What maddening arrogance, presuming himself to be so superior in his fuzzy thinking, and demanding debate when in reality his sophomoric arguments fail so badly to answer the challenge that they hardly merit the time to dismantle them. Too bad about humanity, but he must be allowed to play with his favorite toy, because he's just so curious and it's all so thrillingly interesting!
Totally agree. He describes himself as humble, and suggests that anyone who wants to control AI is hubristic and arrogant. Lol. Honestly, during the interview, I remember thinking "This is absolutely batsh*t" on a number of occasions.
Blech. I’m just nauseated by this tribe of self-absorbed white men wanking amongst themselves about philosophy while their fellow human beings suffer. Good for him winning the Nobel Prize for his work but this is a perfect example of intellect completely divorced from any moral compass.
Very strongly agree. It's a great example of how someone can be really "smart" in one way, but not in other ways (hence, my aversion to talking about "smartness" as a single, one-dimensional measurable thing -- it's not!).
What an unbearable human being. I can’t stand people who think their inflated ego, arrogance and lack of compassion and empathy are somehow excused by —or proof of— their alleged superior intelligence.
Yeah. He strikes me as *wildly* overconfident about his views, which seem incredibly naive and potentially very dangerous. The whole interview -- for me, in the moment -- was astonishing. I let him talk at length because what he was saying was so bizarre. Did you watch the Dwarkesh interview, by chance?
An Englishman, an Irishman, and a tech bro walk into a restaurant.
The Englishman says, “Let’s vote on what to eat — fair and square.”
The Irishman laughs, “Ah, just bring three pints and we’ll argue over the rest.”
The tech bro folds his menu. “Voting is a terrible way to decide dinner. I’m opting out.”
He refuses to order, calls the menu “collective tyranny,” and then calmly eats everyone’s chips, explaining that “true freedom means acting on one’s individual reward function.”
When the bill comes, he pushes it away. “I didn’t consent to this economic structure.”
The Englishman sighs, “He’s opted out of paying.”
The Irishman nods. “Aye—but somehow he’s the only one who’s eaten.”
The tech bro smiles, brushing crumbs off his hoodie.
“Group welfare’s a bitch,” he says, “but personal utility? Now that scales.”
My 2c - the transcript doesn’t really square up with Sutton coming out as the bad guy; instead it clarifies why the interviewer is an unwitting totalitarian. Once you ask the question - should something be allowed - note the passive voice - you implicitly assume that we must have a totalitarian system where the government decides everything - and not too often, the person asking the question decides for the government.
So throughout the interview, Sutton seems pretty consistent in saying that he doesn’t like the framing and hence won’t answer because (my understanding) he can’t be honest and not be misunderstood. Hence at the end, to the question regarding whether he is an accelerationist, he merely replies with the same question - am I?
Regarding democracy, let me mention my position which isn’t unheard of. The final objective seems to be rule of law - and the only system under which we have seen that happen till date is under a democracy . Note that NOT ALL democracies have rule of law - a large number of popular revolutions have become tyrannical. I think the rule of law is defined by clear and large private space and no violence between entities - and usually these require property rights, markets and limited taxation.
Having said that, I must congratulate the author for the transcripts since it allows everyone to form their own opinions.
Nauseating. Let’s all decide to go back to the sort of thinking that said “clocks are cool, everything must be like a clock…” Equally wrong, sure, but the reduction in cringe pro-extinction rhetoric would probably be worth it.
What maddening arrogance, presuming himself to be so superior in his fuzzy thinking, and demanding debate when in reality his sophomoric arguments fail so badly to answer the challenge that they hardly merit the time to dismantle them. Too bad about humanity, but he must be allowed to play with his favorite toy, because he's just so curious and it's all so thrillingly interesting!
Totally agree. He describes himself as humble, and suggests that anyone who wants to control AI is hubristic and arrogant. Lol. Honestly, during the interview, I remember thinking "This is absolutely batsh*t" on a number of occasions.
Blech. I’m just nauseated by this tribe of self-absorbed white men wanking amongst themselves about philosophy while their fellow human beings suffer. Good for him winning the Nobel Prize for his work but this is a perfect example of intellect completely divorced from any moral compass.
Very strongly agree. It's a great example of how someone can be really "smart" in one way, but not in other ways (hence, my aversion to talking about "smartness" as a single, one-dimensional measurable thing -- it's not!).
What an unbearable human being. I can’t stand people who think their inflated ego, arrogance and lack of compassion and empathy are somehow excused by —or proof of— their alleged superior intelligence.
Yeah. He strikes me as *wildly* overconfident about his views, which seem incredibly naive and potentially very dangerous. The whole interview -- for me, in the moment -- was astonishing. I let him talk at length because what he was saying was so bizarre. Did you watch the Dwarkesh interview, by chance?
Fairly Landian
Yup. :-0
this is a great example of there being a very fine line between genius and insanity ...
Lol.
An Englishman, an Irishman, and a tech bro walk into a restaurant.
The Englishman says, “Let’s vote on what to eat — fair and square.”
The Irishman laughs, “Ah, just bring three pints and we’ll argue over the rest.”
The tech bro folds his menu. “Voting is a terrible way to decide dinner. I’m opting out.”
He refuses to order, calls the menu “collective tyranny,” and then calmly eats everyone’s chips, explaining that “true freedom means acting on one’s individual reward function.”
When the bill comes, he pushes it away. “I didn’t consent to this economic structure.”
The Englishman sighs, “He’s opted out of paying.”
The Irishman nods. “Aye—but somehow he’s the only one who’s eaten.”
The tech bro smiles, brushing crumbs off his hoodie.
“Group welfare’s a bitch,” he says, “but personal utility? Now that scales.”
My 2c - the transcript doesn’t really square up with Sutton coming out as the bad guy; instead it clarifies why the interviewer is an unwitting totalitarian. Once you ask the question - should something be allowed - note the passive voice - you implicitly assume that we must have a totalitarian system where the government decides everything - and not too often, the person asking the question decides for the government.
So throughout the interview, Sutton seems pretty consistent in saying that he doesn’t like the framing and hence won’t answer because (my understanding) he can’t be honest and not be misunderstood. Hence at the end, to the question regarding whether he is an accelerationist, he merely replies with the same question - am I?
Regarding democracy, let me mention my position which isn’t unheard of. The final objective seems to be rule of law - and the only system under which we have seen that happen till date is under a democracy . Note that NOT ALL democracies have rule of law - a large number of popular revolutions have become tyrannical. I think the rule of law is defined by clear and large private space and no violence between entities - and usually these require property rights, markets and limited taxation.
Having said that, I must congratulate the author for the transcripts since it allows everyone to form their own opinions.
Nauseating. Let’s all decide to go back to the sort of thinking that said “clocks are cool, everything must be like a clock…” Equally wrong, sure, but the reduction in cringe pro-extinction rhetoric would probably be worth it.