FTX Foundation wanted to buy the nation of Nauru to save EAs' lives

Buying a coal mine ( a common occurrence that normal people do, though it turns out Will misunderstood the process in a way that probably invalidated the plan ) seems sufficiently different from buying a country ( a very rare occurrence with no established process, normal people do not do ) that I don't think you should take Will's serious interest in the former as much evidence about the latter.

Could someone say why they downvoted this comment?

To add even more reasons why this is a bad idea, Nauru has very poor soil as a result of phosphate mining, so on-land agriculture is extremely limited, and most food is currently imported, leading to an obesity epidemic. Similarly, there are no lakes or rivers on the island, so water is either imported or collected from rainfall. 

Also the Australian government is currently operating a controversial detention centre for asylum seekers on the island, and presumably would stand in the way of any purchase. 

Really, it's hard to overstate how much of an obviously bad idea this was. 

Do you have additional evidence that this was specifically Torres, and not someone else who dislikes EA? 

I was initially skeptical of the claim, thinking it was one of Torres followers, but looking at the timestamps, it seems that the OP here was posted 20 minutes before Torres tweeted about the article. And I know Torres has used sock-puppets before, so it at least seems plausible that it's another one. 

However, It could have also been that Torres saw the post here and decided to tweet about it, or that eugenics-adjacent is a different person who posted here and then tipped off Torres about the article, or they both by chance saw the article at around the same time. I don't think there is enough information to make a confident accusation here. 

I'm concerned about downvoting posts containing news information solely on a belief that they were posted by a sockpuppet. It was appropriate for there to be a post on this news development, and downvoting based on a belief about the poster's identity has the unintended effect of burying the adverse news story (and the appearance of doing so).

Conditional on this being Torres, all those downvotes just played into their hands. If this post were truly objectionable, someone should have put the news information in a separate post so that sockpuppet defense doesn't imperil visibility of news information.

I thought it was pretty obvious that "Eugenics-Adjacent" would likely be a critic.

There are also minor citizens, and citizens not yet born. Even assuming all the adult citizens could and would validly and irrevocably sell their democratic rights, they could not validly sell those of the next generation.

I'll first note that it seems incredibly unlikely that 95% of a population would agree to sell their ancestral homeland out from under themselves. But even if they did, what would happen if the next year there was some scandal and they changed their minds, and then 95% of them wanted the FTX project gone? Does the project go caput, despite the substantial investment, or does FTX continue on and override the democratic wishes of the people of Nauru? 

I don't know how unlikely it is. It seems like the kind of thing that probably hasn't been tried, or at least not tried in a high-integrity way. It's plausible to me that it couldn't happen, but we are talking about just a few thousand people, which is small enough (though still, of course, an enormous undertaking) that you could negotiate with a huge fraction of those people individually. My sense is there have been areas with 10,000+ people who were voluntarily relocated, and where the relocation package did get a 95%+ approval, but I am not sure.

But even if they did, what would happen if the next year there was some scandal and they changed their minds, and then 95% of them wanted the FTX project gone?

The same that happens if the nation otherwise made agreements with external parties. Sometimes governments borrow money from foreign nations or corporations, and they are generally expected to pay that money back. 

It is definitely the kind of thing that should be figured out as part of the contract. Having a vote where people can give back any funds they received, or some large fraction of it, but then kick out the people who gave that money, seems pretty reasonable to me. 

Seems like a super messy situation, but I don't think it's without precedent, and it feels like the kind of thing that could be figured out.

It seems to me that the talk of buying an entire nation (instead of say, buying a plot of land inside a nation), is inherently undemocratic, for this reason.

I agree that treating the purchase of a nation as a commodity is deeply confused and probably implies a lack of respect for democratic boundaries by the writer. But a democratic nation, democratically agreeing to sell some or most of the ownership over their nation seems like a reasonable thing for a democracy to do. If it's the will of the people, I am not going to stop them? On what basis would you prevent a nation from democratically deciding to sell their governance this way?

Totally! This seems pretty clearly non-charitable (which I tried to emphasize in my comment).

Jason - good points. 

Even for EAs who live in major cities, it can be helpful to cultivate good relationships with friends or extended family who live in lower-density areas, in case situations escalate (e.g. nuclear brinksmanship, pandemic intensifies) enough that it's worth leaving the city.

In terms of prepping with supplies, it's worth remembering that if one doesn't have effective means to defend one's supplies from others who might want them, one's basically just storing up stuff that will end up being taken by others. In some countries, 'effective defense' just means good fences and locks; in other countries, it means AR-15s. 

The best defense is often just 'op sec' (operational security), meaning, don't brag about being a prepper in public, on social media, or in giving away cues of prepping (e.g. survivalist bumper stickers or house signs), which just makes one a target for others.

It's a bit more complicated, as I understand (from Wikipedia):

"In 1998, 2001, 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2009, the United States Congress voted whether to ban all human cloning, both reproductive and therapeutic (Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act). Divisions in the Senate, or an eventual veto from the sitting President (George W. Bush in 2005 and 2007), over therapeutic cloning prevented either competing proposal (a ban on both forms or on reproductive cloning only) from being passed into law. On 10 March 2010, a bill (HR 4808) was introduced with a section banning federal funding for human cloning. Such a law, if passed, would not have prevented research from occurring in private institutions (such as universities) that have both private and federal funding. However, the 2010 law was not passed.

There are currently no federal laws in the United States which ban cloning completely. Fifteen American states (Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, North Dakota, New Jersey, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and Virginia) ban reproductive cloning and three states (Arizona, Maryland and Missouri) prohibit use of public funds for such activities.

Ten states, California, Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, Montana, New Jersey and Rhode Island, have "clone and kill" laws that prevent cloned embryo implantation for childbirth, but allow embryos to be destroyed."

In global comparisons like this (https://www.ruf.rice.edu/~neal/temp/ST Policy/index/SCBooklet/World.pdf), the US is routinely classified as not having a complete ban on human cloning.

I amend my previous comment to replace the phrase "seriously considered" with "considered." Also, there are many state laws against human reproductive cloning, but many states have no such laws: 

https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/appendix-state-laws-on-human-cloning

It does depend on the cost, to be clear. And I fully agree with you that animal welfare charities are starved for cash and that we can be deploying far more to Global Health and Poverty.

About point 4: While commenting, I presumed the controversial bit was "let's build bunkers only for EAs." Reading other comments, however, it seems that maybe I misunderstood something because there is more focus on the "let's build bunkers" part and not as much on the latter.

The idea of making bunkers is somewhat out there but not uncommon; governments have done it nationally at least once, and an active group of preppers do it now. In the event of a catastrophe, I would appreciate having access to a bunker, and I am sure so would others. 

Making it only for EAs implies (the utterly wrong idea) that in the event of a catastrophe, EAs are somehow more valuable and worthy of saving than non-EAs. This goes against some core ideas that we aim to cultivate.