5 ms·

> It’s unfortunate that what started out with altruistic motives Are you actually buying into SBF’s pathetic ideologies? Or are you more referring to Satoshi’s

> It’s unfortunate that what started out with altruistic motives Are you actually buying into SBF’s pathetic ideologies? Or are you more referring to Satoshi’s white paper when you refer to “altruistic motives”. I can’t understand how anyone would take SBF seriously. He’s a smug charlatan who converted funny money to real money so that he could dump it into politics for his own aims, all while calling his actions “altruism”. Biggest false virtue signaler of all time.

zeven7 4y ago
Parent mentions decentralized anonymous asset exchange being the goal and 51% attacks being the biggest concern. That tells me he's talking about Satoshi. Those topics don't apply to SBF.
tromp 4y ago
> Or are you more referring to Satoshi’s white paper when you refer to “altruistic motives”. There's little altruistic about an emission that allocates half of all supply (first four years) going to early miners including Satoshi himself, and leaves only crumbs for later generations.
- rafale 4y ago
  Satoshi picked that model probably because it's easy to divide by 2 (x >> 2). He didn't want to prematurely optimize or overthink anything because it was a simple experiment and nobody could have predicted that Bitcoin will become the mammoth it is now.
  - mackman 4y ago
    Shifting by two is dividing by four. Not so easy, after all!
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- mdolon 4y ago
  This was my biggest “a-ha” realization around crypto, that the distribution model is utterly and irreparably broken for the most popular currencies. Whenever I bring this up with BTC/crypto maximalists their counterpoint is that fiat is also unevenly distributed and that it’s not a novel problem. The disconnect is truly puzzling.
  - tromp 4y ago
    It's not a novel problem, but nearly all cryptocurrencies exacerbate it by concentrating the majority of emission on the first few years. Non-pow coins even start with the creators holding 100% of supply. When they could instead minimize the problem (or limit it to the pre-existing fiat inequality) with a pure linear emission, i.e. fixed block subsidy. The resulting high supply inflation rate (1/n after n years) would have the side benefit of deterring speculation, and keeping prices (and hence environmental impact) low.
  - lazide 4y ago
    It's not so puzzling when you realize most people are perfectly fine about something if they get paid by it, or think they might one day get paid by it. Less fine if they won't and someone else will.
easytiger 4y ago
Agreed. IN particular, William MacAskill[1] is worth particular interest. Closer to abstract low tier cult than serious philosophy. The fact he changed his name (his real name is William Crouch) to sound more like a marketable philosopher should be indicative enough to anyone with an ounce of sense that one should be guarded engaging with this supposed philosophy. That so many people at FTX called themselves "EAers" or "subscribe to the philosophy of EA" screams charlatanism to me. That it became entwined with the Crypto community is no surprise to me. It reminds me of the many many "churches" in Africa that tell people great fortune will come their way if they are loyal to this particular preacher or whatnot. [2] It is obvious to me those are a scam. Perhaps more akin to Scientology - creation of a VIP club - the less sense it makes the better? I've tried to read about Effective Altruism and my conclusions are that it is immature gibberish and these proponents are not fully formed emotionally intelligent adults. [3] > SBF ended up hanging out a lot with his younger brother Gabe, who was living in an EA commune on nearby Stuart Street. Communes - but it isn't a cult right? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_MacAskill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_MacAskill [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/13/world/africans-fill-churches-that-celebrate-wealth.html https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/13/world/africans-fill-churc... [3] https://web.archive.org/web/20221027180943/https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/sam-bankman-fried-spotlight/ https://web.archive.org/web/20221027180943/https://www.sequo...
- paul80808 4y ago
  I hear a lot of critiques around effective altruism that boil down to attacks on people who practice it as being immature, naive, or cult like. At its core, EA asks what the most effective way to contribute to humanity is. Some of the thinkers are mature and have produced amazing projects, givewell being an obvious example. There are definitely some weirdos affiliated with the movement, but I don't think that that discredits its approach or philosophy.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
    It's performative in exactly the same way I grew up among with evangelical extremists. You can't reduce moral decisions and ethics to some sort of karmic account balance. Functionally EA allows its promotors to rebrand self interest as actually altruism. It becomes an all purpose end to justify any means. A thought ending cliche to avoid engaging with the actual complexity.

zeven7 4y ago

Parent mentions decentralized anonymous asset exchange being the goal and 51% attacks being the biggest concern. That tells me he's talking about Satoshi. Those topics don't apply to SBF.

tromp 4y ago

> Or are you more referring to Satoshi’s white paper when you refer to “altruistic motives”. There's little altruistic about an emission that allocates half of all supply (first four years) going to early miners including Satoshi himself, and leaves only crumbs for later generations.

rafale 4y ago
Satoshi picked that model probably because it's easy to divide by 2 (x >> 2). He didn't want to prematurely optimize or overthink anything because it was a simple experiment and nobody could have predicted that Bitcoin will become the mammoth it is now.
- mackman 4y ago
  Shifting by two is dividing by four. Not so easy, after all!
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
mdolon 4y ago
This was my biggest “a-ha” realization around crypto, that the distribution model is utterly and irreparably broken for the most popular currencies. Whenever I bring this up with BTC/crypto maximalists their counterpoint is that fiat is also unevenly distributed and that it’s not a novel problem. The disconnect is truly puzzling.
- tromp 4y ago
  It's not a novel problem, but nearly all cryptocurrencies exacerbate it by concentrating the majority of emission on the first few years. Non-pow coins even start with the creators holding 100% of supply. When they could instead minimize the problem (or limit it to the pre-existing fiat inequality) with a pure linear emission, i.e. fixed block subsidy. The resulting high supply inflation rate (1/n after n years) would have the side benefit of deterring speculation, and keeping prices (and hence environmental impact) low.
- lazide 4y ago
  It's not so puzzling when you realize most people are perfectly fine about something if they get paid by it, or think they might one day get paid by it. Less fine if they won't and someone else will.

easytiger 4y ago

Agreed. IN particular, William MacAskill[1] is worth particular interest. Closer to abstract low tier cult than serious philosophy. The fact he changed his name (his real name is William Crouch) to sound more like a marketable philosopher should be indicative enough to anyone with an ounce of sense that one should be guarded engaging with this supposed philosophy. That so many people at FTX called themselves "EAers" or "subscribe to the philosophy of EA" screams charlatanism to me. That it became entwined with the Crypto community is no surprise to me. It reminds me of the many many "churches" in Africa that tell people great fortune will come their way if they are loyal to this particular preacher or whatnot. [2] It is obvious to me those are a scam. Perhaps more akin to Scientology - creation of a VIP club - the less sense it makes the better? I've tried to read about Effective Altruism and my conclusions are that it is immature gibberish and these proponents are not fully formed emotionally intelligent adults. [3] > SBF ended up hanging out a lot with his younger brother Gabe, who was living in an EA commune on nearby Stuart Street. Communes - but it isn't a cult right? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_MacAskill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_MacAskill [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/13/world/africans-fill-churches-that-celebrate-wealth.html https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/13/world/africans-fill-churc... [3] https://web.archive.org/web/20221027180943/https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/sam-bankman-fried-spotlight/ https://web.archive.org/web/20221027180943/https://www.sequo...

paul80808 4y ago
I hear a lot of critiques around effective altruism that boil down to attacks on people who practice it as being immature, naive, or cult like. At its core, EA asks what the most effective way to contribute to humanity is. Some of the thinkers are mature and have produced amazing projects, givewell being an obvious example. There are definitely some weirdos affiliated with the movement, but I don't think that that discredits its approach or philosophy.
- jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
  It's performative in exactly the same way I grew up among with evangelical extremists. You can't reduce moral decisions and ethics to some sort of karmic account balance. Functionally EA allows its promotors to rebrand self interest as actually altruism. It becomes an all purpose end to justify any means. A thought ending cliche to avoid engaging with the actual complexity.