All of kta's Comments + Replies
A lot of people have said sharing these notes were helpful, so sharing it here on the EAF! Here are notes on NTI | bio’s recent event with Dr. Lu Borio on H5N1 Bird Flu, in case anyone here would find it helpful!
Thanks for making this, Willem and David! Really interesting. After seeing the IRI statements and then the mean scores, it didn't initially look low to me, but when compared to the average IRI scores across the years, that's certainly a difference! It made me a little sad actually. I wonder what it might look like at present. There's a part of me that feels it can look similar still, despite the changes in the EA community. Also, while it might be relatively low-priority I for one would personally be fascinated/excited to see this being done again!
(Not an AI welfare/safety expert by any stretch, just adding my two cents here! Also I was very piqued by the banner and loved hovering over the footnote! I've thought about digital sentience, but this banner and this week really put me into a "hmm..." state)
My view leans towards "moderately disagree." (I fluctuated between this, neutral, and slightly agree.) For context, when it's AI safety, I'd say "highly agree." Thoughts behind my current position:
Why I'd prioritize it less:
- I consider myself longtermist, but I have always grappled with the opport
Cool that you did this, Oscar! What made you make this?
It seems like, regarding EA engagement, there’s a significant impact in well-organized city groups in smaller countries, leading to a concentrated effect. I read up a bit on EA Estonia/Estonia as a result of this post (didn't know much about them before this!), and they’re a relatively small country with concentrated efforts in key urban centers (Tallinn, the capital; Tartu, a university city). The synergy between the two seems to have the potential to create a concentrated and cohesive national EA net...
Charlotte! So nice to hear from you, you’re definitely one of the loveliest people I’ve met in EA. I’d love to talk about it one day maybe! You’re right that it’s frustrating to have this mix of emotions. I just decided I had too many negative ones to feel I was being productive — after writing this post I’ve been immensely happier and more productive!
Hope you’re well :)
Hi Jessica! I also was happy to work with you. Thanks for commenting. I want to reiterate that I understood this decision and why it was done, but I can’t say it made me feel good (esp when it happened. Maybe one good way to describe it was it felt CEA had favorite kids). And I’ve gotten lots of private messages after this post voicing out similar sad feelings. As someone who does believe in effective decision-making and impartiality in this, I really just understood and accepted it.
I think in my post I was trying to voice out my feelings of sadness I’ve h...
(as of Feb 24) So far there’s a Cambodian girl that has already contracted H5N1 and died, others possibly detected. How does this update everyone? https://fortune.com/well/2023/02/23/h5n1-bird-flu-death-cambodian-girl-multiple-contacts-sick/
(in the interest of being hyper explicit, also wanna note that I support people believing the claims in the TIME article, think it's good for people to genuinely state their beliefs about things, that it's totally fine for people to come to different conclusions about it than I did.)
edit: Also, thank you!
Hey Aella, just wanted to say I found this a very well-written post and this particular quote struck me:
“I think in large part because of those experiences I've had. We're dealing with something high visibility (EA), where the most popular political coalition in journalism (people on the left side of the political aisle) can score points by hating you (insufficiently woke), and that is politically controversial (polyamory, weird nerds, SBF). It seems obvious to me that the odds of having some people with personal experience in the community who also regula...
I agree that the article had an anti-polyamory vibe and that doesn’t seem helpful in it of itself and damaging to some who are not doing anything wrong. But I do think some discussion is warranted, not to be against polyamory, but for how our community treats it in such a way that it affects some dynamics (‘cause it can be tricky!)
For me, the broader picture is,
The blurry professional/personal line EA generally has + a polyamory subculture used negatively + powerful men who are more likely to harass gives a complex equation that can lead to behavior like t...
I agree with this (what Peter said) and also have a couple stuff to add:
- Just so you know, in the Philippines, generally women are considered more charitable, and this somewhat manifests in EA Philippines, where we are mostly women. This might not account for the quality of who is more likely to “quantify charity” but definitely gender is not binary, and I think it’s limiting to say “men more likely; that’s why this community is made up like this.”
Maybe what you say is because there are more men in the movement, but I don’t think it’s simply because men...
Agreed... I think similar stuff happen in many communities and social groups, and I think maybe EA gets tricky 'cause it's like, hey, aren't we generally good people? So shouldn't we like... be outliers and like... be people who are sensitive and stuff and by a given, never sexually harrass? So not that it's any less important, but EA ends up sticking out because of that.
To me, EAs being nice is usually the case, as per the usual impression of non-EAs who see EA conferences ("wow, this was the nicest crowd I've ever seen!) but we are not infall...
(This might be a rambly comment but these are thoughts that plopped out of me after reading the article, particularly after reading the quote by Julia Wise, “How do you figure out what is a community problem versus what is a Bay Area problem or sex problem or something else?”)
I generally think sexual harassment in EA is just extremely more complicated because of how intertwined we all are, and how much we would be willing to put aside (e.g. bad feelings in interpersonal relationships) for optimizing working for "the greater good" (e.g. let's not ruin this ...
I'm quite sad to see "When Gopalakrishnan said she wasn’t interested, she recalls, they would “shame” her or try to pressure her, casting monogamy as a lifestyle governed by jealousy, and polyamory as a more enlightened and rational approach." – I've only supposed this was possible due to my personal feelings of some dynamics in the community, and I actually feared it (as someone who has had personal issues with polyamory) but am sad to have heard it actually concretely happened in this way; I really hope it doesn't happen anymore.
Hey, I'm Kirsten, a student in Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. I was directed to this post by evelynciara after I shared that I posted a song cover inspired by EA. Would love to join this Slack :) This is my email: kirsten.angeles@obf.ateneo.edu
Thanks for your answer ! I agree with not giving a gift to someone if they wouldn’t want it. I mentioned this in a reply to a comment above, but I think I was asking more about what’s a gift someone really interested into EA would like, which might include a fundraiser/donation to a charity they’re passionate about. But if they’re not interested in EA, or wouldn’t be interested in it, it would probably come across not so great. Thank you!
Thanks for your answer! I agree, you have a good point. I think I was asking more about what’s a gift someone really interested into EA would like (e.g. I’d be pretty excited to get a nice EA book) but if they’re not interested in EA, if anyone would be conscious about what they give (e.g. if they’re vegan but don’t give a vegan gift). You have a really good point about the meaning of gifts, thank you!
Thank you for sharing this, Peter! Great notes; I’ve been reading this and have found it quite helpful. I read it after my term as president of EA Blue (uni chapter in the PH) and have learned points of improvement of my leadership then, and how to improve my leadership moving forward. Your notes are detailed and structured, and are great to reference. Love the insights too! On a meta-note, I was wondering if you can share how you take book notes efficiently without significantly slowing down your reading time (or your process in general). Thank you!
Thank you for sharing this – it's also pretty informative as i'm soon moving to DC!