I don’t think the statement “MIRI has given up” is true, unqualified, and I don’t think I’m one of the people you’re referring to who say it.
But like, Death With Dignity sure did cause me to make some updates about MIRI and Eliezer. For all intents and purposes, I go around acting the same as I would act if MIRI and Eliezer gave up. When I read people saying thing like “blah blah since MIRI gave up” my reaction isn’t “what? No they didn’t!”, my reaction is more like “mm, nod”. (The post itself is probably only about half the reason for this; the other half would just be their general lack of visible activity over the last few years.)
I feel like those who are upset that Death With Dignity caused people to believe that MIRI has given up are continuing to miss some critical lesson. I think the result is much less of a failure of people to read and understand the post, and much more of a failure of the prominent people to understand how communication works.
Seeing this post get so strongly upvoted makes me feel like I’m going crazy.
This is not the kind of content I want on LessWrong. I did not enjoy it, I do not think it will lead me to be happier or more productive toward reducing x-risk, I don’t see how it would help others, and it honestly doesn’t even seem like a particularly well done version of itself.
Can people help me understand why they upvoted?