Stop doomscrolling and just read this! Click to read Realtime Techpocalypse Newsletter, by Émile P. Torres, a Substack publication with thousands of subscribers.
Nick Bostrom Took Many of His “Best” Ideas from Other People
My first reaction was that many thinkers and academics synthesize ideas from older sources and that this doesn’t sound that bad (well except for some of the ideas being eugenics or AI doomerism)… some of the examples Emile points out look like just straight up plagiarism.
Also, Bostrom is an academic writing for serious publications. The standards are higher than when Yudkowsky was rewriting pop-science books without sufficient attribution on his private blog, because Yudkowsky is a self-published autodidact.
Yeah, definitely. Even if you are heavily modifying an idea or synthesizing multiple ideas, not citing your sources is still major academic misconduct.
I agree that being a self-aggrandizing dick is probably on the lower end of the harms Bostrom has inflicted upon the world, but I think it’s worth calling out, especially because it runs counter to the narrative that the people who are working to advance the bigger harms use to advance their agenda.
My first reaction was that many thinkers and academics synthesize ideas from older sources and that this doesn’t sound that bad (well except for some of the ideas being eugenics or AI doomerism)… some of the examples Emile points out look like just straight up plagiarism.
its not plagiarism, its listserv to journal intellectual arbitrage, totally rational thing to do. /s
Also, Bostrom is an academic writing for serious publications. The standards are higher than when Yudkowsky was rewriting pop-science books without sufficient attribution on his private blog, because Yudkowsky is a self-published autodidact.
Yeah, definitely. Even if you are heavily modifying an idea or synthesizing multiple ideas, not citing your sources is still major academic misconduct.
I agree that being a self-aggrandizing dick is probably on the lower end of the harms Bostrom has inflicted upon the world, but I think it’s worth calling out, especially because it runs counter to the narrative that the people who are working to advance the bigger harms use to advance their agenda.