As far as I can tell, actually, there is no real reason for us (i.e. the Less Wrong commentariat) to care about these Terasem people. They seem to be weird, and rather confused about some things. That is hardly an exclusive crowd. (And “they once paid Eliezer Yudkowsky to speak at their conference” is not an interesting connection.)
I don’t say this to pick on you, by the way; it’s just that I think it’s important for us not to get distracted by analyzing what every group of cranks (or even every group of AI cranks) out there thinks, says, and does.
Well that’s sensible enough, and I can only rebut it, not refute it. My counterargument is basically this:
1. At the speed at which technology is going forward, it seems entirely possible that the opinions of cranks will eventually drive real world actions of some sort, and so engaging with them ahead of those actions might be a good thing.
2. Without airing dirty laundry, it’s impossible to know how prevalent crank-ish ideas are in a community.
That’s fair. I still think the post is relevant though.
As far as I can tell, actually, there is no real reason for us (i.e. the Less Wrong commentariat) to care about these Terasem people. They seem to be weird, and rather confused about some things. That is hardly an exclusive crowd. (And “they once paid Eliezer Yudkowsky to speak at their conference” is not an interesting connection.)
I don’t say this to pick on you, by the way; it’s just that I think it’s important for us not to get distracted by analyzing what every group of cranks (or even every group of AI cranks) out there thinks, says, and does.
Well that’s sensible enough, and I can only rebut it, not refute it. My counterargument is basically this:
1. At the speed at which technology is going forward, it seems entirely possible that the opinions of cranks will eventually drive real world actions of some sort, and so engaging with them ahead of those actions might be a good thing.
2. Without airing dirty laundry, it’s impossible to know how prevalent crank-ish ideas are in a community.