BurnerExplainer

• BurnerExplainerFeb 9, 2023, 6:45 AM

  −2 points

  1 ∶ 3

  in reply to: aog’s comment on: Does Open Philan­thropy have a pub­lic doc­u­ment re­gard­ing their con­flict of in­ter­est policy?

  Thank you for sharing.

  I wasn’t aware that Open Philanthropy had a relationship disclosure policy. I wonder what other policies they have or had to prevent potential “favoritism” in their grantmaking.

• BurnerExplainerFeb 9, 2023, 6:40 AM

  −8 points

  0 ∶ 6

  in reply to: Jason’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  I just looked up the post I made back then.

  My thinking has evolved over the past two years since making the post, and I think it adds little value to this post to establish the link.

  I would think differently had I carried on using that burner account, and people could read many posts showing how my thinking has evolved (which would instead turn it into a pseudonym instead of a burner), but a two-year gap doesn’t show any evolution in thought.

  Edit: I’m aware this discredits my previous statement of, “I would have used the same burner otherwise”, but that statement was made before I read that previous post.

[Question] Does Open Philan­thropy have a pub­lic doc­u­ment re­gard­ing their con­flict of in­ter­est policy?

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 4:04 PM

  2 points

  2 ∶ 1

  in reply to: Eva’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  I agree with the second paragraph of this comment.

  Regarding the third paragraph,

  In this post, the poster writes “Therefore, I feel comfortable questioning these grants using burner accounts,” which suggests in fact that they do have multiple burner accounts.

  In my specific case,

  1. I acknowledged in the post that I previously used a burner two years ago for whose password I did not save (due it being a burner) and therefore found myself logged out of. I would have used the same burner otherwise.

  2. I could flip this around and say that I don’t have other active burners because fact that my next bullet-point in the post was “I’ll do some of that now” with me proceeding to comment on recent grants in the same post under the same burner instead of making a different post with a different burner.

  3. The use of the plural term “burner accounts” is me talking about burner accounts in the abstract rather than me saying I have multiple burner accounts.

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 3:58 PM

  −6 points

  4 ∶ 3

  in reply to: Davidmanheim’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  Does Open Philanthropy have a public document like this?

  I hope it at least exists internally but I think they should follow the example of other well-established organisations like Gates to make it public, especially given the prevalence of polyamory in this community and the “insularity” of the Bay Area as described in this comment.

  Edit: I believe this was important enough to turn into a separate post.

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 3:54 PM

  −20 points

  1 ∶ 11

  in reply to: Jeff Kaufman 🔸’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  OP agreed to fund CEA’s work on this retroactively.

  From the page I linked, it seems OP agreed to recompensate the Future Forum and not CEA (although the Future Forum may have paid CEA for their time).

  I have some hindsight bias in hearing the event was a disaster with...

  • Many people who showing up on Day 1 then not showing up on Day 2, 3, or 4 because it didn’t seem to be a good use of their time.

  • No forethought about potential noise complaints in a quiet neighbourhood with a nearby country club and stuck-up rich people.

  • Volunteers being pressured into working through the night to move equipment between venues.

  • The main organiser asking the speakers really dumb and basic questions about their work with many people in the audience reportedly cringing.

  • And much more that went wrong.

  So I believe it’d be better for organisers to plan more, stick to their budget, and not use their strong grantor connections to get bailed out.

  I’m just going on your description, but what would you have liked CEA and/​or OP to do differently?

  I’m not sure what the best solution is, nor do I want to spend hours thinking about this based on the limited information I have.

  My comment addresses strong and unfair connections and using the bailing out of this event in particular (which gives me some reason to believe other projects that have gone into debt have been bailed out because of strong grantor-grantee relationships).

  I would have personally filed for bankruptcy and not made use of connections to get bailed out.

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 3:40 PM

  1 point

  0 ∶ 1

  in reply to: RobertM’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  1. I should have made this clearer. My claim (also informed other anecdotes that I should have shared) is that people are put on blacklists for trivial reasons (eg, I don’t like what this person said, they seem too “woke”, they spoke badly about a friend of mine one time) but camouflaged under someone having “weak epistemics” or not being “truth-seeking enough”.

  2. I’m not sure as I haven’t ever made a blacklist or seen other people’s blacklists. A blacklist to me seems something that either has (1) no reason or (2) a very weak reason—maybe that’s camouflaged in something else (perhaps in rationalist language as described in Point #1).

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 3:31 PM

  −2 points

  1 ∶ 1

  in reply to: ElliotJDavies’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  I’m not describing this post as a response to the other post.

  I initially wrote at the top of this post that,

  I wanted to offer a different perspective on this post …

  and I believe that this warranted a separate post. In no way was this meant to be a rebuttal of all the arguments made there. I apologise for the confusion.

  At the top of the post, I’ve now clarified that I’m offering a different perspective (to add to the public discourse) and that this made more sense to me as a post than a comment and NOT a rebuttal.

  What links here?

  • Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding by BurnerExplainer (Feb 8, 2023, 7:00 AM; 48 points)

• BurnerExplainerFeb 8, 2023, 3:27 PM

  5 points

  2 ∶ 1

  in reply to: TW123’s comment on: Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding

  I respect you for writing this comment.

  This would be something I’d be uncomfortable writing under my name.

Why Peo­ple Use Burner Ac­counts: A Com­men­tary on Black­lists, the EA “In­ner Cir­cle”, and Funding