I mean, this is a rather fun article to read but I'm not entirely sure about the thesis.
> AI Safety Is Mostly A Sex Cult.
> I don't think these people should make policy. (1/?)
One of the learnings from things like the whole Epstein saga has been there are a lot of sex cults in the policy making world and, yes, the people making policy generally shouldn't be. But I'm not sure this article actually comes up with a good explanation of why these particular people shouldn't be making policy. People having active sex lives isn't a disqualifying trait. Being in a cult doesn't disqualify people from being in politics. It is routine and expected that fields will have a lot of similar people in them (as I recall the overlap between security researchers and the furry community is unusual too, and that is hardly more important than justifying a passing comment).
It is more routine than the article writer seems to think for all the people in a small field to know each other and get on really well.
I don't like most religions, personally. But there is a significant difference between a regular religious community, that has its own shared beliefs but doesn't completely exclude those who don't share them (e.g. by forbidding members to even become friends with people outside the community), or demand the community members completely dedicate a majority of their time to the religion; and a cult, which does do all of these things.
Note that there exist cults within many major religions. There exist for example extremist Catholic groups that would fit the definition of a cult. But that doesn't mean that all Catholics are a cult.
"AI safety" is not a cult by that definition any more than Christianity or Islam. There's some subgroups that are a bit more cultist, and that's the same in Christianity etc
Same with Falun Dafa, have a friend who is a practitioner, it's completely normal to have friends outside of community (tons of his friends are), no one tries to convert anyone, and between his business and other stuff the time he spends on the practice is really not that much
roenxi · · focus · HN ↗
> AI Safety Is Mostly A Sex Cult.
> I don't think these people should make policy. (1/?)
One of the learnings from things like the whole Epstein saga has been there are a lot of sex cults in the policy making world and, yes, the people making policy generally shouldn't be. But I'm not sure this article actually comes up with a good explanation of why these particular people shouldn't be making policy. People having active sex lives isn't a disqualifying trait. Being in a cult doesn't disqualify people from being in politics. It is routine and expected that fields will have a lot of similar people in them (as I recall the overlap between security researchers and the furry community is unusual too, and that is hardly more important than justifying a passing comment).
It is more routine than the article writer seems to think for all the people in a small field to know each other and get on really well.
MetaWhirledPeas · · focus · HN ↗
Let's survey the American voters
ShinyLeftPad · · focus · HN ↗
tsimionescu · · focus · HN ↗
ShinyLeftPad · · focus · HN ↗
tsimionescu · · focus · HN ↗
Note that there exist cults within many major religions. There exist for example extremist Catholic groups that would fit the definition of a cult. But that doesn't mean that all Catholics are a cult.
ShinyLeftPad · · focus · HN ↗
Same with Falun Dafa, have a friend who is a practitioner, it's completely normal to have friends outside of community (tons of his friends are), no one tries to convert anyone, and between his business and other stuff the time he spends on the practice is really not that much