Maybe I just don’t get it because I’m not part of the Berkeley Community, I just read the writing. But my immediate reaction to this is like, why does Zack care so much about what Eliezer (2024) does or does not think? Or even whether, these days, he is or is not a fraud?
Like if you thought what he wrote in 2007 was great, just listen to that? Many (all?) authors who write great books have also written worse books. Maybe Zack’s opinion is falling a long way from wherever it was.
But perhaps he would be happier to adopt a more ecumenical non-Berkeley-ite stance, which I think has been common all along outside The Berkeley Community, and which is something like “Eliezer wrote some great stuff that was very influential on my thinking and that I still believe was very insightful, and I really appreciate that. I enjoy reading LW more than I think I’d enjoy the marginal alternative use of reading time, but I don’t go too far out of my way to pay attention to or care about what he’s up to these days.”—rather than assigning himself an Epic Quest to Win This Argument.
I think I’m trying to make a different point than footnote 20?
It seems like you are taking me to be saying something like “You shouldn’t care what EY thinks about this Trans issue because “Everybody Knows” not to take his statements on this seriously”—that’s how I read FN20.
Whereas I think my point is much more general and really not specific to Trans at all—like why be so deeply invested in the contents of some one guy’s mind, at all? On any issue?
EY wrote some great (book-like objects). Inspiring, even. Worldview changing. But, like, whatever his opinions are today (on any issue), my view is mostly like, who cares? Either his arguments are convincing or they aren’t.
By analogy, suppose (counter factually) that I think that Barack Obama was the greatest president in history (he wasn’t, but he has to be alive for this analogy to work). Does that mean that I should decide what I think about today’s political and policy problems based on what Obama thinks? Such that if Obama was wrong about something, I should engage in an epic quest to Get Obama’s Attention and get him to admit he’s wrong? I mean, that would be ridiculous, right?
Yes, that would be ridiculous. It would also be ridiculous in a broadly similar way if someone spent eight years in the prime of their life prosecuting a false advertising lawsuit against a “World’s Best” brand ice-cream for not actually being the best in the world.
But if someone did somehow make that mistake, I could see why they might end up writing a few blog posts afterwards telling the Whole Dumb Story.
Absolutely! I value your voice. But, and excuse me if this is a misread, your posts in this series read to me like you are still trying to convince yourself and/or him.
It reads like you are a sort of rationalist Martin Luther criticizing the Pope. But, like, there are already a lot of metaphorically-protestant rationalists.
Well, you don’t see them as much because they don’t necessarily interact with the metaphorical pope(s)/cardinal(s)/etc. I’m just talking about all the thousands of people who have read the sequences and/or other foundational rationalist texts, interpreted them for themselves, and did their best to apply those lessons in their own lives. Many such people exist! They just don’t live in the Bay Area, don’t necessarily go to rationalist meetups, and might not be active LW posters. So the reason I don’t have examples for you is precisely because Active in the Rationalist Community is highly correlated with both “LW readers are likely to know who this person is” and/or “this person is publicly identifiable as a Rationalist,” and also with “Catholic within this metaphor”—Official Rationalist Spaces are effectively catholic churches, in the metaphor. Of course you won’t find a ton of protestants there!
The Protestant/Catholic schism was fundamentally over whether the Bible should be interpreted by the Pope and the Catholic church, with the role of the faithful to listen to their priest and take what they say as the Received Interpretation of the Word of God, or instead whether each individual Christian should become literate, and read and interpret the Bible for themselves. Of course, there were particular points of dispute but they all stemmed from this—is it possible for the Pope to be wrong, and if so, what does that say about our faith?
The Catholic position was, it is not possible for the Pope to be wrong within the bounds of our faith, and therefore if there is proof that the Pope is wrong then it would prove that our faith is wrong. The Protestant position was, like, of course its possible for the Pope to be wrong, he’s just some guy. So when Martin Luther was saying “it is possible for the Pope to be wrong” that was a big f’in deal. But you don’t see modern protestants going around defiantly asserting that it’s possible for the Pope to be wrong—they know there are millions of people who already agree with this idea, and it just kinda seems silly or beside the point for them? A protestant generally doesn’t care what the Pope thinks any more than they care what other prominent world leaders think.
This comment probably won’t get a ton of readership on an old post, but if you understand my metaphor and think you are “protestant,” please react with Checkmark, even if you are mostly an LW lurker. If you understand and you think you are “catholic”, react with Xmark. If you think this metaphor makes no sense or is fundamentally wrong, then I guess react with something else.
Maybe I just don’t get it because I’m not part of the Berkeley Community, I just read the writing. But my immediate reaction to this is like, why does Zack care so much about what Eliezer (2024) does or does not think? Or even whether, these days, he is or is not a fraud?
Like if you thought what he wrote in 2007 was great, just listen to that? Many (all?) authors who write great books have also written worse books. Maybe Zack’s opinion is falling a long way from wherever it was.
But perhaps he would be happier to adopt a more ecumenical non-Berkeley-ite stance, which I think has been common all along outside The Berkeley Community, and which is something like “Eliezer wrote some great stuff that was very influential on my thinking and that I still believe was very insightful, and I really appreciate that. I enjoy reading LW more than I think I’d enjoy the marginal alternative use of reading time, but I don’t go too far out of my way to pay attention to or care about what he’s up to these days.”—rather than assigning himself an Epic Quest to Win This Argument.
You are perhaps wiser than me. (See also footnote 20.)
I think I’m trying to make a different point than footnote 20?
It seems like you are taking me to be saying something like “You shouldn’t care what EY thinks about this Trans issue because “Everybody Knows” not to take his statements on this seriously”—that’s how I read FN20.
Whereas I think my point is much more general and really not specific to Trans at all—like why be so deeply invested in the contents of some one guy’s mind, at all? On any issue?
EY wrote some great (book-like objects). Inspiring, even. Worldview changing. But, like, whatever his opinions are today (on any issue), my view is mostly like, who cares? Either his arguments are convincing or they aren’t.
By analogy, suppose (counter factually) that I think that Barack Obama was the greatest president in history (he wasn’t, but he has to be alive for this analogy to work). Does that mean that I should decide what I think about today’s political and policy problems based on what Obama thinks? Such that if Obama was wrong about something, I should engage in an epic quest to Get Obama’s Attention and get him to admit he’s wrong? I mean, that would be ridiculous, right?
Yes, that would be ridiculous. It would also be ridiculous in a broadly similar way if someone spent eight years in the prime of their life prosecuting a false advertising lawsuit against a “World’s Best” brand ice-cream for not actually being the best in the world.
But if someone did somehow make that mistake, I could see why they might end up writing a few blog posts afterwards telling the Whole Dumb Story.
Absolutely! I value your voice. But, and excuse me if this is a misread, your posts in this series read to me like you are still trying to convince yourself and/or him.
It reads like you are a sort of rationalist Martin Luther criticizing the Pope. But, like, there are already a lot of metaphorically-protestant rationalists.
Who are some other examples?
Well, you don’t see them as much because they don’t necessarily interact with the metaphorical pope(s)/cardinal(s)/etc. I’m just talking about all the thousands of people who have read the sequences and/or other foundational rationalist texts, interpreted them for themselves, and did their best to apply those lessons in their own lives. Many such people exist! They just don’t live in the Bay Area, don’t necessarily go to rationalist meetups, and might not be active LW posters. So the reason I don’t have examples for you is precisely because Active in the Rationalist Community is highly correlated with both “LW readers are likely to know who this person is” and/or “this person is publicly identifiable as a Rationalist,” and also with “Catholic within this metaphor”—Official Rationalist Spaces are effectively catholic churches, in the metaphor. Of course you won’t find a ton of protestants there!
The Protestant/Catholic schism was fundamentally over whether the Bible should be interpreted by the Pope and the Catholic church, with the role of the faithful to listen to their priest and take what they say as the Received Interpretation of the Word of God, or instead whether each individual Christian should become literate, and read and interpret the Bible for themselves. Of course, there were particular points of dispute but they all stemmed from this—is it possible for the Pope to be wrong, and if so, what does that say about our faith?
The Catholic position was, it is not possible for the Pope to be wrong within the bounds of our faith, and therefore if there is proof that the Pope is wrong then it would prove that our faith is wrong. The Protestant position was, like, of course its possible for the Pope to be wrong, he’s just some guy. So when Martin Luther was saying “it is possible for the Pope to be wrong” that was a big f’in deal. But you don’t see modern protestants going around defiantly asserting that it’s possible for the Pope to be wrong—they know there are millions of people who already agree with this idea, and it just kinda seems silly or beside the point for them? A protestant generally doesn’t care what the Pope thinks any more than they care what other prominent world leaders think.
This comment probably won’t get a ton of readership on an old post, but if you understand my metaphor and think you are “protestant,” please react with Checkmark, even if you are mostly an LW lurker. If you understand and you think you are “catholic”, react with Xmark. If you think this metaphor makes no sense or is fundamentally wrong, then I guess react with something else.