Luke’s comment could be interpreted as saying “for us, not being completely incompetent is worth bragging about”
Really? I personally feel pretty embarrassed by SI’s past organizational competence. To me, my own comment reads more like “Wow, SI has been in bad shape for more than a decade. But at least we’re improving very quickly.”
Also, I very much agree with Beckstead on this: “Most extant presentations of SIAI’s views leave much to be desired in terms of clarity, completeness, concision, accessibility, and credibility signals. This makes it harder to make high quality objections.” And also this: “We haven’t gotten great critics. That probably means that we need to work on our arguments and their presentation.”
Yes, I think it at least gives a bad impression to someone, if they’re not already very familiar with SI and sympathetic to its cause. Assuming you don’t completely agree with the criticisms that Holden and others have made, you should think about why they might have formed wrong impressions of SI and its people. Comments like the ones I cited seem to be part of the problem.
I personally feel pretty embarrassed by SI’s past organizational competence. To me, my own comment reads more like “Wow, SI has been in bad shape for more than a decade. But at least we’re improving very quickly.”
That’s good to hear, and thanks for the clarifications you added.
It’s a fine line though, isn’t it? Saying “huh, looks like we have much to learn, here’s what we’re already doing about it” is honest and constructive, but sends a signal of weakness and defensiveness to people not bent on a zealous quest for truth and self-improvement. Saying “meh, that guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about” would send the stronger social signal, but would not be constructive to the community actually improving as a result of the criticism.
Personally I prefer plunging ahead with the first approach. Both in the abstract for reasons I won’t elaborate on, but especially in this particular case. SI is not in a position where its every word is scrutinized; it would actually be a huge win if it gets there. And if/when it does, there’s a heck of a lot more damning stuff that can be used against it than an admission of past incompetence.
sends a signal of weakness and defensiveness to people not bent on a zealous quest for truth and self-improvement.
I do not see why this should be a motivating factor for SI; to my knowledge, they advertise primarily to people who would endorse a zealous quest for truth and self-improvement.
That subset of humanity holds considerably less power, influence and visibility than its counterpart; resources that could be directed to AI research and for the most part aren’t. Or in three words: Other people matter. Assuming otherwise would be a huge mistake.
I took Wei_Dai’s remarks to mean that Luke’s response is public, and so can reach the broader public sooner or later; and when examined in a broader context, that it gives off the wrong signal. My response was that this was largely irrelevant, not because other people don’t matter, but because of other factors outweighing this.
Really? I personally feel pretty embarrassed by SI’s past organizational competence. To me, my own comment reads more like “Wow, SI has been in bad shape for more than a decade. But at least we’re improving very quickly.”
Also, I very much agree with Beckstead on this: “Most extant presentations of SIAI’s views leave much to be desired in terms of clarity, completeness, concision, accessibility, and credibility signals. This makes it harder to make high quality objections.” And also this: “We haven’t gotten great critics. That probably means that we need to work on our arguments and their presentation.”
Yes, I think it at least gives a bad impression to someone, if they’re not already very familiar with SI and sympathetic to its cause. Assuming you don’t completely agree with the criticisms that Holden and others have made, you should think about why they might have formed wrong impressions of SI and its people. Comments like the ones I cited seem to be part of the problem.
That’s good to hear, and thanks for the clarifications you added.
It’s a fine line though, isn’t it? Saying “huh, looks like we have much to learn, here’s what we’re already doing about it” is honest and constructive, but sends a signal of weakness and defensiveness to people not bent on a zealous quest for truth and self-improvement. Saying “meh, that guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about” would send the stronger social signal, but would not be constructive to the community actually improving as a result of the criticism.
Personally I prefer plunging ahead with the first approach. Both in the abstract for reasons I won’t elaborate on, but especially in this particular case. SI is not in a position where its every word is scrutinized; it would actually be a huge win if it gets there. And if/when it does, there’s a heck of a lot more damning stuff that can be used against it than an admission of past incompetence.
I do not see why this should be a motivating factor for SI; to my knowledge, they advertise primarily to people who would endorse a zealous quest for truth and self-improvement.
That subset of humanity holds considerably less power, influence and visibility than its counterpart; resources that could be directed to AI research and for the most part aren’t. Or in three words: Other people matter. Assuming otherwise would be a huge mistake.
I took Wei_Dai’s remarks to mean that Luke’s response is public, and so can reach the broader public sooner or later; and when examined in a broader context, that it gives off the wrong signal. My response was that this was largely irrelevant, not because other people don’t matter, but because of other factors outweighing this.