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That book, IMO, reads very much like a smear attempt, and not one done with a good understanding of the target. The premise, with an attempt to tie capital-R R

That book, IMO, reads very much like a smear attempt, and not one done with a good understanding of the target. The premise, with an attempt to tie capital-R Rationalists to the neoreactionaries though a sort of guilt by association, is frankly weird: Scott Alexander is well-known among the former to be essentially the only prominent figure that takes the latter seriously—seriously enough, that is, to write a large as-well-stated-as-possible survey[1] followed by a humongous point-by-point refutation[2,3]; whereas the “cult leader” of the rationalists, Yudkowsky, is on the record as despising neoreactionaries to the point of refusing to discuss their views. (As far as recent events, Alexander wrote a scathing review of Yarvin’s involvement in Trumpist politics[4] whose main thrust is that Yarvin has betrayed basically everything he advocated for.) The story of the book’s conception also severely strains an assumption of good faith[5]: the author, Elizabeth Sandifer, explicitly says it was to a large extent inspired, sourced, and edited by David Gerard, a prominent contributor to RationalWiki and r/SneerClub (the “sneerers” mentioned in TFA) and Wikipedia administrator who after years of edit-warring got topic-banned from editing articles about Scott Alexander (Scott Siskind) for conflict of interest and defamation[6] (including adding links to the book as a source for statements on Wikipedia about links between rationalists and neoreaction). Elizabeth Sandifer herself got banned for doxxing a Wikipedia editor during Gerard's earlier edit war at the time of Manning's gender transition, for which Gerard was also sanctioned[7]. [1] https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/03/reactionary-philosophy-in-an-enormous-planet-sized-nutshell/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/03/reactionary-philosophy... [2] https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-faq/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-f... [3] https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/24/some-preliminary-responses-to-responses-to-the-anti-reactionary-faq/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/24/some-preliminary-respo... [4] https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/moldbug-sold-out https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/moldbug-sold-out [5] https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/reliable-sources-how-wikipedia-admin https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/reliable-sources-how-wik... [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive1061#Propose_topic_ban https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_no... [7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Manning_naming_dispute#David_Gerard_restricted_in_use_of_tools https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests...

Aurornis 1y ago
I always find it interesting that when the topic of rationalists' fixation on neoreactionary topics comes into question, the primary defenses are that it's important to look at controversial ideas and that we shouldn't dismiss novel ideas because we don't like the group sharing them. Yet as soon as the topic turns to criticisms of the rationalist community, we're supposed to ignore those ideas and instead fixate on the messenger, ignore their arguments, and focus on ad-hominem attacks that reduce their credibility. It's no secret that Scott Alexander had a bit of a fixation on neoreactionary content for years. The leaked e-mails showed he believed there to be "gold" in some of their ideas and he enjoyed the extra traffic it brought to his blog. I know the rationalist community has been working hard to distance themselves from that era publicly, but dismissing that chapter of the history because it feels too much like a "smear" or because we're not supposed to like the author feels extremely hypocritical given the context.
- FeepingCreature 1y ago
  There are certain parts of the history of the rationalist movement that its enemies are orders of magnitude more "fixated" on than rationalists ever were, Neoreaction and the Basilisk being the biggest. Part of evaluating unusual ideas is that you have to get really good at ignoring bad ones. So when somebody writes a book called "Neoreaction: a Basilisk" and claims that it's about rationality, I make a very simple expected-value calculation.
- zahlman 1y ago
  > when the topic of rationalists' fixation on neoreactionary topics comes into question, the primary defenses are that it's important to look at controversial ideas and that we shouldn't dismiss novel ideas because we don't like the group sharing them. No. Rationalists do say that it's important to do those things, because that's true. But it is not a defense of a "fixation on neoreactionary topics", because there is no such fixation. It only comes across as a fixation to people who are unwilling to even understand what they are denigrating. You will note that Scott Alexander is heavily critical of neoreaction. > Yet as soon as the topic turns to criticisms of the rationalist community, we're supposed to ignore those ideas and instead fixate on the messenger, ignore their arguments, and focus on ad-hominem attacks that reduce their credibility. No. Nobody said that those criticism should be ignored. What was said is that those criticism are invalid, because they are. It is not ad-hominem against Sandifer to point out that Sandifer is trying to insinuate untrue things about Alexander. It is simply observing reality. Sandifer attempts to describe Alexander, Yudkowsky et. al. as supportive of neoreactionary thought. In reality, Alexander, Yudkowsky et. al. are strongly-critical-at-best of neoreactionary thought. > The leaked e-mails showed he believed there to be "gold" in some of their ideas This is clutching at straws. Alexander wrote https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-faq/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-f... , in 2013. You are engaging in the same kind of semantic games that Sandifer does. Please stop.

Aurornis 1y ago

I always find it interesting that when the topic of rationalists' fixation on neoreactionary topics comes into question, the primary defenses are that it's important to look at controversial ideas and that we shouldn't dismiss novel ideas because we don't like the group sharing them. Yet as soon as the topic turns to criticisms of the rationalist community, we're supposed to ignore those ideas and instead fixate on the messenger, ignore their arguments, and focus on ad-hominem attacks that reduce their credibility. It's no secret that Scott Alexander had a bit of a fixation on neoreactionary content for years. The leaked e-mails showed he believed there to be "gold" in some of their ideas and he enjoyed the extra traffic it brought to his blog. I know the rationalist community has been working hard to distance themselves from that era publicly, but dismissing that chapter of the history because it feels too much like a "smear" or because we're not supposed to like the author feels extremely hypocritical given the context.

FeepingCreature 1y ago
There are certain parts of the history of the rationalist movement that its enemies are orders of magnitude more "fixated" on than rationalists ever were, Neoreaction and the Basilisk being the biggest. Part of evaluating unusual ideas is that you have to get really good at ignoring bad ones. So when somebody writes a book called "Neoreaction: a Basilisk" and claims that it's about rationality, I make a very simple expected-value calculation.
zahlman 1y ago
> when the topic of rationalists' fixation on neoreactionary topics comes into question, the primary defenses are that it's important to look at controversial ideas and that we shouldn't dismiss novel ideas because we don't like the group sharing them. No. Rationalists do say that it's important to do those things, because that's true. But it is not a defense of a "fixation on neoreactionary topics", because there is no such fixation. It only comes across as a fixation to people who are unwilling to even understand what they are denigrating. You will note that Scott Alexander is heavily critical of neoreaction. > Yet as soon as the topic turns to criticisms of the rationalist community, we're supposed to ignore those ideas and instead fixate on the messenger, ignore their arguments, and focus on ad-hominem attacks that reduce their credibility. No. Nobody said that those criticism should be ignored. What was said is that those criticism are invalid, because they are. It is not ad-hominem against Sandifer to point out that Sandifer is trying to insinuate untrue things about Alexander. It is simply observing reality. Sandifer attempts to describe Alexander, Yudkowsky et. al. as supportive of neoreactionary thought. In reality, Alexander, Yudkowsky et. al. are strongly-critical-at-best of neoreactionary thought. > The leaked e-mails showed he believed there to be "gold" in some of their ideas This is clutching at straws. Alexander wrote https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-faq/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/the-anti-reactionary-f... , in 2013. You are engaging in the same kind of semantic games that Sandifer does. Please stop.