/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.17536043]

based Moldbug has dropped another article

https://graymirror.substack.com/p/scott-alexander-the-disappointed

It's about Scott Alexander and people similar to him among other public intellectuals and why they believe what they believe(and say). NYT has just published an article about Scott and SSC today as well, so read that for context.

[Anonymous No.17536070]

>>17536043
Doxxed lol

[Anonymous No.17536097]

>>17536070
?

[Anonymous No.17536104]

>>17536043
This title is a joke about how he has sex.

[Anonymous No.17536148]

>>17536043
I find him obnoxious, full of hubris, and pseudo-intellectual. So sorry but I’m not interested.

[Anonymous No.17536519]

>>17536043
Why the fuck did he feel the compulsion to share his incel tier bone structure with us?

[Anonymous No.17536543]

>>17536519
Lmao when did he do this

[Anonymous No.17536570]

>>17536543
It's a picture he took for the article in question, just click OP's link

[Anonymous No.17536582]

>>17536519
He should receive the "Most Likely to go on a Incel Rampage After the Age of 50" Award. What a fucking nunce.

[Anonymous No.17536590]

>>17536570
Kek

[Anonymous No.17536598]

>>17536519
Don't be jealous of his noble Ashkenazi physiognomy, if you squint you can actually see the verbal IQ genes

[Anonymous No.17536599]

>>17536519
Kek based physiognomist. I love Moldbug. If only all mamzers were like him

[Anonymous No.17536601]

>>17536519
Why did he take a picture holding the book? Why not simply hold the fucking book? Is he a 15 yo teenager girl?

[Anonymous No.17536965]

just gonna leave this here

[Anonymous No.17537069]

>>17536519

[Anonymous No.17537091]

>>17536519
LA CREATURA GIUDAICA

[Anonymous No.17537100]

>>17536601
kek

[Anonymous No.17537114]

> Compared to the citizenship database of India, American vital records [offensive analogy elided].)

What's the offensive analogy?

[Anonymous No.17537129]

>>17537114
they don't list castes

[Anonymous No.17537140]

>>17537114
I was also too brainlet for this.

Pretty awesome that he takes on school desegregation. At least indirectly. Few things our government does are as gratuitously cruel as sending Whites to school with Blacks. Prison similar.

[Anonymous No.17537193]

>>17536043
thanks for posting.

[Anonymous No.17537486]

>Sir, we’re getting calls from the Bayes Department…

[Anonymous No.17537507]

May be the best thing Yarvin's written. Curious if Scott will play dumb, because he got destroyed.

[Anonymous No.17537937]

>>17537507
I wouldn't consider myself part of the rationalist community but I did enjoy Scott's writing quite a bit, what's the issue at hand here?

[Anonymous No.17537970]

>>17536519
haha
I like his work, but fucking hell.
This detracts from it a lot.

[Anonymous No.17538105]

I wish I had his hair

[Anonymous No.17538275]

>>17536043
>I usually don’t link to LibGen—I may be a grifter, but I still believe in karma
Is this nigga really trying to pirate shame in the first sentence?

[Anonymous No.17538521]

>>17537937
Scott has a lot of misplaced faith in the system. It's partly a reaction to the NYT's hit piece on Scott that just came out.

[Anonymous No.17538723]

So good
https://graymirror.substack.com/p/a-brief-explanation-of-the-cathedral

[Anonymous No.17538756]

>>17537193
wow based

[Anonymous No.17539190]

>>17537193
>the hottest one is a butterface
Nothing a brown paper bag or turning off the lights won't fix
Definitely saving this one for... research purposes, yeah.

[Anonymous No.17539510]

>>17537193
rolling

[Anonymous No.17539791]

>>17537507

> Curious if Scott will play dumb, because he got destroyed.

He would probably agree with 99% of the assessment, just not the conclusion.

>>17537486

This was hilarious.

[Anonymous No.17540817]

>Some embraced the online writings of “neoreactionaries” like Curtis Yarvin, who held racist beliefs and decried American democracy. They were mostly white men, but not entirely.
>hyperlinks to the Carlyle UR post

everytime

[Anonymous No.17541021]

Imagine being born before 1995 with the name 'Cade'

[Anonymous No.17541905]

I'm new to the Scott Alexander thing, can someone explain to me why the New York Times is fucking with him? Based on some quick research I can't see any political views that significantly buck the prevailing orthodoxy

[Anonymous No.17541987]

>>17536043
Why did the NYT try so hard to de-anonymize him? Is there any way to interpret this that doesn't lead to them being total scumbags?

[Anonymous No.17542011]

>>17541987
This is what I want to know. I wouldn't put anything at all past the times, but I don't see the how it's in their ideological interest to dox him. Isn't Alexander a leftist?

[Anonymous No.17543868]

>>17541905
>>17542011
Alexander's blog had a massive comment section, like 1000 comments per post regularly, and with some fairly well known commenters(this is important because it explains why they care about him so much, the blog influenced people the NYT cares about), and he let anybody post there for a few years as long as they were civil. And by anybody even Jim from blogjim lol, though he got banned eventually. There was also a subreddit dedicated to his blog that had a lot of traffic as well, and had the same policy of no censorship apart from slurs and the like. So for years he offered a platform for a kind of high-quality discourse that accepted far right and racist posters, and during the very years that the rest of the internet was clamping down on that. He did in the end ban discussion of Nrx and racism I think, around 2017.

Apart from that he himself flirted with things you aren't allowed to say a bit by criticizing various aspects of progressive doctrine, he criticized feminism, the ideological intolerance of both blue and red 'tribes', censorship, outrage porn, etc. He was a liberal politically, ultra-prog for some stuff, but veering a bit close to centrism for some issues.

So the NYT would view this guy as like...idk something like Jordan Peterson, someone who helped normalize/promote extremist views of racism and the far right even if they are fairly mild themselves. It probably annoys the NYT a lot that he was so influential and allowed that kind of content to exist, and criticized who he did.

[Anonymous No.17543963]

>>17536965
Oy vey

[Anonymous No.17543984]

>>17543868
The elites have lost the plot. Dark times ahead.

[Anonymous No.17543995]

>>17536043
Wait, people still read this psued?

It's not 2013 anymore lads.

[Anonymous No.17544004]

>>17543995
>It's not 2013 anymore lads.
i know

[Anonymous No.17544381]

>>17536043
reserving a few thousand words mid-essay to dunk on obongo's "birth certificate"
never change, moldy

[Anonymous No.17544400]

>>17541905
his conclusions are orthodox plebbit, but he questions things. that isn't actually allowed. only the JYT is allowed to ask questions

[Anonymous No.17544442]

>>17544381
The Bayes Department called and said it's hinky

[Anonymous No.17544456]

>>17544442

[Anonymous No.17544676]

>>17544381
I feel that the extent to which pure dislike of Barack Obama motivated Moldbug's writings is underestimated.

[Anonymous No.17544719]

>>17543868
Let me put in something more critical (at least imo the worst part of his ideas), given that what the above said is also correct.

He flirts with eugenics (based on IQ), and thinks that he and his race have superior IQ (which would presumably prevent them from suffering from whatever eugenics strategy is adopted). His fan base self report IQ on average around 145 or something obviously inflated like that. This leads to my impression of the community: a bunch of people who are/feel that they are among the cognitive elite who spend time thinking about how society should be recreated in their ideals and image. Just my take on what puts me off the most about him btw.

[Anonymous No.17544725]

>>17544676
Plausible given that UR's first post went up just two months after Obama announced his candidacy.

[Anonymous No.17544746]

>>17544719
He does but saying that Jews have a higher average IQ is like the least taboo IQ belief. It's still not exactly acceptable, but if that were the only thing he'd ever said I don't know if anyone would care that much.

Also when did he ever flirt with eugenics?

[Anonymous No.17544785]

>>17544719
>a bunch of people who are/feel that they are among the cognitive elite who spend time thinking about how society should be recreated in their ideals and image
Could say much the same about people who read the New York Times. That's what's so interesting about this: they're going after their own people for no good reason. Pure, unadulterated stupidity.

[Anonymous No.17544802]

>>17544785
People like Scott are not part of the NYT circle, they are not even close. They are direct competitors in fact for a subset of demographic that they both appeal to. People reading SSC instead of the NYT is basically threatening their authority.

[Anonymous No.17544834]

>>17536601
He's not a teen girl, but he's just as insecure as one: and he too compensates by fishing for attention often and blatantly.

>>17541987
Journos gonna be journos.
Writing a story about a lame blog isn't going to attract much attention, writing a story about the DANGEROUS SECRET EXTREMIST BLOG THE BAD GUYS LOVE is far more eye-catching.

>>17544719
>His fan base self report IQ on average around 145 or something obviously inflated like that.
That's what puts me off the most about that community: it's by and large dishonest propagandists trying to sell their mediocre if not fraudolent ideas, over and over and over.

[Anonymous No.17544840]

>>17539190
>butterface
never understood the meaning of this term.
>>17536043
I read it. it's very good. I'll probably incorporate ketman and curates egg in my vocab from now on.
his takedown of scotts 2 and 4 are merciless.

[Anonymous No.17544849]

>>17544719
Imagine thinking IQ matters when a brainlet like Moldbug makes a utopia based on Pushing Tin.

[Anonymous No.17544858]

Moldbug just rekt Scott Alexander

[Anonymous No.17544953]

>>17544840
Butterface means "but her face" as in everything but her face is hot. Pic very much unrelated

[Anonymous No.17544958]

>>17544953
Yeah that's just a snifferbutt

[Anonymous No.17544990]

>>17536043
Anyone read it?

[Anonymous No.17545075]

>>17544746
He is squid in the photo.

Also see:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/MdbJXRofWkLpX24FD/constructing-fictional-eugenics-lw-edition
https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/10/society-is-fixed-biology-is-mutable/

Again, this really only counts as "flirting." What the actual extent he would like to see eugenics in society, and what his fans think he wants or want themselves is your own call.

[Anonymous No.17545144]

>>17545075
>that pic
Jesus christ, amerifats are even dumber than I originally believed.

[Anonymous No.17545155]

>>17545075
There are also other instances that I couldn't find so easily, i.e. where he suggests that the same genetic pressure that was applied to jews in Europe would be good for society on a larger scale.

Like I said, up to you to decide how far down the rabbit hole he and each of his followers are (I assume it varies greatly).

[Anonymous No.17545391]

>>17536043
>I usually don’t link to LibGen—I may be a grifter, but I still believe in karma—but Czeslaw Milosz’s The Captive Mind is one of the great books of the century, it’s 65 years old, and the rights must belong to some worthless, pink-haired granddaughter.
Dude can't even get one sentence into an article without tossing in a completely off-topic and unprovoked ad hominem against an imagined libtard. Why do chud pseuds always do this? I wouldn't mind trying to get a grasp on the worldview of nrxes but they always write like this, constantly posturing, preening and pontificating instead of just getting to the fucking point.

[Anonymous No.17545400]

>>17545391
triggered

[Anonymous No.17545417]

>>17545391
He's notoriously not to the point. Maybe read SSC nrx faq

[Anonymous No.17545453]

>>17545417
if you wanted to learn about nazis, would you read what the jews had to say about them, or would you read the nazis themselves?

[Anonymous No.17545477]

>>17545453
Scott is rather honest about explaining other people's views. It's not the best source ever but for someone who hates Nrx it is probably a good entry point. Anyway Moldbug is jewish too

[Anonymous No.17545484]

>>17545391
He's extremely insecure, as other anons already pointed out.
He didn't make it past the first line without seething about his reputation, that's even more telling than the pathological need to own the libtards.

>>17545453
Whynotboth.png
Also ironic given Yarvin's nose.

[Anonymous No.17545573]

>>17545155
It's funny that NYT would consider 'soft' racial hereditarian arguments (like: people descended from different areas of the world might on average express different phenotypes relative to each other) to be blasphemy considering they've hosted the same viewpoints in their publication as recently as 3 years ago: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/sunday/genetics-race.html

[Anonymous No.17545588]

>>17545417
>Maybe read SSC nrx faq
Got a link? Google doesn't show anything obvious to me.

[Anonymous No.17545704]

>>17545588
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/03/reactionary-philosophy-in-an-enormous-planet-sized-nutshell/
my bad, too many acronyms

[Anonymous No.17545718]

>>17545704
>>17545588
though I realize that is also extremely long-winded

[Anonymous No.17545768]

>>17545704
>when even a steelman summary makes you look like a retard
Yarvin is such a meme.

[Anonymous No.17545809]

>>17544990
Many will now

[Anonymous No.17545863]

>>17545573
It's like reports on Soros 'philanthropy.' Today's unhinged and dangerous crackpottery was yesterday's regular-ass news.

Read 19th century political thinkers dropping the R-bomb. There's none of the post-holohoax air of suspicion, derangement, incipient mass shooting. Everyone's just like yeah, Rothschild's got a bank, he wants things, we want other things, moving on...

[Anonymous No.17545875]

>>17545863
Might be because the b*nques have made some serious progress since then.

[Anonymous No.17545969]

>>17545875
Mmhmm

Goddamn

Can't wait to buy Zyklon with Dogecoin in Minecraft

Currency systems change every 100 years right? 108 since the Act...

[Anonymous No.17545991]

>>17545573
On the other hand, doesn't this show that nyt actually is willing to treat these issues, despite all the claims of censorship.

Then it seems that the NYT believes that something is "off" in the water of SSC. NYT might not have explicitly expressed a single consistent viewpoint, but neither has SSC.

[Anonymous No.17546051]

>>17545991
you don't get the purpose of the NYT article, it's just a smear piece on a certain demographic of people, associating them with le extremist racists and so on.

[Anonymous No.17546075]

>>17545991
I am not sure if it shows NYT's willingness to air differing opinions as much as it is evidence of the extent to which they have gone full woke in the past several years. I suspect if an editor tried to get something like the Reich piece published in the paper today they would be forced to resign within 24 hours. With a profuse hand-wringing written letter of apology as well.

[Anonymous No.17546086]

>>17546051
Sure, it's up to you whether you think neither, one, or both groups have hidden nefarious purposes. But I think THAT is probably a purely ideological position which would be hard to prove either way.

[Anonymous No.17546142]

>>17545075
>self-aggrandizing beta autists should rule the world and be allocated non-autistic "empathisers" to "mate" with
Early and often.

[Anonymous No.17546151]

>>17546086
The motive of the NYT is incredibly transparent, why else are they talking about Curtis Yarvin in a piece about SSC?

[Anonymous No.17546247]

>>17546151
I'm telling you that is how it seems to YOU. They are both part of the same intent clique, whether they like it or not. This is factual reporting about a group of people, any implication is up to the reader.

[Anonymous No.17546266]

>>17546075
I dont doubt that the nyt got more woke in recent times, but are you really saying that the appropriate line was crossed in the list 3 years?

[Anonymous No.17546283]

>>17546247
They're not part of the same intent clique, Scott literally advocated for Hillary Clinton, and not as some accelerationist ploy but because he thought she was genuinely less dangerous than Trump. Scott is a liberal with some views that go against progressive social ideas, Yarvin is about as far right as you can go.

[Anonymous No.17546293]

>>17546266
cthulu still only swims left. but the rate of acceleration of the speed at which he swims is increasing

[Anonymous No.17546309]

>>17546266
There were two lines in recent history, one was the NYT amping up Woke discourse along with everyone else around 2012, the second was around summer 2020, where there was a kind of takeover by the younger cohort against the slightly more permissive editorial stance of the older guys.

[Anonymous No.17546352]

>>17546283
They do support different politicians, though who you vote for does not determine your full views. There is overlap in the two communities. I feel this is not a coincidence, you may not.

[Anonymous No.17546371]

>>17546352
>overlap
Right, tarring by association. You can find overlap between SSC and all sorts of communities, but NYT chooses to talk about Yarvin and racists

[Anonymous No.17546383]

>>17546352
members of both of those communities probably read the NYT as well, if we're playing this game

[Anonymous No.17546424]

>>17546371
>>17546383
The link between the two is much stronger. They have mutual acquaintances irl.

[Anonymous No.17546479]

>>17546424
Explain how this link is apparently so strong, when they profess to believe completely different things, or else you're the one interpreting the situation without evidence.

[Anonymous No.17546575]

>>17546479
Both are much more open to eugenics than average. Both want to challenge political orthodoxy (in different ways). Both appeal to a growing silicon Valley identity. Both are opposed to "critical theory" type critiques of capitalism. Both have access to inner circle A.I people. Both are verbose bloggers.

[Anonymous No.17546590]

The NYT article reads less like a smear piece and more like a guy desperately hoping for the last word of a petty argument because Scott released his real name on the substack himself. I don't see clear malicious intent since the guy quotes several people defending the blog with good reasons. It's still obviously ironic that a supposed fan of the blog would want to air its dirty laundry with the fucking NYT unless he is either downright retarded and doesn't realize the possible consequences, or he has hidden malicious intent and was hoping to get him deplatformed all along. Either way, not a good look.

[Anonymous No.17546602]

>>17546575
So 'tech bros who don't agree with everything progressives say'. Whole lot of people in that category, the only reason they would focus on Moldbug is to associate him with the far right and racism, which is useful to them, because it smears anyone who disagrees with their progressive outlook.

[Anonymous No.17546614]

>>17546602
Is eugenics a typical tech bro thing these days?

[Anonymous No.17546616]

>>17546590
read his reply to the article
https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/statement-on-new-york-times-article

I want to respond to four main negative claims in the article – there are more, but these should give a general sketch of why I feel it was unfair:

1. The article tries to connect me to Charles Murray and The Bell Curve, saying:

In one post, he aligned himself with Charles Murray, who proposed a link between race and IQ in “The Bell Curve.” In another, he pointed out that Murray believes Black people “are genetically less intelligent than white people.”

This is true only insofar as I once expressed agreement with an unrelated position of Charles Murray’s, where he thinks that telling poor people “learn to code” is not a compassionate or sufficient response for dealing with poverty, and that we need to act more decisively by providing poor people with a stable income. You can read the full post involved by following the link, but the paragraph that mentions Murray is:

The only public figure I can think of in the southeast quadrant with me is Charles Murray. Neither he nor I would dare reduce all class differences to heredity, and he in particular has some very sophisticated theories about class and culture. But he shares my skepticism that the 55 year old Kentucky trucker can be taught to code, and I don’t think he’s too sanguine about the trucker’s kids either. His solution is a basic income guarantee, and I guess that’s mine too.

The Times points out that I agreed with Murray that poverty was bad, and that also at some other point in my life noted that Murray had offensive views on race, and heavily implies this means I agree with Murray’s offensive views on race. This seems like a weirdly brazen type of falsehood for a major newspaper.

[Anonymous No.17546655]

>>17546575
it makes very little sense for someone to read both on a regular basis. moldbug was writing more than a decade ago about the three big lies of climate change, institutional racism, and fiat money. he observed that "America is a communist country". he's on another plane to the SSC reader, which seems to be in a perpetual adolescence of "please allow me to think this one bad thing i really really really don't want to believe that the entire global establishment is fake and gay, but honestly guys, you need to get this right"

[Anonymous No.17546833]

>>17546614
taking acid every day is, who the hell knows

[Anonymous No.17547271]

>>17541987
they are afraid

[Anonymous No.17547322]

>>17545391
Autism

[Anonymous No.17547525]

>>17545391
it's to gaslight and filter unironic libtards, like you, right off the bat

[Anonymous No.17547627]

>>17546616
>This seems like a weirdly brazen type of falsehood for a major newspaper.
>weirdly brazen falsehood
>weirdly
Kek.

[Anonymous No.17548052]

>>17547525
Literally 80+% of his articles are always digressive self-aggrandizement, totally devoid of substance or argument. It goes beyond pleb filter into the realm of psychiatric illness.

[Anonymous No.17549059]

>>17548052

[Anonymous No.17549484]

>>17548052
filtered