this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2026
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SneerClub

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Hurling ordure at the TREACLES, especially those closely related to LessWrong.

AI-Industrial-Complex grift is fine as long as it sufficiently relates to the AI doom from the TREACLES. (Though TechTakes may be more suitable.)

This is sneer club, not debate club. Unless it's amusing debate.

[Especially don't debate the race scientists, if any sneak in - we ban and delete them as unsuitable for the server.]

See our twin at Reddit

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rationalist tries to get head around dealing with actual professionals in a professional context. Also, fuck them donkeys. (www.lesswrong.com)
submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by dgerard@awful.systems to c/sneerclub@awful.systems
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the EAs have access to so much money that other orgs have to dance to their tune, and are discovering the professionals think the EAs are fucking nutters

the comments are darling also

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[–] lurker@awful.systems 9 points 2 days ago (2 children)

things that should be taken seriously (e.g. space property rights)

I don't know man, I think there are bigger fish to fry then who owns what in outer space

[–] Architeuthis@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It came out today that Leopold Aschenbrenner (he of the situational awareness fund implosion fame) was also telling everyone who'd listen about how he was going to be buying up galaxies as soon as AI progress made access to them a piece of cake.

Basically outer space manifest destiny is an important part of AI2040, AI Future's sort of summer sequel to AI2027, I'd say it appears to be well on its way to become another rationalist Weird Accepted Truth.

[–] lurker@awful.systems 4 points 1 day ago

Great. Space colonialism. Nick Bostrom yapped about it too. Ughhhh why can’t we just focus on the planet we already damn have

[–] BioMan@awful.systems 4 points 1 day ago (3 children)

https://nypost.com/2026/08/26/business/leopold-aschenbrenner-promised-to-buy-wife-galaxy-then-his-45b-hedge-fund-blew-up/

AI savants are known for their bold predictions. Leopold Aschenbrenner, the so-called “Nostradamus of AI,” took things to another level, reportedly promising his future wife he would someday buy her not a yacht or a mansion, but a galaxy. The 24-year-old German-born wunderkind married the chief of staff to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei earlier this month.

Aschenbrenner signed the paperwork for the emergency sale early Thursday morning before heading to Carmel, Calif., for his wedding that weekend, according to the Wall Street Journal. One speaker reportedly thanked Griffin “for making it all possible,” while another guest gushed about Aschenbrenner’s promise to someday buy his new wife a galaxy... Buying a chunk of universe had been on Aschenbrenner’s mind for years, according to the article, with the investor repeatedly mentioning the idea to incredulous friends.

Aschenbrenner did a stint for Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX Future Fund and stayed with his now-wife, Avital Balwit, at the 600-acre Bahamas resort where FTX executives lived.

[–] o7___o7@awful.systems 2 points 1 day ago

Talk about returning to the scene of the crime yeesh

[–] mawhrin@awful.systems 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

they watched “jupiter ascending” and took all the wrong conclusions from the film.

[–] YourNetworkIsHaunted@awful.systems 1 points 4 hours ago

It was possible to take things away from that movie other than "Lmao these names are silly" and "Channing Tatum is a puppy?"

[–] BioMan@awful.systems 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

https://futurism.com/future-society/leopold-aschenbrenner-ai-investor-buy-galaxies

According to a new scoop from The Wall Street Journal, the 24-year-old former OpenAI employee wanted to buy entire cosmic realms after he got rich off of AI — as in, yes, galaxies of stars and planets like our Milky Way, or the neighboring Andromeda.

This is something that he’s reportedly been telling people, completely unprompted, at San Francisco dinner parties for years. The way Aschenbrener explained it, advances in AI would soon enable humanity to unlock unlimited resources and colonize distant planets. After that, conquering parts of the universe would be a triviality.

This was a serious and imminent enough possibility, in his mind, that Aschenbrenner said he planned to save money so he could buy galaxies in the future. He even apparently promised to buy a galaxy for his wife, Anthropic chief of staff Avital Balwit. Love conquers all.

Still searching for an archive of the ultimate source https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/situational-awareness-leopold-aschenbrenner-ai-fund-4dbb00a4

[–] BioMan@awful.systems 4 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

https://archive.is/20260826031928/https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/situational-awareness-leopold-aschenbrenner-ai-fund-4dbb00a4 got the archive

A few interesting things:

In November 2023, when OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was suddenly fired, hundreds of employees signed a public letter pressuring the board of directors to reinstate him. Aschenbrenner didn’t... After an interim CEO was appointed, OpenAI executives learned from multiple eyewitnesses that Aschenbrenner had appeared to welcome Altman’s replacement, according to the people familiar with the matter. They grew suspicious about who was loyal to whom, even after Altman was reinstated as CEO. Those who spent the following weeks trying to understand the crisis focused in part on Aschenbrenner’s role, concluding that he had been in contact with at least one director who voted to fire Altman.

More confirmation he's one of the True Believers rather than only a greasy opportunist

When it was time to toast the newlyweds, one speaker thanked Citadel CEO Ken Griffin for making it all possible.

These people's personal lives are so bound up with financial forces... who knew this particular Cosmist heresy would get so freaking weird

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah it is nuts, also very funny that in the book im reading which mocks the rationalists, the rationalist goal is to own Jupiter or something.

[–] BioMan@awful.systems 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

no, to BE jupiter

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 1 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

Technically that is unclear this is what he says:

‘No doubt it is,’ Caplan conceded, ‘but I don’t want the superintelligence to come into existence before I’m uploaded. It’s very important to me that I’m the first transcendent being in this stellar system. I can’t risk having to compete with another resource-hungry entity; I have personal plans that require at least one Jovian mass of computronium.’

Before

spoilerDying of a side effect of his life extension experiments a few decades later. ( Or more freezing himself). One of the protagonists quips, at least now Jupiter is safe.