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The HN headline, "Future of Humanity Institute shuts down", sounds cynically funny, in context of current problems/challenges. The grandiose name Oxford chose
by neilv 3y ago
The HN headline, "Future of Humanity Institute shuts down", sounds cynically funny, in context of current problems/challenges.
The grandiose name Oxford chose now sounds like they've determined the situation is hopeless.
- jessriedel 3y ago"Oxford" did not choose the name
- kikokikokiko 3y agoBy your definition no name ever was "chosen" by any corporation in history. Organizations are made of people, and when a new org inside the main org is named, it obviously was named by someone (or a committee). In the end, the "organization" choose the name, potato po-ta-to.
- jessriedel 3y agoYou misunderstand. There are many cases where there is a decision making process (either single person or collective) that reasonably represents an organization's decision. But no such organization representing Oxford picked the name of FHI. It was picked by the people, most likely Bostrom, who started FHI, and did not at all represent a decision by greater Oxford.
- colechristensen 3y ago> in context of current problems/challenges People have been saying nonsense like this for as long as we have recorded history of people saying anything.
- stronglikedan 3y agoNothing new under the sun --Abraham Lincoln
- ryan_j_naughton 3y agoI think it is actually from the bible: What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 1:9
- r2_pilot 3y agoI've very happily been refuting this verse lately by building a smart robot that could not have existed before modern tech.
- eks391 3y ago"A house divided aginst itself cannot stand," part of a speech by Abe and thus credited to him, is also from the Bible: Mark 3:25. I'va a hunch he was religious.
- gizajob 3y agoNihil sub sole novum
- wigster 3y agoand everytime they do, they ARE closer to being correct
- neilv 3y agoIf you're not feeling the increasing dissatisfaction and worsening conditions that a lot of research reports, that's great for you, but I wouldn't call it nonsense.
- colechristensen 3y agoMy point is a large group of people have been feeling "dissatisfaction and worsening conditions" for thousands of years. It's what growing up and getting older feels like. You yearn for how things were in the past. It's easy to take for granted the things which got better before you knew about them and to overemphasize things which are getting worse now. There is always something, there always has been something, always will be. And always there have been people insisting that the modern problems are the real serious ones compared to the past. Doom sells. Lots of people buy it.
- laurex 3y agoWe've had recorded history of people saying things for less time than we've had a formal scientific method. Surely the accumulation of knowledge through our recording of people saying things carries some weight? It truly has not been that long in which great acceleration of climate conditions have become existential- though I suppose in the timelines of life on earth, the era of recorded human thoughts is itself minuscule.
- colechristensen 3y ago>We've had recorded history of people saying things for less time than we've had a formal scientific method. False, we have vast amounts of records of everyday correspondence, written speeches, graffiti, works of fiction, etc. from Romans 2000 years ago, long before scientific method (which I guess is usually attributed to Newton?, anyway approximately contemporary) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_Man Hesiod 2700 years ago wrote about the degradation of society from the Golden Age where people lived among the Gods with a garden of eden vibe down through silver, bronze to "present" iron where life was toil and misery and people were awful and immoral. Ovid said the same 2000 years ago. "Everything is going to shit, things aren't as good as they used to be and they're getting worse now more than ever" is literally a meme as old as human history.
- shawn_w 3y agoI think they're using a more limited meaning of recorded than is usual; probably just referring to voice/sound recording.
- ken47 3y agoI agree with your sentiment. Every era has had its major challenges, and it's egocentric + myopic to say ours are the most important ever.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]