I completely agree that Oliver is a great fit for leading on research infrastructure (and the default thing I was imagining was that he would run the institute; although it’s possible it would be even better if he could arrange to be number two with a strong professional lead, giving him more freedom to focus attention on new initiatives within the institute, that isn’t where I’d start). But I was specifically talking about the “research lead” role. By default I’d guess people in this role would report to the head of the institute, but also have a lot of intellectual freedom. (It might not even be a formal role; I think sometimes “star researchers” might do a lot of this work without it being formalized, but it still seems super important for someone to be doing.) I don’t feel like Oliver’s track record blows me away on any of the three subdimensions I named there, and your examples of successes at research infrastructure don’t speak to it. This is compatible with him being stronger than I guess, because he hasn’t tried in earnest at the things I’m pointing to. (I’m including some adjustment for this, but perhaps I’m undershooting. On the other hand I’d also expect him to level up at it faster if he’s working on it in conjunction with people with strong track records.)
I think it’s obvious that you want some beacon function (to make it an attractive option for people with strong outside options). That won’t be entirely by having excellent people which will mean that internal research conversations are really good, but it seems to me like that was a significant part of what made FHI work (NB this wasn’t just Nick, but people like Toby or Anders or Eric); I think it could be make-or-break for any new endeavour in a way that might be somewhat path-dependent in how it turns out; it seems right and proper to give it attention at this stage.
Huh, I feel confused. I suppose we just have different impressions. Like, I would say that Oliver is exceedingly good at cutting through the bullshit. E.g., I consider his reasoning around shutting down the Lightcone offices to be of this type, in that it felt like a very straightforward document of important considerations, some of which I imagine were socially and/or politically costly to make. One way to say that is that I think Oliver is very high integrity, and I think this helps with bullshit detection: it’s easier to see how things don’t cut to the core unless you deeply care about the core yourself. In any case, I think this skill carries over to object-level research, e.g., he often seems, to me, to ask cutting-to-the core type questions there, too. I also think he’s great at argument: legible reasoning, identifying the important cruxes in conversations, etc., all of which makes it easier to tell the bullshit from the not.
I do not think of Oliver as being afraid to be disagreeable, and ime he gets to the heart of things quite quickly, so much so that I found him quite startling to interact with when we first met. And although I have some disagreements over Oliver’s past walled-garden taste, from my perspective it’s getting better, and I am increasingly excited about him being at the helm of a project such as this. Not sure what to say about his beacon-ness, but I do think that many people respect Oliver, Lightcone, and rationality culture more generally; I wouldn’t be that surprised if there were an initial group of independent researcher types who were down and excited for this project as is.
I don’t really disagree with anything you’re saying here, and am left with confusion about what your confusion is about (like it seemed like you were offering it as examples of disagreement?).
I completely agree that Oliver is a great fit for leading on research infrastructure (and the default thing I was imagining was that he would run the institute; although it’s possible it would be even better if he could arrange to be number two with a strong professional lead, giving him more freedom to focus attention on new initiatives within the institute, that isn’t where I’d start). But I was specifically talking about the “research lead” role. By default I’d guess people in this role would report to the head of the institute, but also have a lot of intellectual freedom. (It might not even be a formal role; I think sometimes “star researchers” might do a lot of this work without it being formalized, but it still seems super important for someone to be doing.) I don’t feel like Oliver’s track record blows me away on any of the three subdimensions I named there, and your examples of successes at research infrastructure don’t speak to it. This is compatible with him being stronger than I guess, because he hasn’t tried in earnest at the things I’m pointing to. (I’m including some adjustment for this, but perhaps I’m undershooting. On the other hand I’d also expect him to level up at it faster if he’s working on it in conjunction with people with strong track records.)
I think it’s obvious that you want some beacon function (to make it an attractive option for people with strong outside options). That won’t be entirely by having excellent people which will mean that internal research conversations are really good, but it seems to me like that was a significant part of what made FHI work (NB this wasn’t just Nick, but people like Toby or Anders or Eric); I think it could be make-or-break for any new endeavour in a way that might be somewhat path-dependent in how it turns out; it seems right and proper to give it attention at this stage.
Huh, I feel confused. I suppose we just have different impressions. Like, I would say that Oliver is exceedingly good at cutting through the bullshit. E.g., I consider his reasoning around shutting down the Lightcone offices to be of this type, in that it felt like a very straightforward document of important considerations, some of which I imagine were socially and/or politically costly to make. One way to say that is that I think Oliver is very high integrity, and I think this helps with bullshit detection: it’s easier to see how things don’t cut to the core unless you deeply care about the core yourself. In any case, I think this skill carries over to object-level research, e.g., he often seems, to me, to ask cutting-to-the core type questions there, too. I also think he’s great at argument: legible reasoning, identifying the important cruxes in conversations, etc., all of which makes it easier to tell the bullshit from the not.
I do not think of Oliver as being afraid to be disagreeable, and ime he gets to the heart of things quite quickly, so much so that I found him quite startling to interact with when we first met. And although I have some disagreements over Oliver’s past walled-garden taste, from my perspective it’s getting better, and I am increasingly excited about him being at the helm of a project such as this. Not sure what to say about his beacon-ness, but I do think that many people respect Oliver, Lightcone, and rationality culture more generally; I wouldn’t be that surprised if there were an initial group of independent researcher types who were down and excited for this project as is.
I don’t really disagree with anything you’re saying here, and am left with confusion about what your confusion is about (like it seemed like you were offering it as examples of disagreement?).