 Screenshot of theSlate Star Codex home page prior to deletion | |
Type of site | Blog |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Successor | Astral Codex Ten |
| Created by | Scott Alexander |
| URL | www www |
| Launched | February 12, 2013; 12 years ago (2013-02-12) |
| Current status | Active (as Astral Codex Ten, Slate Star Codex is online but inactive) |
Astral Codex Ten (ACX), formerlySlate Star Codex (SSC), is ablog focused onscience,medicine (especiallypsychiatry),philosophy,politics, andfuturism. The blog is written by Scott Alexander Siskind,[1] aSan Francisco Bay Areapsychiatrist,[2] under the pen name Scott Alexander.
Slate Star Codex was launched in 2013 and was temporarily discontinued on June 23, 2020. In July 2020 the blog was partially back online, with the content restored but commenting disabled. The successorSubstack blog,Astral Codex Ten,[2] was launched on January 21, 2021.
The site was a primary venue of therationalist community and also attracted wider audiences.[3] TheNew Statesman characterizes it as "a nexus for the rationalist community and others who seek to apply reason to debates about situations, ideas, and moral quandaries."[4]The New Yorker describes Alexander's fiction as "delightfully weird" and his arguments "often counterintuitive and brilliant".[3] EconomistTyler Cowen calls Scott Alexander "a thinker who is influential among other writers".[5]
The New Yorker states that the volume of content Alexander has written onSlate Star Codex makes the blog difficult to summarize, with an e-book of all posts running over nine thousand pages in PDF form.[3] Many posts are book reviews (typically of books in the fields of social sciences or medicine) or reviews of a topic in the scientific literature. For example, the March 2020 blog post "Face Masks: Much More Than You Wanted To Know" analyzes available medical literature and comes to a conclusion that contrary to early guidance by theCDC,masks are likely an effective protection measure againstCOVID-19 for the general public under certain conditions.[3][6] Some posts are prefaced with a note on their "epistemic status", an assessment of Alexander's confidence in the material to follow.[3]
Alexander also blogged at therationalist community blogLessWrong,[3] and wrote a fiction book in blog format namedUnsong.[7] Alexander published a revised version ofUnsong on May 24, 2024.[8][9]
In 2017,Slate Star Codex ranked fourth on a survey conducted by Rethink Charity of howeffective altruists first heard about effective altruism, after "personal contact", "LessWrong", and "other books, articles and blog posts", and just above "80,000 Hours."[10] The blog discusses moral questions and dilemmas relevant to effective altruism, such as moral offsets (the proposition that good acts can cancel out bad acts), ethical treatment of animals, and trade-offs of pursuing systemic change for charities.[11]
Alexander regularly writes about advances inartificial intelligence and emphasized the importance ofAI safety research.[12]
In the long essay "Meditations On Moloch", he analyzesgame-theoretic scenarios of cooperation failure like theprisoner's dilemma and thetragedy of the commons that underlie many of humanity's problems and argues thatAI risks should be considered in this context.[13]
In "The Toxoplasma of Rage", Alexander discusses how controversies spread in media and social networks. According to Alexander,memes that generate a lot of disagreement spread further, in part because they present an opportunity to members of different groups to send astrong signal of commitment to their cause. For example, he argues thatPETA, with its controversial campaigns, is better known than other animal rights organizations such asVegan Outreach because of this dynamic.[14] Another example of this cited by Alexander is theRolling Stone article "A Rape on Campus".[15]
In the short story "Sort By Controversial", Alexander introduces the term "Shiri's scissor" or "scissor statement" to describe a statement that has great destructive power because it generates wildly divergent interpretations that fuel conflict and tear people apart. The term has been used to describe controversial topics widely discussed in social media.[16]
The 2013 post "The Anti-Reactionary FAQ" critiques the work and worldview of theneoreactionary movement, arguing against the work ofCurtis Yarvin (whose views include a belief in naturalracial hierarchies and a desire to restorefeudalism). Alexander allowed neo-reactionaries to comment on posts and in "culture war" threads on the forum because he wanted to promote an openmarketplace of ideas; Alexander engaged in extended dialogues with these users, including his thirty-thousand-word FAQ.[3] Alexander's essays on neoreaction have been cited byDavid Auerbach andDylan Matthews as explanations of the movement.[17][18]
In the 2013 post "Lizardman's Constant is 4%", Alexander coined the term "Lizardman's Constant", referring to the approximate percentage of responses to a poll, survey, or quiz that are not sincere.[19] The post was responding to aPublic Policy Polling statement that "four percent of Americans believe lizardmen are running the Earth", which Alexander attributed to people giving a polling company an answer they did not really believe to be true, out of carelessness, politeness, anger, or amusement.[19]
Alexander suggested that polls should include a question with an absurd answer as one of the options, so anyone choosing that option could be weeded out as atroll.[20][21]
Alexander used hisfirst andmiddle name alone for safety and privacy reasons, although he had previously publishedSlate Star Codex content academically under his real name.[2] In June 2020, he deleted all entries onSlate Star Codex, stating that a technology reporter fromThe New York Times (NYT) intended to publish an article about the blog using his full name. Alexander said that the reporter told him that it was newspaper policy to use real names,[22] and he referred to it asdoxing.[3]The New York Times responded: "We do not comment on what we may or may not publish in the future. But when we report on newsworthy or influential figures, our goal is always to give readers all the accurate and relevant information we can."[23]The Verge cited a source saying that at the time when Alexander deleted the blog, "not a word" of a story aboutSSC had been written.[24] ThePoynter Institute's David Cohn interpreted this event as part of an ongoing clash between the tech and media industries, reflecting a shift from primarily economic conflicts to fundamental disagreements over values, ethics, and cultural norms.[25]
Prior to the article's publication, several commentators argued thatThe New York Times should not publish Alexander's name without good reason. Writing inNational Review, Tobias Hoonhout said that the newspaper had applied its anonymity policy inconsistently.[22] TheNew Statesman's Jasper Jackson wrote that it was "difficult to see how Scott Alexander's full name is so integral to theNYT's story that it justifies the damage it might do to him", but cautioned that such criticism was based solely on Alexander's own statements and that "before we make that call, it might be a good idea to have more than his word to go on."[4] As reported byThe Daily Beast, the criticism by Alexander and his supporters that the paper was doxing him caused internal debate amongThe New York Times' staff.[26]
Supporters of the site organized a petition against release of the author's name. The petition collected over six thousand signatures in its first few days, including psychologistSteven Pinker, social psychologistJonathan Haidt, economistScott Sumner, computer scientist and bloggerScott Aaronson, and philosopherPeter Singer.[3]
According toNew Statesman columnistLouise Perry, Scott Alexander wrote that he quit his job and took measures that made him comfortable with revealing his real name,[27] which he published onAstral Codex Ten.[1]
The New York Times published an article about the blog in February 2021, three weeks after Alexander had publicly revealed his name.[2]
The rationality blog Slate Star Codex uses the brutal Canaanite god Moloch, depicted in Allen Ginsberg's 'Howl,' as a metaphor for humanity's repeated failure to coordinate toward a better future
A second kind of unrecoverable dystopia is a stable civilization that is desired by few (if any) people. It is easy to see how such an outcome could be dystopian, but not immediately obvious how we could arrive at it, or lock it in, if most (or all) people do not want it...Meditations on Moloch is a powerful exploration of such possibilities...
If you're curious, the tireless Scott Alexander of Slate Star Codex has written extensive rebuttals of neoreactionary theory, which go to prove Brandolini's Law
Note that these empirical claims are, well, not true. Scott Alexander explains well here; his devil's advocate account of reactionary beliefs is also well worth your time.
