this is low hanging fruit but: yeah absolutely rancid takes on the middle east from scootson. who would have thought he would produce such nuance-free, fascist opinions about geopolitics?

take 2 minutes to think of precisely the information I need

I can’t even put into words the full nonsense of this statement. How do you think this would work? This is not how learning works. This is not how research works. This is not how anything works.

This part threw me as well. If you can think of it, why read for it? Didn’t make sense and so I stopped looking into this particular abyss until you pointed it out again.

I think the only interpretation of what this person said that approaches some level of rationality on their part is essentially a form of confirmation bias. They aren’t thinking of information that is in the text, they are thinking “I want this text to confirm X for me”, then they prompt and get what they want. LLMs are biased to be people-pleasers and will happily spin whatever hallucinated tokens the user throws at them. That’s my best guess.

That you didn’t think of the above just goes to show the failure of your unfeeble mind’s logic and reason to divine such a truth. Just kidding, sorta, in the sense that you can’t expect to understand an irrational thought process using rationality.

But if it’s not that I’m still thrown.

Very off topic: The only plausible reason I’ve heard to be “nice” to LLMs/virtual assistants etc. is if you are being observed by a child or someone else impressionable. This is to model good behaviour if/when they ask someone a question or for help. But also you shouldn’t be using those things anyhoo.

Hooray, I'm glad that when I inevitably start seeing a therapist again, I can finally talk about all this shit without needing a ton of primer.

I ain't reading all this. I don't even know who Yglesias is.

My first thought: Man, why the fuck does the numbering of the sections annoy me so much?

Second thought: Ok, I'm skimming this because again fuck all these words. Looks like he's trying to explore something about "master" and "slave" morality that I will not dig into because it's probably a bunk formulation of thought. Why does Edward Teach, the pirate, come up? The section did not appear to explain it.

Final thought: Okay, I think I was right not to read any of this. Essentially, it is just a paean to some truly terrible people (Tate, Hanania, Ayn Rand etc.) in the form of a shaggy dog story, with Nietzche referenced a lot.

Anyway, now I'm fighting the urge to get drunk on scotch, listen to "No Surprises" by radiohead and walk into the fucking ocean

Here’s my cocktail suggestion:

50 Shades (Sam Bankman) Fried:

Ingredients:

• 50 different liquors/liqueurs, as many different densities and colours as possible

Equipment:

• Transparent cylindrical urn with spigot

Steps:

1. Sort the ingredients in decreasing order or liquid density.
2. Pour 1/50th of the container capacity of each liquid in order into container, slowly and carefully to retain layers.

(Do not actually make this)

Despite its title this isn't meant to be the best essay

Oh, thanks for clarifying, that was really hard to figure out. /s

Reading this article just made me think “man these idiots need to go to therapy” and then as I thought about what to sneer about I realised “no therapist deserves to hear about P doom”

On one hand, it is good that people are becoming aware of these crazos and the amount of influence they have. On the other hand I am definitely feeling that “I heard of this band first!” kind of jealousy a little.

Summary point 5 is fun.

I conclude that the rate of criminal behavior amongst major philanthropists is high

Great!

which means that we should not expect altruism to substantially lower the risks compared to that of the general population,

Ok, not super clear what “the risks” are here. One interpretation is that they are saying “just because someone donates money doesn’t mean they aren’t a criminal”, which is correct. But it’s not clear! Anyway.

and that negative impacts to EA’s public perception may occur independently of whether our donors actually commit crimes (e.g. because even noncriminal billionaires have a negative public image).

So close! Why do “noncriminal” billionaires have a negative public image? It’s almost as if legality isn’t the decider of morality!

Perhaps one day EAs will gain class consciousness and a sense of morality beyond an uncritical elision of ethics via utilitarianism; we aren’t there yet.

Fake answer: at some point in rat history they thought that Armenian people were genetically superior and decided to take traditional Armenian surnames as their handles, but they both simultaneously and serendipitously bungled the spelling. The names should actually be “Yvian” (pronounced yiv-yahn) and “Iarwian” (pronounced ee-arh-wee-yahn)

Real answer: probably a tolkien elvish name idk

most charitable psychoanalysis: projecting their sense of rationality onto a fictional world is a way to express a deep longing for rules and logic in an often cruelly irrational world

least charitable: their sense of rationality can only be true in a fictional world, so they want to live in that rather than reality

Neutral charity: the author is dead, all interpretation is essentially fanfiction, and since we are all individuals, all relationships with texts/fanfiction are weird.