethically, if you do not agree with the com…

A specific example will help. Imagine I am working for a company and I discover they are engaged in capturing and transporting human slaves. Furthermore, the government where they operate in fully aware and supportive of their actions so denouncing them publicly is unlikely to help. This is a real situation that has happened to real people at points in history in my own country. I believe that one ethical response wo…

I have no clue why people are so confused here.

a) I understand the very few and specific examples, that would justify and require disobedience. In those cases just doing a "bad job" seems super lame and inconsequential. I would ask more of anyone, including myself.

b) all other examples, the category that parent opened so broadly, are simply completely silly, is what I take offensive with. If you think simply disagreeing with anyone you have entered a contract with is cause for sabotaging them, and painting that as ethically superior, then, I repeat: what the fuck?

c) If you suspect criminal behavior then alarm the authorities or the press. What are you going to do on the inside? What vigilante spy story are we telling ourselves here?

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#768
post #767

Did everyone forget that xAI was just a way for Musk to weasle his way out of debt from his Twitter purchase?

His Twitter purchase bought him the Presidency and Congress and Senate - arguably the greatest purchase in this history of mankind

Re: Elon Musk pushes out more xAI founders as AI coding effort falters

#769
post #767

Did everyone forget that xAI was just a way for Musk to weasle his way out of debt from his Twitter purchase?

His Twitter purchase bought him the Presidency and Congress and Senate - arguably the greatest purchase in this history of mankind

Quality needs controlling.
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