The Singularity Institute's Arrogance Problem

lukeprog

I intended Leveling Up in Rationality to communicate this:

Despite worries that extreme rationality isn't that great, I think there's reason to hope that it can be great if some other causal factors are flipped the right way (e.g. mastery over akrasia). Here are some detailed examples I can share because they're from my own life...

But some people seem to have read it and heard this instead:

I'm super-awesome. Don't you wish you were more like me? Yay rationality!

This failure (on my part) fits into a larger pattern of the Singularity Institute seeming too arrogant and (perhaps) being too arrogant. As one friend recently told me:

At least among Caltech undergrads and academic mathematicians, it's taboo to toot your own horn. In these worlds, one's achievements speak for themselves, so whether one is a Fields Medalist or a failure, one gains status purely passively, and must appear not to care about being smart or accomplished. I think because you and Eliezer don't have formal technical training, you don't instinctively grasp this taboo. Thus Eliezer's claim of world-class mathematical ability, in combination with his lack of technical publications, make it hard for a mathematician to take him seriously, because his social stance doesn't pattern-match to anything good. Eliezer's arrogance as evidence of technical cluelessness, was one of the reasons I didn't donate until I met [someone at SI in person]. So for instance, your boast that at SI discussions "everyone at the table knows and applies an insane amount of all the major sciences" would make any Caltech undergrad roll their eyes; your standard of an "insane amount" seems to be relative to the general population, not relative to actual scientists. And posting a list of powers you've acquired doesn't make anyone any more impressed than they already were, and isn't a high-status move.

So, I have a few questions:

What are the most egregious examples of SI's arrogance?
On which subjects and in which ways is SI too arrogant? Are there subjects and ways in which SI isn't arrogant enough?
What should SI do about this?

I intended Leveling Up in Rationality to communicate this:

Despite worries that extreme rationality isn't that great, I think there's reason to hope that it can be great if some other causal factors are flipped the right way (e.g. mastery over akrasia). Here are some detailed examples I can share because they're from my own life...

But some people seem to have read it and heard this instead:

I'm super-awesome. Don't you wish you were more like me? Yay rationality!

This failure (on my part) fits into a larger pattern of the Singularity Institute seeming too arrogant and (perhaps) being too arrogant. As one friend recently told me:

At least among Caltech undergrads and academic mathematicians, it's taboo to toot your own horn. In these worlds, one's achievements speak for themselves, so whether one is a Fields Medalist or a failure, one gains status purely passively, and must appear not to care about being smart or accomplished. I think because you and Eliezer don't have formal technical training, you don't instinctively grasp this taboo. Thus Eliezer's claim of world-class mathematical ability, in combination with his lack of technical publications, make it hard for a mathematician to take him seriously, because his social stance doesn't pattern-match to anything good. Eliezer's arrogance as evidence of technical cluelessness, was one of the reasons I didn't donate until I met [someone at SI in person]. So for instance, your boast that at SI discussions "everyone at the table knows and applies an insane amount of all the major sciences" would make any Caltech undergrad roll their eyes; your standard of an "insane amount" seems to be relative to the general population, not relative to actual scientists. And posting a list of powers you've acquired doesn't make anyone any more impressed than they already were, and isn't a high-status move.

So, I have a few questions:

What are the most egregious examples of SI's arrogance?
On which subjects and in which ways is SI too arrogant? Are there subjects and ways in which SI isn't arrogant enough?
What should SI do about this?

If it helps at all, another data point (not quite answers to your questions):

I'm a complete SI outsider. My exposure to it is entirely indirectly through Less Wrong, which from time to time seems to function as a PR/fundraising/visibility tool for SI.
I have no particular opinion about SI's arrogance or non-arrogance as an organization, or EY's arrogance or non-arrogance as an individual. They certainly don't demonstrate humility, nor do they claim to, but there's a wide middle ground between the two.
I doubt I would be noticeably more likely to donate money, or to encourage others to donate money, if SI convinced me that it was now 50% less arrogant than it was in 2011.
One thing that significantly lowers my likelihood of donating to SI is my estimate that the expected value of SI's work is negligible, and that the increase/decrease in that EV based on my donations is even more so. It's not clear what SI can really do to increase my EV-of-donating, though.
Similar to the comment you quote, someone's boasts:accomplishments ratio is directly proportional to my estimate that they are crackpots. OTOH, I find it likely that without the boasting and related monkey dynamics, SI would not receive the funding it has today, so it's not clear that adopting a less boastful stance is actually a good idea from SI's perspective. (I'm taking as given that SI wants to continue to exist and to increase its funding.)
Just to be clear what I mean by "boasts," here... throughout the sequences EY frequently presents himself as possessing the intellectual horsepower and insight to transform the world in "impossible" ways and holding back from doing so only because he possesses the unusual wisdom to realize that doing so is immoral. I don't think that much is at all controversial, but if you really want specific instances I might be motivated to go back through and find some. (Probably not, though.)

throughout the sequences EY frequently presents himself as possessing the intellectual horsepower and insight to transform the world in "impossible" ways and holding back from doing so only because he possesses the unusual wisdom to realize that doing so is immoral.

I cannot think of one example of a claim along those lines.

4Vaniver14y

I am not impressed by those sorts of ploys.

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