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Inner Rings and EA
C. S. Lewis' The Inner Ring is IMO, a banger. My rough summary - inner rings are the cool club/ the important people. People spend a lot of energy on trying to be part of the inner rings, and sacrifice things that are truly important.
There are lots of passages that jump out at me, wrt to my experience as an EA. I found it pretty tough reading in a way... in how it makes me reflect on my own motivations and actions.
[of inner rings] There are what correspond to passwords, but they are too spontaneous and informal. A particular slang, the use of particular nicknames, an allusive manner of conversation, are the marks.
There's a perrenial discussion of jargon in EA. I've typically thought of jargon as a trade off between havivng more efficient discourse on the one hand, and lower barriers for new people to enter the conversation on the other. Reading things makes me think of jargon more as a mechanism to signal in-group membership.
And when you had climbed up to somewhere near it by the end of your second year, perhaps you discovered that within the ring there was a Ring yet more inner, which in its turn was the fringe of the great school Ring to which the house Rings were only satellites.
There was a time when I was working very hard to get hired at an EA org. At the time I had some vague sense of 'I just need to work hard now, and once I get the job I'll have made it, I'll be able to relax, I'll properly be an EA'.
Once I got the job, this... didn't quite happen. The goalposts shifted, and 'get a job at an EA org' was replaced by 'get into this new role', 'perform really well', 'get into this more exclusive group of decision makers'.
People who believe themselves to be free, and indeed are free, from snobbery, and who read satires on snobbery with tranquil superiority, may be devoured by the desire in another form. It may be the very intensity of their desire to enter some quite different Ring which renders them immune from all the allurements of high life. An invitation from a duchess would be very cold comfort to a man smarting under the sense of exclusion from some artistic or communistic côterie. Poor man—it is not large, lighted rooms, or champagne, or even scandals about peers and Cabinet Ministers that he wants: it is the sacred little attic or studio, the heads bent together, the fog of tobacco smoke, and the delicious knowledge that we—we four or five all huddled beside this stove—are the people who know.
I think I've been kind of snobby about non-EAs in the past. Eg. friends that are non EA's/ are 'normal', and care about things like buying a house, getting a promotion, having nice clothes... I've had an underlying sense of - can't you see that this is all kind of shallow/ meaningless, and you're in a big hamster rat wheel race? And I had a feeling of superiority in being aware of the game, and deciding not to play, and dedicate myself to something that actually matters. But poor me, it is not large lighted rooms or champagne or a nice house that I want: it is the heads bent together, the fog of large whiteboards and the delicious knowledge that we are the people who are actually making a difference.
I must not assume that you have ever first neglected, and finally shaken off, friends whom you really loved and who might have lasted you a lifetime, in order to court the friendship of those who appeared to you more important, more esoteric.
This bit was tough to read. I've largely prioritised making friends with EAs, in particular those who seemed important, to the detriment of other relationships.
The quest of the Inner Ring will break your hearts unless you break it. But if you break it, a surprising result will follow. If in your working hours you make the work your end, you will presently find yourself all unawares inside the only circle in your profession that really matters. You will be one of the sound craftsmen, and other sound craftsmen will know it.
Some of the people I most respect have this 'sound craftsmen'ness to them. They are seemingly impervious to who the 'important people' are, and what they think. They just do their thing.
And if in your spare time you consort simply with the people you like, you will again find that you have come unawares to a real inside: that you are indeed snug and safe at the centre of something which, seen from without, would look exactly like an Inner Ring. But the difference is that the secrecy is accidental, and its exclusiveness a by-product, and no one was led thither by the lure of the esoteric: for it is only four or five people who like one another meeting to do things that they like
This makes me think of EA groups. It seems to me that in the earlier years, EA groups were much more people 'who like one another meeting to d othings that they like', and now they are more like recruiting grounds for the inner circle.
I expect the above is too cynical, both about my own motivations, and about the EA community. I and people in the EA community have a lot of genuine, noble motivations. But the 'inner ring' motivations make up a larger proportion than I would have liked, and than I previously thought.
The EA Mindset
This is an unfair caricature/ lampoon of parts of the 'EA mindset' or maybe in particular, my mindset towards EA.
Importance: Literally everything is at stake, the whole future lightcone astronomical utility suffering and happiness. Imagine the most important thing you can think of, then times that by a really large number with billions of zeros on the end. That's a fraction of a fraction of what's at stake.
Special: You are in a special time upon which the whole of everything depends. You are also one of the special chosen few who understands how important everything is. Also you understand the importance of rationality and evidence which everyone else fails to get (you even have the suspicion that some of the people within the chosen few don't actually 'really get it').
Heroic responsiblity: "You could call it heroic responsibility, maybe,” Harry Potter said. “Not like the usual sort. It means that whatever happens, no matter what, it’s always your fault. Even if you tell Professor McGonagall, she’s not responsible for what happens, you are. Following the school rules isn’t an excuse, someone else being in charge isn’t an excuse, even trying your best isn’t an excuse. There just aren’t any excuses, you’ve got to get the job done no matter what.”
Fortunately, you're in a group of chosen few. Unfortunately, there's actually only one player character, that's you, and everyone else is basically a robot. Relying on a robot is not an excuse for failing to ensure that everything ever goes well (specifically, goes in the best possible way).
Deference: The thing is though, a lot of this business seems really complicated. Like, maximising the whole of the impact universe long term happiness... where do you even start? Luckily some of the chosen few have been thinking about this for a while, and it turns out the answer is AI safety. Obviously you wouldn't trust just anyone on this, everything is at stake after all. But the chosen few have concluded this based on reason and evidence and they also drink huel like you. And someone knows someone who knows Elon Musk, and we have $10 trillion now so we can't be wrong.
(You'd quite like to have some of that $10 trillion so you can stop eating supernoodles, but probably it's being used on more important stuff...)
(also remember, there isn't really a 'we', everyone else is a NPC, so if it turns out the answer was actually animals and not AI safety after all, that's your fault for not doing enough independent thinking).
Position to do good: You still feel kinda confused about what's going on and how to effectively maximise everything. But the people at EA orgs seem to know what's going on and some of them go to conferences like the leaderscone forum. So if you can just get into an EA org then probably they'll let you know all the secrets and give you access to the private google docs and stuff.
Also, everyone listens to people at EA orgs, and so you'll be in a much better position to do good afterwards. You might even get to influence some of that $10 trillion dollars that everyone talks about. Maybe Elon Musk will let you have a go on one of his rockets.
Career capital: EA orgs are looking for talented, impressive ambitious, high potential, promising people. You think you might be one of those, but sometimes you have your doubts, as you sometimes fail at basic things like having enough clean clothes. If you had enough career capital, you could prove to yourself and others that you in fact did have high potential, and would get a job at an EA org. You're considering getting enough career capital by starting a gigaproject or independently solving AI safety.
This things seem kind of challenging, but you can just use self improvement to make yourself the kind of person that could do these things.