All of Jayasimha Nuggehalli's Comments + Replies
"exiled from community" is a bit too harsh, no? This edit is an excellent example of why one should not judge too quickly, or rather we as a community should not be too quick to judge. When SBF was able to contribute, we said SBF was a poster boy for earning to give; now, we say no one should even associate. We need to learn to slow down and listen deeply before we judge.
It may be difficult to parse what happened as an outsider, but for those who work in or near finance it is clear that Sam engaged in wildly unethical and illegal behaviour.
At a minimum, Sam played a reckless game with customer deposits and gambled with money that was never his. At the worst, Sam had suffered massive losses in his hedge fund and tried to use FTX deposits to survive (creating a form of Ponzi scheme). At the moment it appears a mix of the two of is true. It’s horrific fraud either way.
The hole he has dug is very, very deep (billions of dollars deep) and a redemption arc is not forthcoming.
I agree that "exiled from community" is strong language, but "slow down and listen deeply before we judge" doesn't make any sense if you consider how many people lost money, careers, funding, etc from his poor decisions, which he is showing almost no remorse for. Taking naps and playing video games? That must be nice when people are genuinely in a bind because their projects were being funded by the FTX Future Fund.
I have seen a growing trend among EAs disregarding the law and due process. I have also been told not to be a legal alarmist when I have raised concerns about how a prog, event or grant is administered. I will not get into specific examples, but I think a culture where the thought process is " law and procedure should not come in the way of doing good " or 'let's weigh the risk of not following v/s the possible good" creates a situation where decisions are made with brashness. I think the situation with SBF is less to do with thoroughly thought...
I agree - I sympathise with the people who lost the money, and I can see them being furious after reading this article. People have different methods of dealing with stress, some binge eats, and some play video games. Still, I think we as a community need to be more compassionate towards SBF and provide him with the legal right to be treated as innocent until proven guilty.
How can we provide him with that legal right? We're not a court. Are you suggesting we withhold moral judgement until a court provides one? Besides being far too high an epistemic bar for judging people's actions, that will probably be years away, at which point EA's reputation would (rightly) have withered away.
These are some links to podcast links aimed at children that touch on EA topics.
https://www.buzzsprout.com/1018843/episodes/9252374 -Meet Vaidehi Agarwalla - An Effective Altruism Community Builder
https://www.buzzsprout.com/1018843/episodes/8940898 Meet Wanyi Zeng - The Executive Director of Effective Altruism Singapore
https://www.buzzsprout.com/1018843/episodes/3754505
Meet Elissa Lane - A Farm Animal Welfare Expert
https://www.buzzsprout.com/1018843/episodes/4040834 Meet Abhay Rangan - A man dedicated to make plant based milk affordable a...
I will still push back on "exiled from community" - it almost makes it seem like EA is a cult, which I hope it's not.