The new Silicon Valley tech movement

Excellent piece by Noah Smith on techno-optimism. So many good points. Like Noah, I'm a humanist who subscribes to both Positive and Normative forms of Active Techno-Optimism. Quote: "Techno-optimism is thus much more than an argument about the institutions of today or the resource allocations of today. It’s a faith in humanity — and all sentient beings — propelling ourselves forward into the infinite tomorrow." A few of my famous friends and colleagues have expressed hesitations about technological risks. It is not because they are techno-pessimists. They do believe in the ability of technological progress, and AI in particular, to improve human condition. But they doubt that current economic and political institutions, and humanity as a whole, will be capable of using it for good. I also like this bit: "So anyone who thinks that technology is pushed forward solely by scrappy inventors in their garages, while government and big business merely parasitizes off of their labors, is deeply wrong. And anyone who thinks that technology is pushed forward solely by government planners, while the private sector merely parasitizes off of government’s efforts, is also deeply wrong." People often forget that most of the technologies that power the modern world were invented in publicly-funded university labs, or industry research labs of dominant companies, such as AT&T Bell Labs, IBM research, and Xerox PARC, even if many products derived from these inventions were later developed and deployed by smaller companies or garage-dwelling tinkerers. https://lnkd.in/ecDAg8Pi

"The 5,000-odd-word essay, published on his VC fund a16z’s website on Monday, does contain such phrases as: “Love doesn’t scale?.?.?.?Let’s stick with money”; “We believe in the romance of technology?.?.?.?the eros of the train, the car, the electric light”; and, perhaps most startlingly: “We believe any deceleration of AI will cost lives. Deaths that were preventable by the AI that was prevented from existing is a form of murder.” Yet many Silicon Valley types who have read Andreessen’s screed — the central argument of which is that “there is no material problem?.?.?.?that cannot be solved with more technology” — seem not only to see nothing even mildly unusual about it, but to believe that it is actually a work of genius." The real problem of Silly Con Valley is not the crypto-fascist entrepreneurs writing and saying crypto-fascist stuff, the real problem is that they are a role model for young entrepreneurs.

????lots of great additional points from?Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreessen?on the recent techno-optimism manifesto that Marc wrote: https://lnkd.in/gNWsevF6 Some points: - “love doesn’t scale” - fission and fusion - reconciling anti-statism with American Dynamism - colleges, student loans, UBI … and much more! Fun video

“He’s no longer the protagonist, he is now the antagonist. He’s not the force for rebellion and change. He’s the force leading the status quo. He’s no longer the scrappy hero of the cyberpunk story, he’s now the evil corporate villain that tries to destroy the hero. And he’s so out of touch that he doesn’t realize that transition happened a couple decades ago.” The above is a fantastic quote (paraphrased from memory) from an insightful cyberpunk fiction forum poster that summed up Elon Musk in 2018. It could just as easily be used to describe Marc Andreessen. Another forum poster replied, “he thinks he’s still the pod-racing kid Anakin and he’s full on Darth Vader.” He’s too rich to understand that the rest of us need corporate responsibility and accountability… because of him. ——— Gizmodo: “Marc Andreessen Is Wrong About Everything. The billionaire says he wants to lead a "techno-optimist" revolution. But he's too rich to understand that his belief system is stupid” (Lucas Ropek) (Oct 20 2023) “Move fast and break everything Andreessen’s newly espoused ideology did not spring up in a vacuum. Instead, it’s part of a broader movement that seeks to take all the guardrails off of technological development and push forward with “progress,” whatever the cost may be. This community, known as the tech “accelerationists” or the adherents of “Effective Accelerationism,” has seen intensifying online interest in recent years. The belief system is a little bit convoluted, but one central tenet is that social change and progress will be driven by an ever-accelerating interplay between capitalism and technology. Key to the movement is an anonymous figure known as “Beff Jezos,” who basically acts as a kind of influencer for the ideology. The group has appropriately been referred to as a “cult.” Andreessen’s bad idea archive Techno-Optimist Manifesto gives you a good idea of what the tech accelerationists’ worldview looks like, and it goes something like this: in the future, everything will be amazing. People will be able to travel freely throughout the galaxy; everyone will be rich; our lives will be awesome. How will this happen? Through technological innovation, of course! The only problem is that true technological innovation is currently being held up by things like government regulations and ethical concerns. Put another way: considerations of the public good are harming the public good. As soon as we, as a society, do away with these guardrails and accept the twin and ineluctable principles of innovation and capitalism, we will be on the road to manifesting this amazing future. At the beginning of the manifesto, the billionaire tells us that we have been told “lies” about technology. These lies, as far as can be discerned, are that technology can ever be harmful.“ (keep reading) Gizmodo: https://lnkd.in/gy75cVe8 Cult Manifesto https://lnkd.in/gAWgqjdg #techbros #bigtech #effectiveaccelerationism #siliconvalley #web2 #web3 #cryptoking

Introducing 'The Techno-Optimist Manifesto' by Marc Andreessen. I found this article to be a thought-provoking read, with some points I agree with and others I question. I firmly believe in putting humans at the center of technology decisions. Technology should serve humanity, not the other way around. I encourage you to read this article and share your thoughts. #ThoughtLeadership #Technology #HumanCentricity #LinkedInCommunity https://lnkd.in/ew_JwrU6

In some ways, I’ve always been highly interested in anything digital and tech, which has taken on a whole different dimension since I moved to the West Coast and closer to Silicon Valley. There's a fascinating dichotomy when working with tech-enabled companies that are envisioning and reimagining the future, while also needing to be grounded in current societal and commercial realities of the end consumer - or just people. Marc Andreessen’s “Techno-Optimist Manifesto” on one hand, and Amanda Silberling, Dominic-Madori Davis, and Kyle Wiggers' brilliant piece for TechCrunch titled “When was the last time Marc Andreessen talked to a poor person?” on the other hand provide a compelling illustration of the continuous and universal challenge in finding the right equilibrium between an optimistic view of technology and a more grounded, realistic perspective. I highly recommend reading both sides (linked in comments below)

The most interesting thing in tech: Marc Andreessen has just published a manifesto in favor of techno optimism. I agree with much of it! I love technology; I love progress. But why does a manifesto need an enemies list, and why would one put “sustainable development goals” among many other bugbears on it? There’s a wonderful response though from Stewart Brand which shows how perhaps the document will be a good conversation starter about how to move tech forward while balancing values.

Well, I guess it’s good to know [who thinks] you're enemies. In his "Techno-Optimist Manifesto,", Marc Andreessen has clearly identified those working on #techethics and #trustandsafety as enemies of the Techno-Optimists. Andreessen writes: Our present society has been subjected to a mass demoralization campaign for six decades – against technology and against life – under varying names like “existential risk”, “sustainability”, “ESG”, “Sustainable Development Goals”, “social responsibility”, “stakeholder capitalism”, “Precautionary Principle”, “trust and safety”, “tech ethics”, “risk management”, “de-growth”, “the limits of growth”. I understand how it might be “demoralizing” to VCs for us to question #growth at all costs and refocus constructive criticism on?impacts of technologies, both good and ill. But tech ethics has never been "against tech," and certainly not against life. If anything, these efforts have been a re-moralization campaign—to acknowledge that human choices and power dynamics inform technological innovations, interventions, and therefore come with moral and ethical consequences and impacts. We shouldn't be surprised. Owning the narrative with a manifesto makes values, ideologies, and positions clear. But it’s also a means of sowing division by defining the problems and offering their inevitable solutions.?The very framing of a stated enemy belies the zero sum thinking of a combative mindset on the offensive, at war. In this manifesto moment, it's worth returning to this Anna Wiener piece that explores Andreessen’s long history of narrative shaping and situates it in a my trajectory of tech coverage's maturation towards criticism. It's from 2021, the last time Andreessen lobbed an ideological rallying cry into the discourse: "IT'S TIME TO BUILD."

Artificial Intelligence is a “philosopher’s stone” that can cure illnesses and stop pandemics,?- said venture capitalist and billionaire Marc Andreessen in a 5,200-word manifesto. But the key problem is a “despite great scientific and technological advances, man has not the faintest idea of who he is or what he is doing”. Manifesto is here https://lnkd.in/es3W2EbS