Fascinating article about a cult of AI rationalists that ended up killing 6 people.
https://www.theguardian.com/global/ng-interactive/2025/mar/05/zizians-artificial-intelligence For a lot of readers, this might be the first they have heard of the singularity, effective altruism, utilitarianism, paperclip maximizers, rationalism, MIRI, CFAR, LessWrong and the Sequences, or transhumanism. Rationalists are described as atheists with their own versions of heaven and hell: a godlike AI that uploads your mind to a virtual utopia of your choosing, or eternal torment if you know anything of Roko's Basilisk, because according to timeless decision theory, a future AI will simulate torturing you because you didn't put enough effort into creating it. It tells the story of a young, idealistic Eliezer Yudkowsky wanting to build an AI that would end poverty, hunger, and death, forming a community to help solve the alignment problem, realizing it was hopeless and unstoppable, and resigning humanity to defeat. The article follows the Zizians, a cult of young, leftist, vegan, transgender, technically literate AI doomers as they broke away from the larger AI community in San Francisco with their extremist views. ------------------------------------------ Artificial General Intelligence List: AGI Permalink: https://agi.topicbox.com/groups/agi/T3a4621e83c2a188b-Mabb5f809374313998efcc5b7 Delivery options: https://agi.topicbox.com/groups/agi/subscription
