Links 15
Scott Alexander: “A lot of media is predicting the death of effective altruism, or a major blow to EA, or something in that category. Not going to happen. The media isn’t good at understanding people who do things for reasons other than PR. […] If every single other effective altruist in the world were completely discredited, I would just shrug and do effective altruism on my own. If they instituted the death penalty for effective altruism, I would do it under cover of night using ZCash. […] ‘Saint gets eaten by lions in Colosseum, can early Christianity possibly survive this setback?’ Update your model or prepare to be constantly surprised.”
Isabel Slone: “For years, I have been unwittingly feeding Facebook conflicting information about who I am. As a journalist, I have used it casually for reporting purposes, joining divergent communities dedicated to everything from women in business to Airbnb hosts and polyamorists. After finding subjects for stories, I never bothered to leave these groups, and like creeping ivy, their posts began to overtake my feed, to delightful results.”
“If you’re an English speaker, you’re probably saying ‘Qatar’ incorrectly, but only in the sense that your pronunciation of ‘Paris’ or ‘Chile’ would be considered wrong from the point of view of a Parisian or a Chilean. Which means that the real question is: What sort of wrong is right?”
