Besides the triviality of everything having a beginning, a developement and an end, I found that the model is too simplicistic and already shows some crack when applied to LessWrong:
pre-existing difference: about LW there was only one man, Eliezer, who perceived the difference between what he considered a sane approach to AI and all the others approach;
then it came a blog about showing this approach and “raising the sanity waterline”, which I think created the difference in many of his followers, or at least attracted enough interest. In this case, the rallying flag created the difference in those who attended, which in turn created (or smoothed) more differences;
developement and end are mixed in this case, there was supposedly a peak and a denouement, but the site is still active, the tribe has fragmented and regrouped again.
there was only one man, Eliezer, who perceived the difference between what he considered a sane approach to AI and all the others approach
But the LW community was not really, in the first instance, built around Eliezer’s (or anyone’s) ideas about how to approach AI. It was built around his ideas about how to think rationally, and a lot of that existed before Eliezer wrote anything on the subject.
(I am not making claims about the originality or unoriginality of Eliezer’s writings about rationality. The point, with which I am absolutely sure he would agree, is that much of the difference between a typical LW rationalist and a typical non-rationalist lies in things that Eliezer did not invent and was not the first to write down.)
then it came a blog about showing this approach and “raising the sanity waterline”, which I think created the difference in many of his followers
That is… a very strong statement. You think that EY’s blog actually created the differences in the people who then coalesced into a tribe around their creator?
Besides the triviality of everything having a beginning, a developement and an end, I found that the model is too simplicistic and already shows some crack when applied to LessWrong:
pre-existing difference: about LW there was only one man, Eliezer, who perceived the difference between what he considered a sane approach to AI and all the others approach;
then it came a blog about showing this approach and “raising the sanity waterline”, which I think created the difference in many of his followers, or at least attracted enough interest. In this case, the rallying flag created the difference in those who attended, which in turn created (or smoothed) more differences;
developement and end are mixed in this case, there was supposedly a peak and a denouement, but the site is still active, the tribe has fragmented and regrouped again.
But the LW community was not really, in the first instance, built around Eliezer’s (or anyone’s) ideas about how to approach AI. It was built around his ideas about how to think rationally, and a lot of that existed before Eliezer wrote anything on the subject.
(I am not making claims about the originality or unoriginality of Eliezer’s writings about rationality. The point, with which I am absolutely sure he would agree, is that much of the difference between a typical LW rationalist and a typical non-rationalist lies in things that Eliezer did not invent and was not the first to write down.)
That is… a very strong statement. You think that EY’s blog actually created the differences in the people who then coalesced into a tribe around their creator?
What do you count as regrouping?