effective accelerationism
In plain wordsAn online movement, known as e/acc, that wants AI and other technology developed as fast as possible, arguing that progress is good and that safety-driven regulation does more harm than good.
A techno-optimist ideology, abbreviated e/acc, that advocates accelerating technological development — above all AI — with minimal regulatory restraint. Its founding texts framed growth in thermodynamic terms: civilization, like life, is a process that captures and dissipates free energy, so maximizing technological and economic expansion aligns with a tendency of the universe itself. In practice e/acc functions as a counter-movement to AI-safety advocacy and to effective altruismeffective altruism, n.: A movement that treats charity like a research problem, comparing causes by how much good each dollar or working hour achieves; many of its members came to rank risks from advanced AI as a top priority., whose name it parodies. Adherents oppose licensing regimes, compute thresholds and pausesAI pause, n.: A proposed halt, temporary or indefinite, on building AI systems more powerful than today's, to give safety research and regulation time to catch up., favor open-sourceopen-source AI, n.: AI released, ideally with its code and details of its training data and not just the finished model, so that anyone may use, inspect, alter, share and even rebuild it. How open is open enough is debated. development and market competition, and label opponents doomersdoomer, n.: Someone who believes advanced AI is likely to cause a catastrophe, possibly human extinction; often used as a put-down by people who think those fears are exaggerated. or decelsdecel, n.: A dismissive label, used mainly by AI accelerationists, for anyone who wants AI development slowed down, paused or heavily regulated.. Critics see a meme-driven rationale for industry interests that is indifferent to concrete harms; supporters present it as optimism about abundance.
Half the founders in the room had e/acc in their bios, and none of them wanted to talk about licensing.
Origin
Emerged on Twitter in 2022 among pseudonymous accounts; the earliest known reference is a May 2022 newsletter by four of them, including 'Beff Jezos' (identified by Forbes in December 2023 as the physicist Guillaume Verdon) and 'bayeslord', whose 'Notes on e/acc principles and tenets' (10 July 2022) set out its creed. Its name combines effective altruism with Nick Land's philosophical accelerationism. Marc Andreessen's October 2023 'Techno-Optimist Manifesto', widely read as an e/acc text, broadened its reach.
Usage note
Distinct from Nick Land's accelerationism, which concerned capitalism's dissolution of human institutions, and from d/accdifferential technological development, n.: A strategy of speeding up technologies that make us safer and slowing down risky ones, so that protections arrive before the dangers they guard against., Vitalik Buterin's 'defensive accelerationism' (2023), which favors technologies that strengthen defense and decentralization.
Related
- deceldecel, n.: A dismissive label, used mainly by AI accelerationists, for anyone who wants AI development slowed down, paused or heavily regulated.
- doomerdoomer, n.: Someone who believes advanced AI is likely to cause a catastrophe, possibly human extinction; often used as a put-down by people who think those fears are exaggerated.
- differential technological developmentdifferential technological development, n.: A strategy of speeding up technologies that make us safer and slowing down risky ones, so that protections arrive before the dangers they guard against.
- effective altruismeffective altruism, n.: A movement that treats charity like a research problem, comparing causes by how much good each dollar or working hour achieves; many of its members came to rank risks from advanced AI as a top priority.
- AI pauseAI pause, n.: A proposed halt, temporary or indefinite, on building AI systems more powerful than today's, to give safety research and regulation time to catch up.
- open-source AIopen-source AI, n.: AI released, ideally with its code and details of its training data and not just the finished model, so that anyone may use, inspect, alter, share and even rebuild it. How open is open enough is debated.
- effective altruismeffective altruism, n.: A movement that treats charity like a research problem, comparing causes by how much good each dollar or working hour achieves; many of its members came to rank risks from advanced AI as a top priority.
- doomerdoomer, n.: Someone who believes advanced AI is likely to cause a catastrophe, possibly human extinction; often used as a put-down by people who think those fears are exaggerated.
Mentioned in
doomerdoomer, n.: Someone who believes advanced AI is likely to cause a catastrophe, possibly human extinction; often used as a put-down by people who think those fears are exaggerated., effective altruismeffective altruism, n.: A movement that treats charity like a research problem, comparing causes by how much good each dollar or working hour achieves; many of its members came to rank risks from advanced AI as a top priority., rationalist communityrationalist community, n.: A loose online community that prizes careful reasoning and spotting one's own biases; gathered around the forum LessWrong, it was one of the first groups to take the dangers of advanced AI seriously., deceldecel, n.: A dismissive label, used mainly by AI accelerationists, for anyone who wants AI development slowed down, paused or heavily regulated., differential technological developmentdifferential technological development, n.: A strategy of speeding up technologies that make us safer and slowing down risky ones, so that protections arrive before the dangers they guard against., it's over, we're so backit's over, we're so back, phr.: A meme describing the mood swings of the AI world: one day bad news means 'it's over', the next a new model or result means 'we're so back'., -pilled-pilled, adj.: A slang word ending meaning someone has been won over to a belief, often suddenly and completely; 'AGI-pilled' means convinced that human-level AI is coming soon., successionismsuccessionism, n.: The view that it would be acceptable, or even good, for AI to replace humanity as the main bearer of intelligence and value on Earth, as our successors.