Firstly, it is completely reasonable to look at the motivations of people in a movement when trying to evaluate what the world will look like if they were given more power and influence. My objection is the way that she went about this.
”But it also has to be okay to engage with the social context of futurists’ arguments, and an article that specifically tells you it’s about that seems like the most prosocial and scribe-friendly possible way to engage in that sort of discussion”
It would say that this article was neither pro-social nor scribe-friendly so I have no issues with discouraging this kind of writing. It is not pro-social as she essentialises various groups instead of talking about their biases or incentives, which furthers a certain superweapon that is currently being built against groups considered privileged.
It is not scribe-friendly because her treatment of various actors is extremely unnuanced and unpersuasive. A more realistic characterisation would do things such as explain that optimists are more likely become entrepreneurs and therefore to overestimate the positive impacts of technology. Or it could lament that the public good is dependent on the innovation of private actors, but that these actors will tend to focus their efforts on the issues that most affect them. These ideas are present, but in a form that is optimised to earn her social status within her ingroup by attacking an outgroup, rather than in a form that is designed to be persuasive.
Your Clever Arguers section is relate to the Epistemic Learned Helplessness post on Scott’s old blog. There are undoubtedly circumstances where it can be beneficial to refuse to be persuaded by discourse because you lack the ability to evaluate the arguments. Nonetheless, I don’t get the impression from the article that the author is declaring her inability to evaluate the situation, as opposed to confidently stating her belief that Q4 is the correct one.
Insofar as there are two sides here, one includes both someone who is literally building rockets and talking about his plans to establish a Mars base, and someone who managed to scare the first person with “BWAHAHA my AI will follow you to Mars, nowhere is safe.” And also multiple other parties openly planning to build a superintelligence that will forcibly overthrow all the worlds’ governments simultaneously and take over the entire accessible universe.
The other side has written some magazine articles making fun of the first side.
To clarify, I specifically meant that indicating her working hypotheses up front was scribe-friendly and prosocial, not that everything about the article was.
I think I was a bit unclear on the learned helplessness thing. It’s only part of what’s going on—another important part is modeling these narratives as coordination mechanisms for coalitions with various short-term goals and methods.
Firstly, it is completely reasonable to look at the motivations of people in a movement when trying to evaluate what the world will look like if they were given more power and influence. My objection is the way that she went about this.
”But it also has to be okay to engage with the social context of futurists’ arguments, and an article that specifically tells you it’s about that seems like the most prosocial and scribe-friendly possible way to engage in that sort of discussion”
It would say that this article was neither pro-social nor scribe-friendly so I have no issues with discouraging this kind of writing. It is not pro-social as she essentialises various groups instead of talking about their biases or incentives, which furthers a certain superweapon that is currently being built against groups considered privileged.
It is not scribe-friendly because her treatment of various actors is extremely unnuanced and unpersuasive. A more realistic characterisation would do things such as explain that optimists are more likely become entrepreneurs and therefore to overestimate the positive impacts of technology. Or it could lament that the public good is dependent on the innovation of private actors, but that these actors will tend to focus their efforts on the issues that most affect them. These ideas are present, but in a form that is optimised to earn her social status within her ingroup by attacking an outgroup, rather than in a form that is designed to be persuasive.
Your Clever Arguers section is relate to the Epistemic Learned Helplessness post on Scott’s old blog. There are undoubtedly circumstances where it can be beneficial to refuse to be persuaded by discourse because you lack the ability to evaluate the arguments. Nonetheless, I don’t get the impression from the article that the author is declaring her inability to evaluate the situation, as opposed to confidently stating her belief that Q4 is the correct one.
Insofar as there are two sides here, one includes both someone who is literally building rockets and talking about his plans to establish a Mars base, and someone who managed to scare the first person with “BWAHAHA my AI will follow you to Mars, nowhere is safe.” And also multiple other parties openly planning to build a superintelligence that will forcibly overthrow all the worlds’ governments simultaneously and take over the entire accessible universe.
The other side has written some magazine articles making fun of the first side.
Which side is building the superweapons again?
To clarify, I specifically meant that indicating her working hypotheses up front was scribe-friendly and prosocial, not that everything about the article was.
I think I was a bit unclear on the learned helplessness thing. It’s only part of what’s going on—another important part is modeling these narratives as coordination mechanisms for coalitions with various short-term goals and methods.