Food for Thought 10: e/acc

Food for Thought is a series of events, where we discuss philosophical and practical questions of EA in small groups over food and drinks: We are exploring effective altruism one bite at a time. EA newcomers are welcome; studying the suggested material is encouraged but not required, please RSVP.

Topic

Can we get to a post-scarcity technological utopia through harnessing the techno-capital-machine? Proponents of the effective accelerationism ("e/acc") movement believe that unrestricted technological progress (especially driven by artificial intelligence) may lead to the best solution of universal human problems like poverty, war and climate change.

Lets have a look at the e/acc ideas through an EA lens and discuss how the ideas of both movements relate to each other. 

Suggested resources

These 10 minutes of a Lex Fridman podcast episode with Guillaume Verdon, one of the minds behind the e/acc movement gives a good first impression of the topic.

For anyone who wants a deeper dive into the topic we recommend the following:

• Notes on e/acc principles and tenets, a summary of the principles of e/acc
• Differential technology development: preprint on the concept, a paper about differential technology development, which could be seen as the EA answer to e/acc

Where/How/What

We are going to meet at Atopia. It is easy to reach via Ringbahn (Prenzlauer Allee), M10 (Prenzlauer Allee/Danziger Staße) or M2 (Fröbelstraße).

What to bring

1. Some change to buy a drink - they don't accept card payment at Atopia.