6 ms·

> lesswrongers, longtermerists, various */acc type communities Are these specific blogs or is this the label of some kind of philosophical viewpoint? I'm unfam

> lesswrongers, longtermerists, various */acc type communities Are these specific blogs or is this the label of some kind of philosophical viewpoint? I'm unfamiliar with these terms and a web search didn't clear it up for me.

YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
I've been wondering about that, too, for a while. A few days ago I found this article on Aeon that is strongly critical of longtermism, and gives much background on what it is: https://aeon.co/essays/why-longtermism-is-the-worlds-most-dangerous-secular-credo https://aeon.co/essays/why-longtermism-is-the-worlds-most-da... In the comments of that article someone posted a link to the following, which is a rebuttal to a similar critique of longtermism again by the Aeon article's author. I link it here for balance: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/xtKRPkoMSLTiPNXhM/response-to-phil-torres-the-case-against-longtermism https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/xtKRPkoMSLTiPNXhM/... Based on the Aeon article, my understanding is that longtermism is a loosely organised movement that nevertheless nurtures within it the seeds of a future totalitarian ideology, one premised on some views about technological utopias, post-humanism, and utilitarianism taken to extremes. This impression has remained even after reading the rebuttal above, which seems to me to deflect the criticisms not by denying them but by claiming that the ideas criticised by the article are not mainstream within the movement anymore. This has failed to convince me because I understand that the movement is not centrally organised, so it's not easy to know what its members hold to be mainstream views, or not. That such extreme, and repugnant, ideas have been expressed by members of the movement (not less some luminaries like Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord, apparently) is what is criticised in the first place, and I think there's good reason for that. On the other hand, it seems to me that, for the time being, longtermists are not activists and just like to imagine how a perfect world would be, even if their ideas sound odd; so they're not harming anyone. The question is whether their movement will morph into an activist ideology, and lead their members to commit atrocities in its name, like so many other movements that take ideas about moral duty and the common good to extremes. I don't know anything about the lesswrong community except that it congregates on a website with the same name (that I don't read) and I don't know what are the */acc type communities the OP is referring to.
smiley1437 4y ago
Here's an example of what you might see on lesswrong.com: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/aZd9s5mXkdrGJNJi6/shutting-down-ai-is-not-enough-we-need-to-destroy-all https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/aZd9s5mXkdrGJNJi6/shutting-d...
- sebzim4500 4y ago
  Erm... you might want to check the publish date and tags on that article.
ben_w 4y ago
Less Wrong is a community about logical reasoning, overcoming cognitive biases etc., IIRC started by Yudkowsky. Longtermists and longtermism is about trying to take a holistic view of maximising good in the universe, and the length of timescales they're focussed on is approximately "all of it". I think acc means acceleration (of AI?) but I've only been seeing the string for the last week.
- SideburnsOfDoom 4y ago
  I also know of this description of Yudkowsky: "a crank AI scholar who thinks preventing his ideas for sci-fi novels from becoming reality is more important than preventing malaria, and who freaked out once when a computer program from the future threatened to hurt him." https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41198053 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41198053 Make of that what you will, and if you like, read the book or find the author Sandifer's talks on podcast or video. But many people do make the case, in detail, that this "logical reasoning", "rationalists", "holistic view", "longtermism" etc has at best gone off the rails, and at worst was never on them in the first place. This is what grandparent poster means by "fringe viewpoints and problems with cults of personality" I mean, who wouldn't agree with "effective altruism". It sounds great, what's the alternative, being ineffective at it? Well, "if you do the numbers, you’ll understand that the most effective possible action is to fit out a really nice castle where movement leaders can sit and contemplate the future robot apocalypse" https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2023/02/06/ineffective-altruism-ftx-and-the-future-robot-apocalypse/ https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2023/02/06/ineffective-...
  - ben_w 4y ago
    Pretty weird to criticise EY for thinking that about Malaria right before criticising EA who… put a lot into malaria prevention (amongst other neglected tropical diseases). Why would I read someone else's take on him when I've already read AI to Zombies? (Skip the Quantum Mechanics, Sabine Hossenfelder does it better). > I mean, who wouldn't agree with "effective altruism". It sounds great, what's the alternative, being ineffective at it? Ironically, the rationalist community would be who — I've heard them make both these points in other contexts: 1. Just because it's called something nice don't make it so (e.g. official name for Berlin Wall) 2. If you invert a phrase and it sounds like nonsense, the phrase doesn't mean much (other examples include any Rep/Dem politician saying "I believe in America" because it would be really weird if they didn't) (And since SBF, also going "what did we do wrong, what did we miss, how can we do better?") > was never on them in the first place I'd agree with that. It runs directly into everything upsetting about Utilitarianism, and I've only ever seen people shrug at those issues and act like they are immutable mathematical truths rather than anything to be resolved. > castle Sure isn't a good look! Lots of massively Bad here. But I'm also thinking of an ex of mine, lovely person and we're still friends, genuinely cares about the poor and the needy, it's been 5 years since we split and they've still not repaid what they borrowed to donate to charity while themselves unemployed. Politicians (at least, those who get elected) don't take any of my ex's causes remotely seriously. Worse, the UK's Overton window on both left and right treats, and has in my lifetime always treated, such people with contempt[0]. Have you seen where the British send their leaders to university? (Of course you have, that's rhetorical, I read your profile :)) Heck, sometimes it feels like the whole country is almost a pile of ridiculous castles around random street corners. [0] with a possible wibble for Corbyn, but I won't make that digression at this time
PartiallyTyped 4y ago
Lesswrongers refers to the LessWrong community. This community is generally interested with alignment. There have been quite a few interesting allegations but I will let you look into that on your own without my opinion. LW and rationalists have a lot of overlap, LW might even be a proper subset of rationalists. The “rationalist” community has as the name implies reasoning as its basis, basically trying to use reason to generate and test knowledge, where reason has some degree of rigour. There is also another movement or loosely coupled collective of people with great overlap with rationalists, those who refer to themselves as “longtermists”. Loosely speaking, longtermists claim to think about very long term issues that concern humanity, instead of immediate issues. Think hundreds of years further down the road. I think acc may have been intended to be ACX / Astral Codex Ten (=X), which is a community around Scott Alexander. A prolific author, member of LW and well known Rationalist. I attempted to make this comment devoid of my opinion of said people. Hopefully this wasn’t too handwavey.
- wahnfrieden 4y ago
  e/acc l/acc r/acc u/acc c/acc etc. and completely mask off adjacent ones like kali/acc calling longtermerists long term thinkers is stopping a bit short. specifically they believe that long term considerations must include billions/trillions of future unborn AI minds that require as much humanity and care, even starting now, in proportion to current/future smaller numbers of physical beings. a lot of wacky thought comes out of these foundations
  - adamsmith143 4y ago
    >specifically they believe that long term considerations must include billions/trillions of future unborn AI minds that require as much humanity and care, even starting now, in proportion to current/future smaller numbers of physical beings. a lot of wacky thought comes out of these foundations This is a clear strawman and not representative of what actual longtermists believe.
    - JohnFen 4y ago
      It's certainly what the longtermists I've been exposed to believe. Or say, anyway.

YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago

I've been wondering about that, too, for a while. A few days ago I found this article on Aeon that is strongly critical of longtermism, and gives much background on what it is: https://aeon.co/essays/why-longtermism-is-the-worlds-most-dangerous-secular-credo https://aeon.co/essays/why-longtermism-is-the-worlds-most-da... In the comments of that article someone posted a link to the following, which is a rebuttal to a similar critique of longtermism again by the Aeon article's author. I link it here for balance: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/xtKRPkoMSLTiPNXhM/response-to-phil-torres-the-case-against-longtermism https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/xtKRPkoMSLTiPNXhM/... Based on the Aeon article, my understanding is that longtermism is a loosely organised movement that nevertheless nurtures within it the seeds of a future totalitarian ideology, one premised on some views about technological utopias, post-humanism, and utilitarianism taken to extremes. This impression has remained even after reading the rebuttal above, which seems to me to deflect the criticisms not by denying them but by claiming that the ideas criticised by the article are not mainstream within the movement anymore. This has failed to convince me because I understand that the movement is not centrally organised, so it's not easy to know what its members hold to be mainstream views, or not. That such extreme, and repugnant, ideas have been expressed by members of the movement (not less some luminaries like Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord, apparently) is what is criticised in the first place, and I think there's good reason for that. On the other hand, it seems to me that, for the time being, longtermists are not activists and just like to imagine how a perfect world would be, even if their ideas sound odd; so they're not harming anyone. The question is whether their movement will morph into an activist ideology, and lead their members to commit atrocities in its name, like so many other movements that take ideas about moral duty and the common good to extremes. I don't know anything about the lesswrong community except that it congregates on a website with the same name (that I don't read) and I don't know what are the */acc type communities the OP is referring to.

smiley1437 4y ago

Here's an example of what you might see on lesswrong.com: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/aZd9s5mXkdrGJNJi6/shutting-down-ai-is-not-enough-we-need-to-destroy-all https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/aZd9s5mXkdrGJNJi6/shutting-d...

sebzim4500 4y ago
Erm... you might want to check the publish date and tags on that article.

ben_w 4y ago

Less Wrong is a community about logical reasoning, overcoming cognitive biases etc., IIRC started by Yudkowsky. Longtermists and longtermism is about trying to take a holistic view of maximising good in the universe, and the length of timescales they're focussed on is approximately "all of it". I think acc means acceleration (of AI?) but I've only been seeing the string for the last week.

SideburnsOfDoom 4y ago
I also know of this description of Yudkowsky: "a crank AI scholar who thinks preventing his ideas for sci-fi novels from becoming reality is more important than preventing malaria, and who freaked out once when a computer program from the future threatened to hurt him." https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41198053 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41198053 Make of that what you will, and if you like, read the book or find the author Sandifer's talks on podcast or video. But many people do make the case, in detail, that this "logical reasoning", "rationalists", "holistic view", "longtermism" etc has at best gone off the rails, and at worst was never on them in the first place. This is what grandparent poster means by "fringe viewpoints and problems with cults of personality" I mean, who wouldn't agree with "effective altruism". It sounds great, what's the alternative, being ineffective at it? Well, "if you do the numbers, you’ll understand that the most effective possible action is to fit out a really nice castle where movement leaders can sit and contemplate the future robot apocalypse" https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2023/02/06/ineffective-altruism-ftx-and-the-future-robot-apocalypse/ https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2023/02/06/ineffective-...
- ben_w 4y ago
  Pretty weird to criticise EY for thinking that about Malaria right before criticising EA who… put a lot into malaria prevention (amongst other neglected tropical diseases). Why would I read someone else's take on him when I've already read AI to Zombies? (Skip the Quantum Mechanics, Sabine Hossenfelder does it better). > I mean, who wouldn't agree with "effective altruism". It sounds great, what's the alternative, being ineffective at it? Ironically, the rationalist community would be who — I've heard them make both these points in other contexts: 1. Just because it's called something nice don't make it so (e.g. official name for Berlin Wall) 2. If you invert a phrase and it sounds like nonsense, the phrase doesn't mean much (other examples include any Rep/Dem politician saying "I believe in America" because it would be really weird if they didn't) (And since SBF, also going "what did we do wrong, what did we miss, how can we do better?") > was never on them in the first place I'd agree with that. It runs directly into everything upsetting about Utilitarianism, and I've only ever seen people shrug at those issues and act like they are immutable mathematical truths rather than anything to be resolved. > castle Sure isn't a good look! Lots of massively Bad here. But I'm also thinking of an ex of mine, lovely person and we're still friends, genuinely cares about the poor and the needy, it's been 5 years since we split and they've still not repaid what they borrowed to donate to charity while themselves unemployed. Politicians (at least, those who get elected) don't take any of my ex's causes remotely seriously. Worse, the UK's Overton window on both left and right treats, and has in my lifetime always treated, such people with contempt[0]. Have you seen where the British send their leaders to university? (Of course you have, that's rhetorical, I read your profile :)) Heck, sometimes it feels like the whole country is almost a pile of ridiculous castles around random street corners. [0] with a possible wibble for Corbyn, but I won't make that digression at this time

PartiallyTyped 4y ago

Lesswrongers refers to the LessWrong community. This community is generally interested with alignment. There have been quite a few interesting allegations but I will let you look into that on your own without my opinion. LW and rationalists have a lot of overlap, LW might even be a proper subset of rationalists. The “rationalist” community has as the name implies reasoning as its basis, basically trying to use reason to generate and test knowledge, where reason has some degree of rigour. There is also another movement or loosely coupled collective of people with great overlap with rationalists, those who refer to themselves as “longtermists”. Loosely speaking, longtermists claim to think about very long term issues that concern humanity, instead of immediate issues. Think hundreds of years further down the road. I think acc may have been intended to be ACX / Astral Codex Ten (=X), which is a community around Scott Alexander. A prolific author, member of LW and well known Rationalist. I attempted to make this comment devoid of my opinion of said people. Hopefully this wasn’t too handwavey.

wahnfrieden 4y ago
e/acc l/acc r/acc u/acc c/acc etc. and completely mask off adjacent ones like kali/acc calling longtermerists long term thinkers is stopping a bit short. specifically they believe that long term considerations must include billions/trillions of future unborn AI minds that require as much humanity and care, even starting now, in proportion to current/future smaller numbers of physical beings. a lot of wacky thought comes out of these foundations
- adamsmith143 4y ago
  >specifically they believe that long term considerations must include billions/trillions of future unborn AI minds that require as much humanity and care, even starting now, in proportion to current/future smaller numbers of physical beings. a lot of wacky thought comes out of these foundations This is a clear strawman and not representative of what actual longtermists believe.
  - JohnFen 4y ago
    It's certainly what the longtermists I've been exposed to believe. Or say, anyway.