FYI—Geoff will be talking about the history of Leverage and related topics on Twitch tomorrow (Saturday, October 23rd 2021) starting at 10am PT (USA West Coast Time). Apparently Anna Salamon will be joining the discussion as well.
Text from the Tweet (for those who don’t use Twitter):
“Hey folks — I’m going live on Twitch, starting this Saturday. Join me, 10am-1pm PT: twitch.tv/geoffanders This first stream will be on the topic of the history of my research institute, Leverage Research, and the Rationality community, with @AnnaWSalamon as a guest.”
I’m not involved in this in any way, but from the comments I’ve seen of yours in these threads you’ve shown great honesty and openness with everything.
I’d be more inclined to join if I could ask questions. I’ve not twitched before, my sense is the chat is a bit ephemeral to the video. Is the intention that it is mostly going to be you two talking?
Edit: Slightly changed tone of comment to avoid potentially sounding flippant.
Unfortunately for me, there is apparently no video recording available on Twitch for this stream? (There are two short clips, but not the full broadcast.)
If anyone has a link to it, if you could include it here, that’d be great. !
Alas, no. I’m pretty bummed about it, because I thought the conversation was rather good, but Geoff pushed the “save recording” button after it was started and that didn’t work.
Based on the fact Twitch is counter-intuitive about recording (it’s caught me out before too) and the technical issues at the start, I made a backup recording just in case – only audio but hope it helps!:
I re-listened to Anna and Geoff’s conversation, which is the main part of the audio that I found interesting. Timestamps for that conversation:
1:57:57 - Early EA history, the EA Summit, and early EA/Leverage interactions 2:13:34 - Narrative addiction and leaders being unable to talk to each other 2:17:20 - Early Geoff cooperativeness 2:19:58 - Possible causes for EA becoming more narrative-addicted 2:22:35 - Conflict causing group insularity 2:24:50 - Anna on narrative businesses, narrative pyramid schemes, and disagreements 2:28:28 - Geoff on narratives, morale and the epistemic sweet spot 2:30:08 - Anna on trying to block out things that would weaken the narrative, and external criticism of Leverage 2:36:30 - More on early Geoff cooperativeness 2:41:44 - ‘Stealing donors’, Leverage’s weird vibe (non-materialism?), Anna/Geoff’s early interactions, ‘writing off’ on philosophical grounds, and keeping weird things at arm’s length 2:50:00 - The value of looking at historical details, and narrative addiction collapse 2:52:30 - Geoff wants out of the rationality community; PR and associations; and disruptive narratives
Shoot. They did try at the beginning and thought they were recording. A few other points, additional to my other comment (these are half-remembered, rephrased, and presumably missing parts and context):
Anna hypothesizes that Geoff was selecting who he talked with and worked with and hired in part based on them being “not too big”, so that he could intellectually dominate them. She tells a story where she and Nate went (in 2017? 2019?) to talk with Geoff, and Anna+Nate thought talking was good or fruitful or something but Geoff seemed uninterested, and maybe that’s because Anna and Nate are “too big”.
Geoff describes trying, 2010±2, to get EA orgs to team up / combine, but finding lack of interest. I got a (speculative) bit of a sense of frame control battles going on in the shadows, like Geoff said something like “well when you think in detail about ambitious plans, you tend to see ways in which other people could fit into them”, and I could imagine his overtures having a subtle sense of trying to capture or define a frame, like some proportion of “here’s how you fit into my plan” rather than “here’s a common goal we’re aiming at, here’s synergies between our strategies, also let’s continuously double crux about crucial things”. (It would be bad to punish people for having ambitious plans that involve other people; it would be good to understand how to navigate “provisional plans” that can go in a direction and gain from coordination, while also remaining deeply open to members doing surprising things that upturn the plans, as well as not taking over their soul etc.) ETA: Anna’s comment here seems to be counterevidence: [Anna] was like “yes, that matches my memory and perception; I remember you [Geoff] and Leverage seeming unusually interested in getting specific collaborations or common projects that might support your goals + other groups’ goals at once, going, and more than other groups, and trying to support cooperation in this way”[...].
Geoff describes feeling very shut out unfairly by EA; there was a 2012(?) week-long EA summit run by, and at, Leverage, after which there was EA(+x-risk/rationality?) camaraderie, but then Leverage wasn’t allowed to have a table at some later EA event (maybe a later EA summit).
Geoff describes wanting to have an “exit strategy” from the rationality community, and describes getting “mixed messages”, like “please stay” and also something else like “you’re bad” or something.
Anna described “narrative addiction”, i.e. addiction to narratives. Used a speculative example/metaphor of an anorexic, who is somehow addicted to the control offered by a narrative, and so rejects information that pushes against the narrative. (I didn’t quite get this; something like, there’s a narrative in which being {good, attractive, healthy, non-selfish...?} can be controlled by not eating, and even if that’s false, it’s nice to think you can achieve those things? Where the analogy is like, thinking [the thing that I’m doing helps with X-risk / life-saving / etc.] is a narrative that one could be addicted to in the same way.) Anna hypothesizes that Leverage (as well as other EA/x-risk orgs) had narrative addiction. I’m curious what Leverage’s narratives were, in part because that seemed to play a significant role in Zoe’s experience.
FYI—Geoff will be talking about the history of Leverage and related topics on Twitch tomorrow (Saturday, October 23rd 2021) starting at 10am PT (USA West Coast Time). Apparently Anna Salamon will be joining the discussion as well.
Geoff’s Tweet
Text from the Tweet (for those who don’t use Twitter):
“Hey folks — I’m going live on Twitch, starting this Saturday. Join me, 10am-1pm PT:
twitch.tv/geoffanders
This first stream will be on the topic of the history of my research institute, Leverage Research, and the Rationality community, with @AnnaWSalamon as a guest.”
Yep. I hope this isn’t bad to do, but I am doing it.
I’m sure it’ll be fine :-)
I’m not involved in this in any way, but from the comments I’ve seen of yours in these threads you’ve shown great honesty and openness with everything.
I’d be more inclined to join if I could ask questions. I’ve not twitched before, my sense is the chat is a bit ephemeral to the video. Is the intention that it is mostly going to be you two talking?
Edit: Slightly changed tone of comment to avoid potentially sounding flippant.
Geoff is answering chat questions at the moment (at least until 11 AM PT) so if you have any questions you should consider joining.
Unfortunately for me, there is apparently no video recording available on Twitch for this stream? (There are two short clips, but not the full broadcast.)
If anyone has a link to it, if you could include it here, that’d be great. !
Alas, no. I’m pretty bummed about it, because I thought the conversation was rather good, but Geoff pushed the “save recording” button after it was started and that didn’t work.
Based on the fact Twitch is counter-intuitive about recording (it’s caught me out before too) and the technical issues at the start, I made a backup recording just in case – only audio but hope it helps!:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Af1dl-v7Q7uJhdX8Al9FsrJDBc4BqM_f/view?usp=sharing
Thank you so much! This is great!
!!! BRILLIANT. I thought the conversation was quite important, and your foresight has saved it for the community’s memory. Thank you so much. :)
This should be signal-boosted for all the people who missed the stream.
Update: I’ve disabled public access by request. Geoff said (here) he’s going to post the recording to his website.
Audio linked on Geoff’s website: https://www.dropbox.com/s/p0nah8ulohypexe/Geoff%20Anders%20-%20Twitch%20-%20Leverage%20History%201%20with%20Anna%20Salamon.m4a?dl=0
Video link on Geoff’s website, corresponding to ten seconds of dead air plus the first 20:35 of the audio: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pt3q5xejglsgrcr/1st%20Twitch%20Stream%20-%20Leverage%20History%20-%20Beginning.mp4?dl=0#
I re-listened to Anna and Geoff’s conversation, which is the main part of the audio that I found interesting. Timestamps for that conversation:
1:57:57 - Early EA history, the EA Summit, and early EA/Leverage interactions
2:13:34 - Narrative addiction and leaders being unable to talk to each other
2:17:20 - Early Geoff cooperativeness
2:19:58 - Possible causes for EA becoming more narrative-addicted
2:22:35 - Conflict causing group insularity
2:24:50 - Anna on narrative businesses, narrative pyramid schemes, and disagreements
2:28:28 - Geoff on narratives, morale and the epistemic sweet spot
2:30:08 - Anna on trying to block out things that would weaken the narrative, and external criticism of Leverage
2:36:30 - More on early Geoff cooperativeness
2:41:44 - ‘Stealing donors’, Leverage’s weird vibe (non-materialism?), Anna/Geoff’s early interactions, ‘writing off’ on philosophical grounds, and keeping weird things at arm’s length
2:50:00 - The value of looking at historical details, and narrative addiction collapse
2:52:30 - Geoff wants out of the rationality community; PR and associations; and disruptive narratives
Shoot. They did try at the beginning and thought they were recording. A few other points, additional to my other comment (these are half-remembered, rephrased, and presumably missing parts and context):
Anna hypothesizes that Geoff was selecting who he talked with and worked with and hired in part based on them being “not too big”, so that he could intellectually dominate them. She tells a story where she and Nate went (in 2017? 2019?) to talk with Geoff, and Anna+Nate thought talking was good or fruitful or something but Geoff seemed uninterested, and maybe that’s because Anna and Nate are “too big”.
Geoff describes trying, 2010±2, to get EA orgs to team up / combine, but finding lack of interest. I got a (speculative) bit of a sense of frame control battles going on in the shadows, like Geoff said something like “well when you think in detail about ambitious plans, you tend to see ways in which other people could fit into them”, and I could imagine his overtures having a subtle sense of trying to capture or define a frame, like some proportion of “here’s how you fit into my plan” rather than “here’s a common goal we’re aiming at, here’s synergies between our strategies, also let’s continuously double crux about crucial things”. (It would be bad to punish people for having ambitious plans that involve other people; it would be good to understand how to navigate “provisional plans” that can go in a direction and gain from coordination, while also remaining deeply open to members doing surprising things that upturn the plans, as well as not taking over their soul etc.) ETA: Anna’s comment here seems to be counterevidence: [Anna] was like “yes, that matches my memory and perception; I remember you [Geoff] and Leverage seeming unusually interested in getting specific collaborations or common projects that might support your goals + other groups’ goals at once, going, and more than other groups, and trying to support cooperation in this way”[...].
Geoff describes feeling very shut out unfairly by EA; there was a 2012(?) week-long EA summit run by, and at, Leverage, after which there was EA(+x-risk/rationality?) camaraderie, but then Leverage wasn’t allowed to have a table at some later EA event (maybe a later EA summit).
Geoff describes wanting to have an “exit strategy” from the rationality community, and describes getting “mixed messages”, like “please stay” and also something else like “you’re bad” or something.
Anna described “narrative addiction”, i.e. addiction to narratives. Used a speculative example/metaphor of an anorexic, who is somehow addicted to the control offered by a narrative, and so rejects information that pushes against the narrative. (I didn’t quite get this; something like, there’s a narrative in which being {good, attractive, healthy, non-selfish...?} can be controlled by not eating, and even if that’s false, it’s nice to think you can achieve those things? Where the analogy is like, thinking [the thing that I’m doing helps with X-risk / life-saving / etc.] is a narrative that one could be addicted to in the same way.) Anna hypothesizes that Leverage (as well as other EA/x-risk orgs) had narrative addiction. I’m curious what Leverage’s narratives were, in part because that seemed to play a significant role in Zoe’s experience.