Ben Goertzel on Charity

XiXiDu

Ben Goertzel on Charity — LessWrong

Comment Permalink

If you take a project founder's evaluation of their own project as objective truth, I have a project for you to fund.

I don't, but it is evidence that people disagree with the SIAI and think that there are more effective ways towards a positive Singularity. Don't forget that he once worked for the SIAI. If Michael Vassar was to leave the SIAI and start his own project, wouldn't that be evidence about the SIAI?

As for the up/downvotes, downvote all you like, but if I were you I would check my priors regarding the thought the average LessWronger puts into their comments and voting behaviour.

I had people going through my comments downvoting over 40 in a matter of minutes. I have seen enough irrational and motivated voting behavior to not trust it anymore, especially when it comes to anything about the community itself.

wedrifid15y20

If Michael Vassar was to leave the SIAI and start his own project, wouldn't that be evidence about the SIAI?

Yes, and in Michael's case it would be evidence against the value of the SIAI...

6Wei Dai15y

Did you think that many LWers weren't aware of this fact? I would have thought that everyone already knew... [...] I'm curious if you've seen this discussion, which occurred while Ben was still Research Director of SIAI. ETA: I see that you commented in that thread several months after the initial discussion, so you must have read it. I suppose the problem from your perspective is that you can't really distinguish between Eliezer and Ben. They each think their own approach to a positive Singularity is the best one, and think the other one is incompetent/harmless. You don't know enough to judge the arguments on the object level. LW mostly favors Eliezer, but that might just be groupthink. I'm not really sure how to solve this problem, actually... anyone else have ideas?

4Alexandros15y

Your 'lessons learned' implies you do. [...] This is not news to anyone. [...] I don't think he was ever on their payroll, so 'worked for' is inaccurate. Also, he's still on their advisory board: http://singinst.org/aboutus/ourmission/ . Finally, OpenCog started from within SIAI as far as I know, and is still mentioned on the history page. [...] Fair enough.

See in context