Keep in mind most newspapers are not trailblazers and will often report the same story reported by other newspapers. The LessWrong-Neoreactionary link seems to have first been claimed by media outlets in mid 2016, after Peter Thiel gave his endorsement to Trump. I know that some other “dark enlightenment” people have been commenters on lesswrong and overcoming bias for a while, but it never seemed like they were core people or authors of much content at all. The fact that the mainstream media did not comment on this until 2016 likely means that they were looking at Peter Thiel as a funder of MIRI as the primary piece of evidence. Which is a weak form of evidence, because I don’t think he is even associated with the rationality community aside from that. In addition, we can’t even say he’s “neoreactionary” other than he apparently voted for Trump. We know only vague generalities and few details about his personal views.
The LessWrong-Neoreactionary link seems to have first been claimed by media outlets in mid 2016
Seems to me it was on RationalWiki long before that. When journalists use google to find something interesting about LW, this is one of the first things they find.
Keep in mind most newspapers are not trailblazers and will often report the same story reported by other newspapers. The LessWrong-Neoreactionary link seems to have first been claimed by media outlets in mid 2016, after Peter Thiel gave his endorsement to Trump. I know that some other “dark enlightenment” people have been commenters on lesswrong and overcoming bias for a while, but it never seemed like they were core people or authors of much content at all. The fact that the mainstream media did not comment on this until 2016 likely means that they were looking at Peter Thiel as a funder of MIRI as the primary piece of evidence. Which is a weak form of evidence, because I don’t think he is even associated with the rationality community aside from that. In addition, we can’t even say he’s “neoreactionary” other than he apparently voted for Trump. We know only vague generalities and few details about his personal views.
Seems to me it was on RationalWiki long before that. When journalists use google to find something interesting about LW, this is one of the first things they find.