I don’t think Scott Alexander is entitled to get annoyed about excessive anti-racism programmes in the workplace given that he is well known to be very racist.
Hell, maybe he has done an above-average number of unconscious bias trainings and DEI workshops and racism book clubs, but it’s because he keeps talking about how black people are mentally inferior at work and making him do training is cheaper than firing him.
California just had a small one the other day, so maybe Scott Alexander’s shitty opinions cause earthquakes.
We wanted to be able to hold a job without reciting DEI shibboleths or filling in multiple-choice exams about how white people cause earthquakes. Instead we got a thousand scientific studies cancelled because they used the string “trans-” in a sentence on transmembrane proteins.
If you were too racist to see the wood for the trees, that’s your problem comrade! Well, actually it’s everyone’s problem now.
I think they’re claiming that they are aware of the potential issues in how knowledge is produced (bias, unconscious or not)…but they think that they are uniquely humble and aware of all the issues, they certainly aren’t influenced by ideology, and they aren’t susceptible to the same logical fallacies as everyone else.
I think starting with Sam Bankman Fried is a solid idea. Relatively informed members of the general public a) know who that guy is, and b) know that he made some really poor decisions. He does not have the silicon valley mystique that attaches itself to some other adherents, I think fewer people will think “well that guy is really smart, why would he be in a cult”. Then you can go back and explain EA and LessWrong and Yudkowsky’s role in all of this.
Do the founders of religions usually get much out of it? Jesus was nailed to a cross.
I honestly don’t know, and if anyone tries to find out he might delete his blog again. If he is on a Thiel sinecure or running his own business, he shouldn’t be using the first person