this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2025
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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.]

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As found by @gerikson here, more from the anti anti TESCREAL crowd. How the antis are actually R9PRESENTATIONALism. Ottokar expanded on their idea in a blog post.

Original link.

I have not read the bigger blog post yet btw, just assumed it would be sneerable and posted it here for everyone's amusement. Learn about your own true motives today. (This could be a troll of course, boy does he drop a lot of names and thinks that is enough to link things).

E: alternative title: Ideological Turing Test, a critical failure

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[–] YourNetworkIsHaunted@awful.systems 4 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

Having made the very poor decision to wade through all of that, and taken the necessary nap to try and let my brain stop overheating from the strain, here's what I'm left with:

This gets at part of why the TESCREAL bundle is such an awkward frame to work in. Emile Torres and the other writers who have broken it down do a very impressive job of drawing connections between the different members of the bundle not only through ideological consistencies and historical development of a body of work but through direct links between people and organizations that eventally led to this bizarre but influential sci-fi eschatology where our most important moral duty as a society is the development of post human AI that can move us one step closer to having forty gazillion simulated "people" doing who knows what in their Dyson spheres until the last sun goes out. Unlike most millenarian movements the people who work to advance these ideas don't (or at least didn't) have a central organization or a single ideology so you can't just criticize LessWrong or Effective Altruism in the same way that you could criticize the Branch Davidians or Heaven's Gate. And that really does feel like the most relevant point of comparison here: a terrifyingly large share of our collective money and power are controlled by people who seem to adhere to a bizarre secular apocalypse cult, but that cult doesn't have a name because these people don't organize that way. Describing the TESCREAL bundle does an admirable job of naming the problem and constructing it from the ground up, which is honestly a far more "good faith" handling of their belief system than any alternative I can find.

The most relevant point of comparison I can think of is the idea of "leaderless resistance" in both activist and terrorist activities. Even though you have a bunch of people who plan and take actions to advance their shared beliefs, they recognize the vulnerability created by doing so through an explicit heirarchical organization, so they don't create one. Unlike the klan or other terrorists, TESCREAL is able to use celebrity and public communities as their points of recruitment and activity rather than drawing media attention through atrocity, but the same ambiguity and pattern of disavowal seems to play in how the network operates. Anything too far outside of mainstream acceptability can be disavowed by LW as a specific organization or by Elon and Thiel as specific individuals, even as they're all broadly on the same "side" of the issue. TESCREAL is an attempt to name that "side" in a way that prevents this. People can argue whether or not they or their faces are adherents of TESCREALism, but not the existence of TESCREALism.

However, the fact that it's a constructed bundle rather than a preexisting flag that these people have claimed explicit allegiance to makes the attempt to describe the problem look like a bad-faith effort to construct an enemy where none exists. And that appears to be what the R9PRESENTATIONAL bundle (even more awkward than TESCREAL! Good job!) is trying to do. Most of the bundle doesn't refer to specific elements of an array as much as adjectives that can apply to a whole host of different activities and organizations. Transhumanism, for example, is a complete and specific structure of beliefs. "Relational" is an attribute of many different ideologies and while I think the idea is that the underlying bundle views all of these qualities as good the central thing he's trying to describe already has names like Humanism, Environmentalism, Socialism, Anti-capitalism, Ludditism, and so on. I think the problem is that the author doesn't want to demonize any of those actual ideologies that oppose TESCREALism either explicitly or incidentally because they're more popular and powerful and because rather than being foundationally opposed to "Progress" as he defines it they have their own specific principles that are harder to dismiss.

Most of the connections that the writer here draws are also well outside of living memory, while the oldest elements of TESCREAL appear to date back to cyberpunk science fiction in the 1980s and the surrounding conversations about technology and the meaning and importance of humanity. The defining elements came together over a period of decades, not centuries. While some of that was writers building on a body of knowledge and theory, that just brought us back to the end result where the central idea existed but didn't have a name, so one had to be constructed for it by naming it's constituents and ideological forefathers. By contrast, R9PRESENTATIONALism seems to have its "real" roots in obscure or unpopular theological disputes in the early 19th century. Even if those disputes did have some impact on the intervening history of thought, naming and outlining those and avoiding talking about anti-capitalism and environmentalism as central ideas to the tech backlash makes the attempt to construct a category very transparent. The author doesn't want to be anti-socialism or anti-environmentalism, but does want to do the tech thing that socialists and environmentalists are criticizing, so he needs to reframe those criticisms as arising from somewhere else that he can more comfortably position himself against.

This, combined with the emphasis on opposition to postmodernism, means that we're very likely to, whether the author intends it or not, end up going down some weird roads with this. I'm not sure if we're going to get to Jordan Peterson ranting about "Postmodern Neomarxism" or if we're going to end up doing the full Alex Jones thing, but just like those two zoo exhibits it should be fun to watch from outside the enclosure.

[–] zogwarg@awful.systems 3 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

the oldest elements of TESCREAL appear to date back to cyberpunk science fiction in the 1980s

Nitpick: Cosmism was birthed in 19th century Russia, complete with "Death is the enemy" "Let's ressurect everyone" (using science) "Let's conquer the universe" and proto-eugnenics of the "common project of humanity as transforming all into great men".

I think Russian cosmism is part of the deep history there, but the modern incarnation is still pretty heavily integrated with the 1990-2009 era through guys like this. I'm not an expert in the history or philosophy here, but I think there's definitely room to treat it as a separate modern revival that fits in the same kind of mold.

[–] zogwarg@awful.systems 3 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I attempted a point by point sneer, but there is a bit too much silliness and not enough cohesion to produce something readable.

So focusing on "Post-critique":

OP misspels of some of his "enemy" authors, in a way directly cribbed from Wikipedia suggesting no real analysis.

[...], such texts included Ricouer's Freud and Philosophy: An Essay on Interpretation, Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations and On Certainty, Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception, Hannah Arendt's The Human Condition, and Kierkegaard's works [...]

Ricouer should be Ricœur or at the very least Ricoeur. (Incidentally OP also makes a very poor summary of his work)

Complete and arbitrary marriage of epistemic post-critique and literary post-critique, which as far as I can see have nothing to do with each other beyond sharing a name, and in fact even seem a bit at odds with each other in how they relate to recontextualisation.

I would say this is obviously bot vomit, but I have known humans to be this lazy and thickheaded.

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 3 points 9 hours ago

Yeah also noticed that, in what little actual arguments there are between the name-dropping, he seems to use some terms in the wrong order in a weird way. And cery likely a bot/troll, but very funny of serious. Do not have a substack account, so couldn't check if he posted more on the subject. As substack now loginwalls the archives.

[–] o7___o7@awful.systems 6 points 20 hours ago

A man with a swastika tattoo shouting "nuh uh, you're the real nazis!"

[–] istewart@awful.systems 4 points 18 hours ago

what in the world does any of this bull shit have to do with showing off your mid-tier Yamaha sport bike

[–] blakestacey@awful.systems 10 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Almost all are avowedly committed to the ideals of tolerance, pluralism, and diversity in faith; if you were to say that a belief system should be dismissed simply because it is essentially religious in nature in essentially any other context, they would be some of the loudest voices speaking out against you. So why should TESCREAL be any different? Why is it that religion as a whole is fine, but not this religion?

Because a religion passing itself off as scientific is a bad thing? Just spitballin' here.

[–] blakestacey@awful.systems 6 points 11 hours ago

Why is it that religion as a whole is fine, but not this religion?

Me: This plant is poisonous.

You, a lesswrong brain genius: Plants are a vital part of the Earth's ecosystem. They make the oxygen that we breathe. You call yourself a vegetarian, and yet you have a problem with this plant. Why is it that plants as a whole are fine, but not this plant?

Me: This plant is poisonous.

[–] istewart@awful.systems 5 points 18 hours ago

We have at least one major worked example of that in Scientology, but IIRC many of the rats are reluctant to even accept that

[–] scruiser@awful.systems 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's true. "Passing itself off as scientific" also describes Young Earth Creationism and Intelligent Design and various other pseudosciences. And in terms of who is pushing pseudoscience... the curent US administration is undeniably right-wing and opposed to all mainstream science.

Also, I would at least partially disagree with this:

Very few of the people making this argument are militant atheists who consider religion bad in of itself.

I would identify as an atheist, if not a militant one. And looking at Emile Torres' Wikipedia page, he is an atheist also. Judging by the uncommon occasions it comes up on sneerclub, I think a lot of us are atheist/agnostic. Just not, you know, "militant". And in terms of political allegiance, a lot of the libertarians on lesswrong are excited for the tax cuts and war on woke of the Trump administration even if it means cutting funding to all science and partnering up with completely batshit Fundamenalist Evangelicals.

I think the religious angle isn't a general criticism as much as a counter to the specific narrative that the TESCREAL ideology is somehow rooted purely in logic and realistic evaluations of technology rather than in fantasy and wild speculation. The criticism of how it rhymes with certain elements of fundamentalist Christianity are usually rooted in this same observation, as well as in the fact that the elements of Christianity that TESCREALism most closely rhymes with are themselves harmful or insane regardless of what kind of wrapper you put them in. Like, both Christian and Singularitarian eschatologies use their faith in apocalyptic prophecies/predictions to devalue action to address very real suffering in the here-and-now in favor of trying to improve the lot of humanity in this hypothetical future, which just so happens to involve preaching more Christian/Singularitarian end times crap and also giving insiders to associated organizations lots of money and power. There's a leftist version of that too and it's also pretty fucked up.

[–] gerikson@awful.systems 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I hate to "give it to them", but the targets of TESCREAL are reprehensible BUT fascinating. It's kinda fun to learn about people like the Cosmists or Nick fucking Land. But the targets of this dude are basically unknown academics. The right doesn't need a convoluted acronym to dump on those, they already have "woke".

[–] scruiser@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I feel like lesswrong's front page has what would be a neat concept in a science fiction story at least once a week. Like what if an AGI had a constant record of it's thoughts, but it learned to hide what it was really thinking in them with complex stenography! That's a solid third act twist of at least a B sci-fi plot, if not enough to carry a good story by itself. Except lesswrong is trying to get their ideas passed in legislation and they are being used as the hype wing of the latest tech-craze. And they only occasionally write actually fun stories, as opposed to polemic stories beating you over the head with their moral or ten thousand word pseudo-academic blog posts.

[–] blakestacey@awful.systems 9 points 1 day ago

So, R9PRESENTATIONALists are classicists who defend the "traditional university" and the Great Books canon, while also denouncing large institutions and aiming "to elevate the perspectives of underprivileged minorities".

Sure, Jan.

[–] scruiser@awful.systems 7 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It feels like this person was mad at the TESCREAL label and decided to make a blog post going "nuh-uh, I know you are but what am I"... except they have none of the academic ability of the TESCREAL authors so they just sort of pile on labels and ideologies without properly showing any causal or ideological relationship (like the TESCREAL authors do). Heck, they outright screw up words and definitions in a few places, (Orate sticks out to me).

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 6 points 1 day ago

except they have none of the academic ability of the TESCREAL authors

This has two potential readings, and both of them are funny.

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Yep.

"Yall are in a cult, and it is TESCREAL."

"No, you jocks are are doing a religion but dont know it, here is why you are doing ruh-nine-presentationalism, and ..."

"Yeah this it"

E: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/are-yall-with-the-cult

[–] scruiser@awful.systems 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

“Yall are in a cult, and it is TESCREAL.”

So I know you were going for a snappy summary, but I think one of the important things to note is that the TESCREAL essay doesn't call them a singular cult, it draws connections between the letters of the acronym including inspirations, people in multiple letters of the acronym, common terminology, common ideological assumptions, and such.

I think a hypothetical more mature rationalist movement would acknowledge their historical and current influences and think critically about how they relate to them instead of just going nuh-uh. Like the relatively more reasonable EAs occasionally point out problematic trends in their movement and at least try to address them (not particularly effectually, but at least they aren't all in total denial).

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

Yeah i was just doing the meme from king of the hill. If I go indepth, I would sneer at stuff like: "Because if TESCREALism really is a secularized religion, then… so what?"

For being a misrepresentation, it is secularized eschatological Christianity (perhaps even Catholicism, but not Protestant enough to say that, counting the rich feels very knife in church door ish), not just a religion. Doesn't even represent the argument correctly. It is the rapture of the nerds, not the breaking of the Saṃsāra for nerds.

E: bonus points for after first generalizing religion then picking islam as some weird anti apostate example. Must have been an accident. E2: the apostate (yes, my word, he said 'shirkers', which is not a term I have ever seen used re religion) stuff is even funnier considering that Émile P. Torres (who for some reason is not mentioned in the opening, just later), is somebody who has written about “existential threats” for ages (more on his ideas on this here which also has the bonus that it is way more readable than the main post), DavidG was a lesswronger, a lot of science fiction writers who are not positive about TESCREAL are people who wrote transhumanist sf, and see also the large group of sneerclubbers who used to read LW/SSC etc. (E3: forgot to mention, Gebru is a computer scientist).

[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

"shirk" is an islamic term for idolatry/type of heresy, person who does that is called "mushirk"

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 2 points 2 hours ago (1 children)
[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 1 points 1 hour ago

i'm not reading all that so idk if it's used correctly in context, but more usual islamic term for infidel is "kafir" (spellings vary; there's no single romanization of arabic)

[–] cstross@wandering.shop 2 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

@Soyweiser What is "king of the hill"? TV/cinema or some other visual entertainment?

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 1 points 2 hours ago

It is a tv series yes, this is basically the clip from the show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aOHQ-sMCps there is more context re the episode but it isn't that relevant. I should have just linked it initially. (I have since edited the first post with a link to the know your meme page which explains it).

Animated series about an honest propane salesman from Texas trying to survive modernity.

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

Oh duh, I remember that meme now. With the people getting on the bus wearing weird white robe outfits?

[–] aio@awful.systems 14 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Hochman correctly deduces that R9PRESENTATIONALism originated in the 18th century, but fails to realize that the roots of this movement actually lie with the Bavarian Illuminati, a secret society which was supposedly suppressed by edict in 1784 but has in fact maintained a shadowy existence influencing politics up to the present day.

[–] YourNetworkIsHaunted@awful.systems 2 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I know this is a shit post but I think we should probably spare some thought for the connection between Adam Weishaupt and modern technofascist grifters in the sense of trying to profit from building a social club/identity around a set of ideas that are broadly popular among a subset of wealthy elites but not necessarily powerful in wider society. Given their shared (professed) allegiance to the enlightenment and progress I cannot see him being anything other than proud of what Lighthaven or MIRI have accomplished in the field of separating people from their money.

[–] AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 5 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

The Behind The Bastards podcast had a sequence of episodes looking at the idea of The Illuminati (from Weishaupt, through anti-Masonic panics, Discordianism, and the idea’s inglorious most recent resting place, Qanon), and their summary of Weishaupt’s organisation was that it was a grift: an organisation whose ostensible purpose was to provide an endless ladder of “esoteric knowledge” the idle rich would pay to climb, with its actual “inner teachings” being the advancement of controversial ideas like secularism and human rights, which many of the marks climbing the ladder would have doubtlessly found objectionable, so they were palmed off with recycled alchemy/kabbalah and secret codes.

[–] YourNetworkIsHaunted@awful.systems 1 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

That's exactly what I was thinking of, only with the kabbalah replaced by generic self-help and a list of cognitive biases.

Ed: or, y'know, kabbalah

[–] jackr@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I think we could count discordianism as an antirationalist ally

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 6 points 23 hours ago

Most people on discord hate Rationalism.

[–] corbin@awful.systems 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

We aren't. Speaking for all Discordians (something that I'm allowed to do), we see Rationalism as part of the larger pattern of Bureaucracy. Discordians view the cycle of existence as having five stages: Chaos, Discord, Confusion, Bureaucracy, and The Aftermath. Rationalism is part of Bureaucracy, associated with villainy, anti-progress, and candid antagonists. None of this is good or bad, it just is; good and bad are our opinions, not a deeper truth.

Now, if you were to talk about Pastafarians, then you'd get a different story; but you didn't, so I won't.

[–] jackr@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

You almost talk as if you are a pope or something.

I see you, I believe rationalism would be seen as more aneristic and so many discordians would naturally turn against them. thoudh ultimately their frame of reference is no better or worse than any other. So let me amend my statement꧇ I believe the average disqordian would find themselves in opposition to rationalism.

[–] mawhrin@awful.systems 4 points 21 hours ago

frankly i feel like i need to excommunicate the lot of you. which i do, by the powers vested in me by being the one true pope etc.

[–] jaschop@awful.systems 5 points 1 day ago

This was one obscure shitpost to decode.

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

I like that his first argument out of the gate is "You call us a secular religion? Well maybe we are, what happened to religious tolerance?" Just perfect how you tee yourself up to fall in line with the religious conservatives when needed.

We really need bring some sceptical epistemic attitudes back. Maybe some kind of eco-atheism, keeping yourself grounded on actual real shit. (for some definition of real)

[–] jaschop@awful.systems 3 points 22 hours ago

I googled "eco-atheism" and dedicated a post to what I found: https://awful.systems/post/5314810

[–] swlabr@awful.systems 7 points 1 day ago

Pronounced ruh-nine-presentationalism