The Company Man

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/JH6tJhYpnoCfFqAct/the-company-man

by surprisetalk • 10 months ago

212 55 10 months ago

lesswrong.com

renewiltord• 10 months ago

I thought Von Neumann had a pretty good line for this kind of weepy writing:

Some people confess guilt to claim credit for the sin.

bryanrasmussen• 10 months ago

I don't think that line is supposed to apply to fiction.

limaoscarjuliet• 10 months ago

Assuming this is fiction... A good friend of mine is a professional writer. I learned from her that most of what is presented to us, readers, as fiction is really not so far removed from what really happened.

Terr_• 10 months ago

Yeah: We've seen some AI-related companies/CEOs acting as if they are heroes deeply conflicted by the ramifications of their own superpowers, inviting us to imagine their product might be too awesome for mere mortal hands, and agonizing over how they might make bajillions of dollars for savvy investors that [BUY] [BUY] [BUY] today... but at what figurative cost!?

*clutches pearls, faints onto nearby divan*

01HNNWZ0MV43FF• 10 months ago

"I used to get soooo drunk" heard it more than a few times lol

Mistletoe• 10 months ago

despite having some FartCoin which has been doing very well lately, shockingly well, this FartCoin. I wonder if it will continue to "moon" to the point where I can quit my job and become a VC and go on podcasts in which I will try to downplay the source of my initial capital so as to maintain some illusion that this economy makes any kind of sense at all to me or anyone else for that matter. Though perhaps by the time I am doing podcasts I will be so far gone I will just own it and maintain that it required great genius to have foreseen the rise of FartCoin and allocated capital to same.

https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/fartcoin/

Fartcoin hasn't been doing that well though, I had to check the date of the article and it is recent. Maybe he got in Fartcoin long ago in early Nov. 2024? 200x since then but only a 2x since the end of Nov. 2024.

rightbyte• 10 months ago

You know it is fiction writing, right?

mikestorrent• 10 months ago

What a delightful read, thanks.

jongjong3• 10 months ago

I also work in AI as a software engineer. I feel bad about what's happening but I'm just getting by and AI is ultimately a threat to my career too. My younger truck driver cousin is doing much better than me financially. He didn't go to university, didn't rack up university debt, didn't have to work nights and weekends for 15 years.

My main problem isn't AI though, it's the structure of the anti-competitive tech sector; which is itself driven by the structure of the monetary system in which it operates.

AI is just yet another tool, like crypto, and other distractions which may be used to further disenfranchise me and others. I don't feel bad about other people because I've been a victim myself and as a tech person, I also get the privilege of being labelled as part of the oppressor class, while being oppressed by them... While working one of the most competitive and mentally-taxing jobs in the history of humanity... Seeing the harms, understanding the problems, seeing the solutions but being so powerless that I'm literally forced to work for the oppressor.

I feel too much pain to feel any guilt. I can totally relate to the comment about 'nice colleagues' but I understand it's a very superficial concept, unfortunately. Our world is so dystopian, even kindness is turned into a weapon. Their kindness is partly what holds this incredibly violent system together as it strengthens bonds between the elites which protect the system. Kindness, kinship and filter bubbles combine to form a moat around a global monopoly on power, violence and opportunities; causing the most unjust, asymmetric treatment of humans in the history of mankind. Topped with layer upon layer of gaslighting which looks more and more disturbing and unbelievable as you move down the social hierarchy and lose your voice and power. We have a system where every person lives in a different reality and yet pretend to live in the same reality. People communicate with words but nobody shares the same understanding of the words; that's how bad the situation is.

YZF• 10 months ago

I'm a bit hesitant to comment. I relate to some of what you're saying some of the time. Don't compare yourself to others. It's great your cousin is doing well but having more money ("doing well financially") shouldn't be a benchmark, that is a distraction. If you've been a software engineer for 15 years you're probably doing ok.

the most unjust, asymmetric treatment of humans in the history of mankind.

Things are not perfect but I think we're very far from the worst in history. Things used to be way worse for most humans for most of the history of mankind. I would say unfortunately we aren't going straight "up and to the right" in terms of human happiness, well being, a better world, but that's the nature of things, there are ups and downs. I think things can and will still work out (climate, geo-politics, AI, economy etc.) if we do our little bits. Look for the good things and we'll work on the bad things.

Getting less screen time and more time with people and outdoors can help with perspective. It's easy to get sucked in doom and gloom on the Internet. Happens to me.

People do abuse words but I think we can still communicate just fine. We just need to do a better job of explaining in detail what we're talking about.

It's interesting that you talk of yourself as being the oppressor class while thinking of yourself of being oppressed. I think that shows the limits of this line of thinking. Most would probably consider you "elite" as well. We're all just people I think is the easy answer there. I'm not jealous for a second of any "elite", I'm sure they have the same human struggles (or even worse) as all of us.

Hope you can get over your pain, try and get some help if that makes sense to you.

jongjong3• 10 months ago

I appreciate the comment. You're right, things have been worse for certain people.

I'm definitely not 'elite' even though I've been a software engineer for 15 years, I was very unfortunate. Just imagine doing everything right but everything that's outside of your control going terribly wrong. That's what happened to me. I know others in the industry who had it worse but there is no consistency in experience.

The fact that you assume that because I've been a software engineer for 15 years, that it means I wasn't struggling financially the whole time is telling. It's what I meant when I said that we speak the same words but they don't mean the same thing. You assume software engineer means someone who is well-off. You don't know what country I'm from. I tell you, if you're outside of the US, the experience of being a software engineer has been VERY different. I'm based in Australia but I lived in Europe for several years (which was a horrible idea career-wise).

I have a friend from India. I'm jealous of him. His salary relative to cost of living is incredible. He can live like a king in his own country. I had some colleagues from Poland; they can buy their own houses/apartments working remote and living in their own countries. Meanwhile, I don't have the legal right to own property in those cheap countries, not even mentioning language barriers. I can't afford a deposit on a house in my country. I could never afford. Impossible to find a house or even apartment under $1 million. I've been living paycheck to paycheck. I struggled hard and only just managed to save like $30k in assets over 15 years working nights and most weekends on side projects. I'm running like 5 full-featured, working side projects concurrently none of them making money currently. I did get passive income from one of them for about 3 years but then was basically cheated out of it by a whole group of powerful people in crypto sector. Literally a conspiracy to discredit and defame me within my community, without any apparent justification and no basis in fact; just before COVID happened; I became somewhat paranoid because of this... Then COVID and ensuing political environment just poured fuel on the fire.

jtbaker• 10 months ago

My younger truck driver cousin is doing much better than me financially. He didn't go to university, didn't rack up university debt, didn't have to work nights and weekends for 15 years.

As someone that works in software for the transportation sector, I find it hard to believe this generalizes for the population of each profession. The last few years have been really rough for the transportation business, with rates near rock bottom. Combine this with having to be on the road all the time, the lifestyle of being on the road for a lot of drivers, and you couldn't pay me to do it. I'm quite happy working from the quiet home office.

thornewolf• 10 months ago

This was well written. I'm glad that I powered through the initial hesitation I felt when I recognized the narrative style.

alphazard• 10 months ago

Can you elaborate? I also feel like I've heard this particular voice before, but I can't recall where.

jimmygrapes• 10 months ago

I may be imagining it but it's very reminiscent of "Scott Alexander" / Slate Star Codex / whatever he rebranded to

cturner• 10 months ago

Microserfs?

svoit• 10 months ago

It brought to mind Edward Norton's narration in Fight Club.

JSR_FDED• 10 months ago

This is so great, absolutely love the wry inner monologue style:

There is little less interesting than another man's drug trip. Unfortunately, he's both Arden Vox and my boss, so I try my best to appear fascinated.

Almost immediately you know you’re in good hands.

skeptrune• 10 months ago

What a delightful piece of realistic fiction. I was very entertained and amused.

ipnon2• 10 months ago

There is a lot of unmet demand for AI researchers that don't seem completely crazy. The Manhattan Project, people are wearing suits and ties, they're all aligned with the broader goals of the nation, the madmen who are proposing super bombs with 100 megatons are being corralled into relative containment. At a certain point in history, the development of nuclear power and thus nuclear weapons became inevitable, but so far we've managed to live with this technology without an apocalypse. But in AI development it sometimes seems like every other person is an Edward Teller. There are limits, I think, to the benefits of the open-mindedness of the Silicon Valley culture.

petesergeant• 10 months ago

Demand for or need for?

suddenlybananas• 10 months ago

Is it like this in Chinese companies? I genuinely have no idea.

bentaber• 10 months ago

Im enjoying reading this but struggling with the fact that the average number of words per sentence nears 150. I exaggerate, of course. But please, use periods.

binary132• 10 months ago

I really appreciated the stylistic difference.

GaryNumanVevo• 10 months ago

It's intentional, it's satirizing the SlateStarCodex style of writing

j3s• 10 months ago

amazingly well-written. exposing the utter psychopathy of the rationalist movement & of silicon valley more broadly.

this is the type of magical writing that an LLM can't capture a single iota of.

zjp• 10 months ago

I'm glad to see some satirization of the woe-is-me-for-making-hundreds-of-thousands-under-capitalism flavor of techbro in the first few paragraphs. Insufferable archetype.

TomasBjartur3• 10 months ago

Hi. I am the author. If anyone is interested in following my writing, especially those not often on LessWrong, consider subscribing to my Substack: https://tomasbjartur.substack.com/

I plan to mirror any future fiction there.

I haven't written much but my next-best stories are likely these:

The Maker of MIND: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/H4kadKrC2xLK24udn/the-maker-...

The Liar and The Scold https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/duF4Qh9pn7Y5imhsm/the-liar-a...

Of the two, I prefer The Maker of MIND. Both got similar karma on LessWrong and were written ~2021.

gsf_emergency_3• 10 months ago

Entertaining, almost insightful!

Disappointed at: >It wouldn't have worked anyway

Feedback:

Motivation comes from "this stuff is nuts, but it could work"

Meaning from: "That was nuts, but it worked"

Between the two, it's a chore to get a bunch of homsaps to agree on exactly what is nuts OR what's possible. AI could definitely help with sanity checking the contentious stuff without always giving great reasons so that we may cross it off either of two lists quick.

(Governments need a third list for prioritising the new instances of Thomas Midgley Jr to put in the airlock)

ipnon2• 10 months ago

You've really struck a nerve, congrats, it's quite the accomplishment.

theOGognf• 10 months ago

I really enjoyed it. Very Hitchhiker’s Guide -like. It’s been a while since I’ve read something like that. Thanks for sharing

AxiomaticSpace• 10 months ago

Your writing style reminds me a lot of the titular short story in "Liberation Day" by George Saunders. I really hope you stick with writing because I think it is quite good.

Taikonerd2• 10 months ago

Oh, that's a great connection to make! It was very George Saunders-y.

greazy2• 10 months ago

Great article. I'd love to read the work you mention here if it exists:

I read a work of great insight on the corrosive effect of irony on American culture, critiquing it as a kind of anesthesia poisoning the pop cultural artifacts out of which the American soul is now woven.

TomasBjartur3• 10 months ago

https://jsomers.net/DFW_TV.pdf

OJFord• 10 months ago

I'd read the novel! I think there's room for more character development, and the neat tie-ups/references back to Krishna's ambitions, Blood Meridian, etc. would be more impactful across chapters in something longer form.

nicbou• 10 months ago

It was a hilarious read. It reminded me of Mike Judge's view of Silicon Valley, and "Every Bay Area House Party". Please, keep writing.

https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/every-bay-area-house-party

Taikonerd2• 10 months ago

Hi Tomas! I wanted to ask: is the name "Arden Vox" significant?

Aarden in Dutch means "earth" or "earthly", and Vox in Latin means "voice." So his name kinda means "voice of Earth" -- which seems appropriate, given his motivation for working on The Project.

TomasBjartur3• 10 months ago

No. The joke there is "Ardent Voice", and the slight connotations of Vox populi: as he is both acting unilaterally for everyone and thinks they are him. And of course this famous phrase: Vox populi, vox Dei – "The voice of the people is the voice of God".

Esther is just a reference to the novel I Smell Esther Williams, which I was reading when I was writing the story. And it is referenced in the DFW essay the protagonist inverted the message of.

As for Krishna, I just thought the line "granting me an unwariness that allows me to ask such things of Krishna" was amusing, so named him Krishna.

sanex• 10 months ago

I enjoyed this work of nonfiction.

SeanAnderson• 10 months ago

This is absolutely enthralling. It's one of the best pieces of writing I've had the pleasure of enjoying in quite some time. I keep laughing while grimacing and looking inward. The vocabulary is exceptional, too. Really well done.

It kind of reminds me of Krazam's YouTube skits, but in long-form writing.

EDIT: I kind of wanted more from the ending, though. It wrapped up surprisingly quick.

raincole• 10 months ago

Lol the top comment there is golden. The perfect icing on the cake of this satirizing piece.

jamesrom• 10 months ago

If you need a case study on "kill your darlings", read this.

awithrow• 10 months ago

What didn't you like about it?

Animats• 10 months ago

Buildup OK, ending weak.

potato3732842• 10 months ago

Like all good satire, this will go right over the heads of those who ought to see it in the mirror.

robertlagrant• 10 months ago

For some reason, this is my favourite line:

I am already feeling tipsy from my second pint of Guinness

TheOtherHobbes• 10 months ago

Great read, but it would have been even better if an AI wrote it.

The comments under it on LW are a wasteland of incomprehension.

DiscourseFan• 10 months ago

I can't think too highly of a character who judges anyone a genius that refers to themselves as a rationalist, but I guess that's part of the irony.

peteybeachsand• 10 months ago

it's making fun of so many things at once, chock full of great jokes

The Company Man

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