Conservationists tend not to support gene drive interventions because they value the undisturbed state of the ecosystem, besides fearing unintended outcomes. We aren't supportive of gene drives as an intervention at this time because they are still very hard to control and there would probably be complex issues with resistance. 

I appreciate this post a lot, particularly how you did not take more responsibility than was merited and how you admitted thinking it wasn't a red flag that SBF skirted regulations bc the regulations were probably bad. I appreciated how you noticed hindsight bias and rewritten history creeping in, and I appreciate how you don't claim that more ideal actions from you would have changed the course of history but nonetheless care about your small failures here.

Do you think EA's self-reflection about this is at all productive, considering most people had even less information than you? My (very, very emotional) reaction to this has been that most of the angst about how we somehow should have known or had a different moral philosophy (or decision theory) is a delusional attempt to feel in control. I'm just curious to hear in your words if you think there's any value to the reaction of the broader community (people who knew as much or less about SBF before 11/22 than you).

Why did you remove both quotes then?

Now that I realize who you are and which house this was-- do you think it's fair to describe that house as an EA house? 

I'm vouching for this anonymous person's judgment although I can't personally verify their assessment of that person's character.

These are anonymous quotes from two people I know and vouch for about the TIME piece on gender-based harassment in the EA community:

Anon 1: I think it's unfortunate that the women weren't comfortable with the names of the responsible parties being shared in the article. My understanding is that they were not people strongly associated with EA, some of them had spoken out against EA and had never identified as an EA or had any role in EA, and an article with their names would have given people a very different impression of what happened. I guess I think someone should just spell out who the accused parties are (available from public evidence).

Anon 2: I want EAs to not be fucking stupid 😭

"Oh geez this Times reporter says we're doing really bad things, we must be doing really bad things A LOT, that's so upsetting!"

yet somehow "This New York Times reporter says Scott Alexander is racist and bad, but he's actually not, ugh I hate how the press is awful and lies & spins stuff in this way just to get clicks"

And yes, this included reports of people, but like I've met the first person interviewed in the article and she is hella scary and not someone I would trust to report accurately on this. And I know one of the people being talked about is [redacted] & some of the circumstance beyond that, which is like a known thing that people have considered and taken action on, and like.......... why the fuck are EAs just like "damn this is so sad, we really fucked up guys" without being AT ALL skeptical about the reporting or sources??????

I appreciate this

Idk I think it might be pretty hard to have a role like Head of Communications at CEA and then separately communicate your personal views about the same topics. Your position is rather unique for allowing that. I don't see CEA becoming like MIRI in this respect. It comes across as though he's saying this in his professional capacity when you hover over his account name and it says "Head of Communications at CEA". 

But the thing I think is most important about Shakeel's job is that it means he should know better than to throw around and amplify allegations. A marked personal account would satisfy me but I would still hold it to a higher standard re:gossip since he's supposed to know what's appropriate. And I expect him to want EA orgs to succeed! I don't think premature callouts for racism and demands to have already have apologized are good faith criticism to strengthen the community.
 

Hey Shakeel, thanks for your apology and update (and I hope you've apologized to FLI). Even though call-out culture may be popular or expected in other contexts, it is not professional or appropriate for the Comms Head of CEA to initiate an interaction with an EA org by publicly putting them on blast and seemingly seconding what could be very damaging accusations (as well as inventing others by speculating about financial misconduct). Did you try to contact FLI before publicly commenting to get an idea of what happened (perhaps before they could prepare their statement)?

I appreciate that you apologized for this incident but I don't think you understand how deep of a problem this behavior is. Get an anonymous account if you want to shoot from the hip. When you do it while your bio says "Head of Communications at CEA" it comes with a certain weight. Multiplying unfounded accusations, toward another EA org no less, is frankly acting in bad faith in a communications role. 
 

I took OP to be talking about major donors with independent wealth (not earning to give or GWWC donations wealth) but I think this is a good point. It could be used to argue that the community should have had more control over SBF’s funds since he choose to focus on earning so he could contribute to EA that way.