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Shame on Y Combinator

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771–780 of 1001 posts

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#771
Altman has it right, as much as Trump is reprehensible what candidate the partners of YC support has no bearing on whether or not a business relationship should be broken up. Politics are a private matter, just as religion, your sexuality, who you choose as a significant other and so on.

Thiel has had the guts to publicly come out in support for one of two very reprehensible candidates, one who I would be happy not to see become president of the most powerful country in the world (privately I wonder if these two are really the best people America could come up with to lead the country but that's another matter). At the same time I'm not so conceited that I would call for others to dissociate themselves from a working relationship with Peter Thiel though I will happily dissociate myself from him (easy for me to say, I have no business dealings with Peter Thiel, so probably I should say 'would').

Freedom is all about how you live your life, not about telling others how they should live theirs and what they should and should not do and even if I would be happy to see Altman (and by extention YC) dissociate himself from Peter Thiel I would not stoop to the point of asking or demanding of him that he do so, it's his life, his business and any kind of cognitive dissonance between what he sees as a serious threat to America as we know it today/continued association with a supporter of that threat is entirely his own.

I've always had a real problem with people telling others how they should live their lives, decide for yourself what you want and leave other people out of it.

People telling other people how they should live is why there is religious persecution, why LGBT people can't marry and why political dissent is repressed in many places. This behavior has no place in an advanced society. Peter Thiel should be free to support whichever candidate he feels like and Sam Altman should be free to associate himself and YC with Peter Thiel.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#773

Earlier quoted context omitted.

as long as no one have actually formulated an argument based on facts how Trump is a threat to democracy I dont see how he is more dangerous than Hillary, Bush or Obama. And i am pretty sure a large portion of people outide the US see those three as bigger threats to their lives than Trump given US foreign policy. So until someone show how the us system can be destroyed by Trump I stand by my position that Trump is n…

If you believe that Trump is no more dangerous than Clinton, your support for Peter Thiel makes sense, and, while I'd implore you to reconsider, I'm content for us to agree to disagree. But Sam Altman and Paul Graham don't agree with you. They virulently disagree with you. They repeatedly compare Trump to a fascist dictator. They claim Trump is an existential threat to our democracy. Paul Graham said that if Trump wi…

This is a very good point. I do not think supporting Trump is outside the bounds of decency, and I would not disassociate from Thiel on these grounds. But Sam Altman stated that "If Peter said some of the things Trump says himself, he would no longer be part of Y Combinator." The recent Citizens United Supreme Court decision re-affirmed the intimate connection between monetary support and political speech. So this is a serious logical disjunction on sama's part. Every fascist is someone's friend.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#774

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People keep claiming that this sentiment is "profoundly illiberal". Those people should read more liberal philosophy, because it is not as if this is the first time this issue has come up. You can bring it back to John Stuart Mill if you like, but (very unsurprisingly) it's also one of the major themes of post-World-War-2 liberal philosophy. We are not required to tolerate intolerance when intolerance poses a threat…

I do not believe Trump is significantly more intolerant than HRC or any other likely presidential candidate, he simply focuses his rhetoric on populist ire across all of his positions. It's the only trick he knows so he does it again and again. Additionally, HRC has in the past advocated a nearly identical "wall" policy but used softer rhetoric: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gUAdAYFbIc GOP candidates for several e…

This person gets it. Our society is under threat by more than just Trump or Hilary.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#775

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So? Then they are wrong as well then, at least in that particular, their eminence notwithstanding. Appealing to authority makes your position no more tenable. Principles that are abandoned when under duress are no principles at all.

I'm seeing variants of this thrown around a lot here, but I don't see people engaging with tptacek's point, at least to my reading of it. Let me turn this around. When corporations choose to get actively political, like Chick-Fil-A's support of anti-gay groups and Ben & Jerry's support of Black Lives Matter, should we not take that into account when we decide whether to do business with them? I don't think you'd make…

Personal relationships, including business relationships, are governed by different principles than what brand of ice cream you buy.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#776
The size of this thread, and the split of opinions, is a clear indication to me that this goes beyond the single decision of "Whether or not keep Thiel on board".

I would like to bring your attention to that bigger issue (sorry if this comment is useless to you in making up your mind about Thiel).

I consider myself a transhumanist, a futurologist, a technologist, that sort of thing. I got into this about 3 years ago. And I've done a lot of thinking/reading on this topic, and I've tried my best to gauge the perception about technology in the eyes of non-techies, especially economists, and politicians.

And my conclusion is that, except for a few, economists and politicians are hopelessly lagging behind the fast pace of socio-economic change. I also predicted that within a matter of years, we're headed for a serious social disruption of an unpredictable nature.

Here is my thesis: 2016 is the beginning of that socially disruptive era. And it's all due to technological progress and automation-driven-unemployment!

If you think it's only about the 2016 US election, and things will settle down within weeks after November 8 election of Clinton, you would be misguided. Of course the election fever will settle down, but not the frustration behind it, which is growing like a frog in a slowly boiling water. I can tell you right now, the 2018 election season would be worse, and 2020 season would be far worse!

Case in point: Have you seen the statistics related to self-driving cars and trucks? Arguably it'll put 3 million truckers out of work. This will happen within a matter of months, not years, not decades. What do you think would happen when all of a sudden 3 million people are without means to put food on their table? Something that would make you forget Trump!

You might ask, we don't have self-driving cars yet why do we have social disruption? Well, self-driving cars is a poster-child of automation. It's something that's easy to understand and relate to. There is a ton of subtle, behind-the-scenes, automation going on, that is indirectly making harder for humans to utilize their skills for making money. Smart-phone and related apps, news article bots, automated warehousing like Amazon Kivy, Uber/Lyft, Airbnb, Etsy, vertical farming, solar and wind power, on, and on, and on. But more importantly:

Social disruption is not a step function but a logistic curve. It's not that we'll have zero disruption until self-driving trucks are available for retail purchasing, and after that we'll have full disruption. Instead, it's a sign of things to come, and we're off the zero-level, and slowly rising up the S-curve of the logistic function.

Please think of this problem in a bigger context. If technologists cannot do this, economists and politicians definitely can't.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#777
Because of extreme overuse, I think that now roughly half of the country don't care about being called racist or sexist anymore. Congratulations.

In fact, in certain circumstances it's actually a pretty good evidence that something "interesting" is being said and someone is trying to silence it, like how searching for grayed out comments in HN is the first thing I do in threads like this.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#778

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you do not believe that Trump is an existential threat to American democracy, then, while I implore you to reconsider, I am content to agree to disagree. But you might take that disagreement up first with Paul Graham and Sam Altman. They do not agree with you. They aggressively don't agree with you. They compare Donald Trump with a fascist dictator. I think they're right about Trump, and therefore that they're ver…

>They compare Donald Trump with a fascist dictator. A bit childish, considering the slot the candidate is running for is not in a dictatorship. If you think Trump could convert the US to a dictatorship, I would like to see the evidence supporting this.

"A bit childish, considering the slot the candidate is running for is not in a dictatorship."

True, but Trump's rhetoric indicates he has not grasped the distinction.

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#779
post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to start things off, you do realize that firing him would appear to be illegal ? At least, assuming there are no arcane reasons why California's laws do not apply here: http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/HowToFileLinkCodeSections.htm Labor Code section 1101 Protects employees who engage or participate in politics or who become candidates for public office. An employer may not make, adopt, or enforce any rule, regulation…

In addition to being QUITE POSSIBLY ILLEGAL, it would also be QUITE THE MAGIC TRICK, since Peter Thiel is not an employee of Sam Altman, and the organization Sam Altman runs is famous for being built around the essay "How To Start A Startup", which suggests that a unique strength of startups versus normal companies is that they aren't bound by discrimination laws, and so Paul Graham can choose not to start companies…

Wait, are you trying to say something about Paul Graham, or something about Sam Altman? Because one of those wrote that essay, and the other heads YC right now.

You had a point somewhere up around "Peter Thiel is not an employee of Sam Altman [but rather a partner that can be let go of at any time for any reason]" but what happened to the rest of your comment?

Re: Shame on Y Combinator

#780
Peter Thiel's financial support for Trump's campaign, as well as Trump's campaign of hatred, racism, xenophobia and misogyny, are perfect examples of the Overton window sliding into insanity.

The next Trump may be slightly more moderate. He may accept that women may have some of the same rights as men. He may accept the fact some foreigners should be afforded some civil liberties. He may even accept access to healthcare is a good thing and that Islam is not inherently evil.

And, next to Trump, he'll be pictured as a moderate.

I am sorry if I look intolerant of diversity, but this cannot be tolerated. We cannot allow the subversion of democracies.

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