I agree with your point about broadening beyond elite institutions, and there’s also an interesting argument that a focus on elite institutions could select for undesirable qualities as well as intelligence—e.g. a preoccupation with jumping through well-defined hoops in order to achieve social status, and general disregard for “little people”. For example, in 2014 a Yale prof wrote:
Our system of elite education manufactures young people who are smart and talented and driven, yes, but also anxious, timid, and lost, with little intellectual curiosity and a stunted sense of purpose: trapped in a bubble of privilege, heading meekly in the same direction, great at what they’re doing but with no idea why they’re doing it.
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I taught many wonderful young people during my years in the Ivy League—bright, thoughtful, creative kids whom it was a pleasure to talk with and learn from. But most of them seemed content to color within the lines that their education had marked out for them… Everyone dressed as if they were ready to be interviewed at a moment’s notice.
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It is true that today’s young people appear to be more socially engaged than kids have been for several decades and that they are more apt to harbor creative or entrepreneurial impulses. But it is also true, at least at the most selective schools, that even if those aspirations make it out of college—a big “if”—they tend to be played out within the same narrow conception of what constitutes a valid life: affluence, credentials, prestige.
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...what these institutions mean by leadership is nothing more than getting to the top. Making partner at a major law firm or becoming a chief executive, climbing the greasy pole of whatever hierarchy you decide to attach yourself to. I don’t think it occurs to the people in charge of elite colleges that the concept of leadership ought to have a higher meaning, or, really, any meaning.
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...Kids at less prestigious schools are apt to be more interesting, more curious, more open, and far less entitled and competitive.
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...Selecting students by GPA or the number of extracurriculars more often benefits the faithful drudge than the original mind.
I suspect that the “elite institution mindset” played an important role in the FTX debacle, and is also a big reason why the EA movement has contributed to AI racing. Throwing money at people with strong resumes often means throwing money at status seekers, and “winning the AI race” (probably more accurate to say “speedrunning human extinction”) could sadly be seen as a way to gain status. As Jack Clark put it:
In AI, like in any field, most of the people who hold power are people who have been very good at winning a bunch of races. It’s hard for these people to not want to race and they privately think they should win the race.
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Pretty much everyone who works on AI thinks that they’re ‘one of the good people’. Statistically, this is unlikely to be the case.
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Proactively giving up power is one of the hardest things for people to do. Giving up power and money is even harder. AI orgs are rapidly gathering power and money and it’s not clear they have right incentives to willfully shed their own power. This sets us up for racing.
I agree with your point about broadening beyond elite institutions, and there’s also an interesting argument that a focus on elite institutions could select for undesirable qualities as well as intelligence—e.g. a preoccupation with jumping through well-defined hoops in order to achieve social status, and general disregard for “little people”. For example, in 2014 a Yale prof wrote:
I suspect that the “elite institution mindset” played an important role in the FTX debacle, and is also a big reason why the EA movement has contributed to AI racing. Throwing money at people with strong resumes often means throwing money at status seekers, and “winning the AI race” (probably more accurate to say “speedrunning human extinction”) could sadly be seen as a way to gain status. As Jack Clark put it: