wait are these meant to be serious? they’re not parodies made by
sneerers… oh dear god.
Before seeing this I didn’t really think EY belonged in the dark
enlightenment? I haven’t seen him ever voice any reactionary, or race
realist, or right-wing sentiment. He’s friends with Robin Hanson, and
probably some variety of libertarian, but dark enlightenment? So much so
that they made a card for him? What did I miss?
I also didn’t realize the dark enlightenment people thought
LessWrong (and by extension EY, SSC and Robin Hanson) were all part of
the neoreaction/alt-right. They included them on their map! And this
stuff is from 5+ years ago…
basically what it comes down to is that yudkowsky has always expressed vaguely right-libertarian political beliefs publicly, but some things hint at something darker- moldbug was a fan of his, michael anissimov was at one point media director of MIRI, and, well, they made a trading card of him.
again, the yud man himself denies any connection, and has only ever presented himself as vaguely right-libertarian.
>has only ever presented himself as vaguely right-libertarian.
He also seems reasonably far-left socially. Like, his politics on "social" issues might actually be good? Maybe? I honestly don't know his views that well. He's anti-Trump IIRC, which OK, low bar, but is vastly better than the SSC subreddit, and any of the above listed neoreaction/alt righties. Scott pals around with neoreactionaries and EY doesn't. Is Scott...more sneer-worthy than EY??? I always thought EY was way more embarrassing but lately I dunnno
Scott's rise in popularity happened somewhat at EY's expense. Scooter is a *much* better writer who is also more comfortable playing footsie with neoreactionaries, who migrated to SSC comments when they were ostracized from LW by EY.
Scott seems like a nicer guy and a worse person, IMHO. They're both way too comfortable with supplying gateway drugs for fascism.
If I woke up and had an enormous following of alt-right YouTube creeps, I would take serious stock of what I was putting out into the world. Scott is proudly incapable of doing that.
> Scooter is a much better writer
Strong disagree. Yudkowsky is a much more engaging writer. I might roll my eyes a few times, but I can read through Yudkowsky's stuff. Alexander on the other hand loves boring, long-winded diatribes which I am physically incapable of reading in full.
I suspect Scott's rise in popularity is due largely to your clause after what I quoted. Yudkowsky shied away from politics as the mind-killer. Whereas Scott loves writing about politics and 'culture war' topics. So of course he's gonna have a harder time being popular among reactionaries and crypto-reactionaries.
Everything I've read by EY just reeks of hostility and arrogance, while Scott is much more passive-aggressive, self-deprecating, and cutesy in an almost McSweeney's sort of way. It's a lose-lose.
Edit: EY did have a penchant for repackaging Kahneman's ideas in a more approachable LiveJournal style, years ago. His autobiography is just one of the most infuriating and clueless things I've ever read, to the extent that it makes me hate the rest of it by association.
he's absolutely not "far-left socially." he might be vaguely *liberal* socially, but liberal is not the same thing as left. insofar as "socially left-wing" would have any meaning, it would be in terms of causes like feminism, which yudkowsky is generally not positive towards.
There are two clusters of sneer targets.
Cluster 1 might be labeled "arrogant nerds," and contains ideas that are supremely weird and cringe-y while preferably being rick-and-morty tier arrogant. This cluster's archetype is Yudkowsky. It contains ideas like:
* obsession with AI risk
* cryonics
* timeless decision theory
* being more Rational than normies (bonus points if the normies are domain experts)
* IQ fetishism
* Harry Potter fan fiction
* worrying about the suffering of electrons
Cluster 2 might be labeled "pseudo-intellectual bigots," and contains misogynistic or racist sentiments. These can come in various flavors ranging from "brave truth seeker silenced by the mainstream" to "just asking questions, don't be a sensitive snowflake". This cluster's archetype is /r/slatestarcodex. It contains things like:
* HBD
* rants about feminism
* the intellectual dark web
* following the Pence rule while being an incel
* Trump apologia
* comparing rape favorably to other things, complaining about consent norms, and generally doing a poor job of hiding a rape fetish
You'd think that the two clusters have nothing to do with each other, but surprisingly the frequently co-occur. Yudkowsky is maximally sneerworthy in the cluster 1 sense, but only very occasionally in the cluster 2 sense. Scott is medium-sneer on both clusters. Many /r/slatestarcodex dwellers are close to maximally sneerworthy in the cluster 2 sense.
this is like those big "here's two classes you can divide everyone into" ontologies that Rationalists invent every few months and obsess over, except it's actually useful.
I just found out about this subreddit today from the butthurt drama you cause on SSC. How does cluster 2 differ from the alt right? It sounds like the description of /pol. It (being r/slatestarcodex) doesn't seem that bad, but I normally comment on the main blog. Am I missing something?
Cluster 2 are basically the alt-right, yes. They are legion on /r/slatestarcodex. Some examples that spring to mind:
[This recent post](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/a2lipn/culture_war_roundup_for_the_week_of_december_03/ebbp1t0/?context=10000), given reddit gold, arguing that the neo-Nazi murderer was in fact a necessary check on the left-wing "mob agitators". Slatestarcodex posters also defended the murder right after it happened, posting doctored videos from alt-right websites purporting to show it was an accident or something.
HBD discussion is basically everywhere, I don't have a link handy but tell me if you've actually never seen it.
One of the most upvoted posts of all time - like, literally the most I've seen - is [this one](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/9o9uo4/culture_war_roundup_for_the_week_of_october_15/e81o3k1/) endorsing the NPC meme and comparing progressives to mormons. It's far from the worst the subreddit has to offer (barnaby is a skilled writer), but given the upvotes it should basically be considered the *best* the subreddit has to offer, and it is *still* just a rant against progressives.
If you want truly racist stuff, like endorsing-14-words-explicitly stuff, try [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/6j9yse/what_are_some_true_beliefs_deep_down_you_knew/djde7xb/) which got 45 upvotes and massive praise.
Misogyny is pretty much everywhere there. I can give you links to several users explicitly arguing against women's suffrage (though they are typically downvoted), but more common are people arguing women are sociopaths who are out to exploit people. I don't have a link right now but I can produce some if you want.
Lol, it most certainly does not "only" say that. It says seeding society with the 14 words is better than seeding it with the US constitution. Even supposing that "complex nuanced memes are not as fit", one wonders why it is preferable to seed society with a white supremacist message rather than seeding it with *nothing*.
Here's a simple meme for you: be less racist. Give it a try!
Here's a sneak peek of /r/slatestarcodex using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/top/?sort=top&t=year) of the year!
\#1: [Most of What You Read on the Internet is Written by Insane People](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/9rvroo/most_of_what_you_read_on_the_internet_is_written/)
\#2: [You Should (Probably) Lift Weights](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/9h2jbi/you_should_probably_lift_weights/)
\#3: [Reading notes: Civilization & Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, Vol. I: The Structures of Everyday Life](https://np.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/8bypq0/reading_notes_civilization_capitalism_15th18th/)
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I just found out about this place today so please excuse my ignorance, but what is so bad about his politics? I'm not trying to troll, but I'm confused.
corny MRA-style stuff about how feminism is ~~the devil~~ voldemort and Cute Girls Reject Nice Guys And Go After JERKS, also a lot of "well antifa are the REAL fascists" kinda stuff. obnoxious right-leaning faux-centrism.
> Is Scott...more sneer-worthy than EY???
Yes, by far. Yudkowsky has written some dumb stuff, but nothing on the level of, say, Untitled.
Also, grifting Silicone Valley libertarians is good.
>Also, grifting Silicone Valley libertarians is good.
Huh, you're 100% right - every dollar Peter Thiel pours into MIRI is a dollar he can't donate to Objectivist think tanks or psychotic right-wing politicians.
So fearmongering about the AIpocalypse is good praxis? I did not see that coming.
I believe Thiel is no longer backing them. Now they hit the cryptocurrency people - largest single donor is Vitalik Buterin.
**edit:** checked the [Form 990](https://intelligence.org/transparency/) - their 990 for 2017 lists a pile of crypto donations, but not names of donors.
This is bullshit. Yudkowsky, for all his wackiness, has always been way, way more clear than scoot about his no pasaran stance towards the nrx segments orbiting that crowd.
I would go as far as saying he genuinely opposes them privately as well as publicly, while scoot has drifted rightwards over the years.
> the yud man himself denies any connection
as i said myself \^
at any rate, regardless of his publicly expressed stance, michael anissimov was media director for MIRI for quite some time, and i don't think it's unreasonable that one might have suspicions due to that. not to mention the million and a half in thiel money.
I found some here,
here
and here.
I don’t have a big backup folder with all of them though, sadly.
Edit: did some looking around. From what I can gather, the whole
collection used to be there,
but that page now gives a 404. According to archive.org, the last
working version was from Oct,
19th 2013, so I guess it’s the most up to date. As far as I can tell
it has all of them, from Moldbug to Big Yud.
nah, this one's missing the whole racialist, masculinist, and traditionalist sections, as well as a couple formalists- the other links you posted includes a few of the ones that were missing from the last link tho (richard spencer, free northerner, sunshine mary)
this other archive \[[link](http://archive.li/EoNzl)\] of what appears to be the same page has some more of the ones which were missing- Lawrence Auster, Nick Steves, The Lady of Grerp, Alex Kurtagić, Martin of Prussia, jack Donovan, Frost, Kevin Macdonald, C.M. Sturges, Bryce Laliberte, Scharlach, Handle, and Theden, but it also missing some of the ones yours had.
>Kevin Macdonald
Interesting that an Irish catholic would be pushing the idea that the Jews are the ones controlling everything. Is he trying to deflect from [something](https://www.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1qayc3/the_hibernian_conspiracy/)?
it didn't get deleted, it's just in the pile of closed threads
https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3653939&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1
today you can read it without login (this may not be constant)
wait are these meant to be serious? they’re not parodies made by sneerers… oh dear god.
Before seeing this I didn’t really think EY belonged in the dark enlightenment? I haven’t seen him ever voice any reactionary, or race realist, or right-wing sentiment. He’s friends with Robin Hanson, and probably some variety of libertarian, but dark enlightenment? So much so that they made a card for him? What did I miss?
I also didn’t realize the dark enlightenment people thought LessWrong (and by extension EY, SSC and Robin Hanson) were all part of the neoreaction/alt-right. They included them on their map! And this stuff is from 5+ years ago…
I found some here, here and here. I don’t have a big backup folder with all of them though, sadly.
Edit: did some looking around. From what I can gather, the whole collection used to be there, but that page now gives a 404. According to archive.org, the last working version was from Oct, 19th 2013, so I guess it’s the most up to date. As far as I can tell it has all of them, from Moldbug to Big Yud.
They are on the Something Awful thread unless it got deleted in the last month or so.