hey so about your favorite boy hank green.
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@lunemercove @zzt Oh, fuck, he did an HRT video? This is knowledge I could have done without.
@bstacey I don't think I watched it, but I remember hearing some bad things
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@davidgerard and while we’re here: don’t take Green’s apology at face value. he’s paid to influence you. LLM addiction is a convenient out, especially if he suspects the jig is up.
keep in mind that this guy got paid to get you interested in something that he now says is addictive. that thing is additionally a known vector for misinformation. he has done damage. he has more than enough resources and knowledge to try and undo some of that damage.
until Hank Green materially fixes some of the damage caused by LLMs, generative AI, and his promotion of them, you shouldn’t accept his current apology or any apology he makes in the future. if he makes vague motions in the direction of fixing some of it, don’t underestimate the severity of the damage. do not forgive this man unless and until he does something real.
this isn’t a high bar, it’s common decency. I don’t think he’s gonna manage.
@zzt @davidgerard I always got a scumbag vibe from him, can't stand watching him.
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@kevingranade @zzt "“It’s really hard to run a fellowship that’s not an indoctrination camp if you're working with Aella, who never saw a room she didn't want to turn into a cult"
@davidgerard @kevingranade @zzt I can visualise the Sankey diagram... "recruited the fluffer"
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@davidgerard “shame on green but” eat shit. this is a self-admitted shill doing active damage to science and since he’s an influencer, we can stop him by spreading the word. this is the one clearcut case where having a problem with someone on the internet will stop the damage they can do.
the fuck is wrong with you that you want to give this a pass? you want guys like this to be spokespeople for scientific truth? why?
@zzt @davidgerard i really hesitate to call LLMs "addictive" since it doesn't seem to lead to any assistance if it were a problem and it steals valor from people with substance abuse disorder while using it as an excuse for their own volitional dogshit decisions which are framed as a cruel product of the machine when actual "addicts" never get the same sympathy
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@zzt @davidgerard i really hesitate to call LLMs "addictive" since it doesn't seem to lead to any assistance if it were a problem and it steals valor from people with substance abuse disorder while using it as an excuse for their own volitional dogshit decisions which are framed as a cruel product of the machine when actual "addicts" never get the same sympathy
@zzt @davidgerard hank green should donate 2 million dollars to a local methodone clinic and lobby for legislation to decriminalize drug possession so addicts can get the help they need then we can give him the addict card
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@davidgerard @kevingranade @zzt Sweet Jesus, I just search for who that was and now I want to be pressure-cooked in disinfectant.
@LabSpokane @davidgerard @kevingranade @zzt I'm amused by the influencer named Catherine Goetze. Presumably she stretches the AI's capabilities.
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@zzt @davidgerard i really hesitate to call LLMs "addictive" since it doesn't seem to lead to any assistance if it were a problem and it steals valor from people with substance abuse disorder while using it as an excuse for their own volitional dogshit decisions which are framed as a cruel product of the machine when actual "addicts" never get the same sympathy
@hipsterelectron @davidgerard there are many more types of addicts than substance abuse addicts
an LLM addiction is close in mechanism and outcome to a gambling addiction. a gambler in the throes of their addiction is absolutely making dogshit decisions. I don’t feel an overwhelming urge to have sympathy for an active gambler or an active LLM addict, as both are still doing damage to the people around them.
maybe that’s unkind of me. I don’t know if kindness helps here. in my lifetime I’ve physically dragged multiple people away from slot machines before they spent money they really shouldn’t, and I’ve lent a couple hundred bucks to a friend who spent the last of their grocery money on Overwatch loot boxes (yes really). the latter was more kind, but it sure as fuck didn’t stop them from hurting me.
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@hipsterelectron @davidgerard there are many more types of addicts than substance abuse addicts
an LLM addiction is close in mechanism and outcome to a gambling addiction. a gambler in the throes of their addiction is absolutely making dogshit decisions. I don’t feel an overwhelming urge to have sympathy for an active gambler or an active LLM addict, as both are still doing damage to the people around them.
maybe that’s unkind of me. I don’t know if kindness helps here. in my lifetime I’ve physically dragged multiple people away from slot machines before they spent money they really shouldn’t, and I’ve lent a couple hundred bucks to a friend who spent the last of their grocery money on Overwatch loot boxes (yes really). the latter was more kind, but it sure as fuck didn’t stop them from hurting me.
@zzt @davidgerard oh i fear i was unwoke here thanks
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hey so about your favorite boy hank green. it’s such a shame that he went overboard with the LLM stuff, that was impossible to see coming, good on him for realizing he was addicted right? well wishes for the good boy!
anyway there’s smoking gun evidence that he was paid by effective altruists to do marketing for the “AI is so dangerous but so revolutionary” flavor of critihype. this is alleged by hank green expert hank green in the washington post, as well as an EA in charge of influencer marketing. he was literally being paid by TESCREALs.
someone in the same community ran a program where TikTokers were required to post an AI critihype video a day in a cult-like environment where they were subjected to “voluntary” waterboarding and other forms of indoctrination. I’m not kidding, this literal thing happened.
here’s @davidgerard’s pivot to AI with the evidence linked: https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/08/06/the-ai-doomsday-cult-recruits-social-media-influencers/
@zzt @davidgerard I know that a few of the AI booster sellouts ended up getting acqu-hired by BigAI (Bun guy, Clawdbot guy) and have no doubt others might be positioning themselves to try to sellout for that sweet sweet AI bubble cash (I could name a few guys who are semi-famous online but wont haha, to be nice). lots of folks will set principles aside if it means a million dollar plus payout
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@davidgerard I’m very serious about this by the way
if you respect science, you must not forgive hank green. you must spread the word on what he’s done, especially if you used to be a fan. this is corruption in the raw and what he’s done must be known.
if you respect science, you must verify the claims of science communicators independently and reject any who are doing marketing. most of the major YouTube science communicators are doing paid, undisclosed marketing for effective altruists or for political groups. this isn’t hard to spot, but you must be critical and you can’t let yourself be impressed by perceived celebrity, popularity, or production values.
if you respect science, you have to demand accountability. science is actively under attack and if we don’t do anything to defend it, we will be in a new dark age. this is the moment, and you don’t have to do much. you just have to be very loud and very unforgiving.
@zzt @davidgerard I only knew about him because of that but would've extended grace if it'd just have been someone being in AI-induced illusion and coming back out of it.
But that... that's very inexcusable oof.
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@davidgerard “oh we can’t ban everyone from the internet who makes a mistake” boy I wish my mistakes resulted in a gigantic paycheck, but this wasn’t a mistake
green spent over a year doing crafted undisclosed marketing, choosing and framing topics to forward the Effective Altruist mission to make LLMs look dangerous but powerful (a type of critihype marketing invented by the AI corporations that funnel money into effective altruism, but you didn’t need me to tell you that as both OpenAI’s Altman and Anthropic’s Amodei have spouted the same talking points as Green), and interviewing members of the Effective Altruist and TESCREAL communities
that’s not a mistake, that’s labor. that’s why these rich fucking assholes paid him. his job was to convince you that the science on LLMs is that they’re very powerful and therefore very dangerous.
@zzt @davidgerard I always thought it was sketchy when people would tell him "most people, including programmers, don't like genAI" and he'd just say "well, everyone I know in tech is saying they use it constantly and love it."
Yeah, Hank, that's called sampling and confirmation bias and *you* have talked about why it's important to worry about.
It's also a big red flag of "who the hell are you hanging out with?"
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@zzt @davidgerard I always thought it was sketchy when people would tell him "most people, including programmers, don't like genAI" and he'd just say "well, everyone I know in tech is saying they use it constantly and love it."
Yeah, Hank, that's called sampling and confirmation bias and *you* have talked about why it's important to worry about.
It's also a big red flag of "who the hell are you hanging out with?"
@zzt @davidgerard I've officially requested a refund for a #CrashCourse coin I bought earlier this year and would encourage others to do the same and call out recent events as specifically why.
I wanted to support the creation of high quality publicly available education resources as the flood of low-quality resources and misinformation only becomes more common, but recent events showed me they're not worthy of my trust in that regard.
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hey so about your favorite boy hank green. it’s such a shame that he went overboard with the LLM stuff, that was impossible to see coming, good on him for realizing he was addicted right? well wishes for the good boy!
anyway there’s smoking gun evidence that he was paid by effective altruists to do marketing for the “AI is so dangerous but so revolutionary” flavor of critihype. this is alleged by hank green expert hank green in the washington post, as well as an EA in charge of influencer marketing. he was literally being paid by TESCREALs.
someone in the same community ran a program where TikTokers were required to post an AI critihype video a day in a cult-like environment where they were subjected to “voluntary” waterboarding and other forms of indoctrination. I’m not kidding, this literal thing happened.
here’s @davidgerard’s pivot to AI with the evidence linked: https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/08/06/the-ai-doomsday-cult-recruits-social-media-influencers/
@zzt @davidgerard i'm old enough to remember how scicomm-wanker Jonah Lehrer was found to plagiarise and invent quotes and should have been dropped by everyone - and how the people behind RadioLab failed even that low bar.
Would be absolutely not surprised if he's back today, happily shilling for some "ai" garbage. Not sure why this reminds me of this YT dude
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@davidgerard I’m very serious about this by the way
if you respect science, you must not forgive hank green. you must spread the word on what he’s done, especially if you used to be a fan. this is corruption in the raw and what he’s done must be known.
if you respect science, you must verify the claims of science communicators independently and reject any who are doing marketing. most of the major YouTube science communicators are doing paid, undisclosed marketing for effective altruists or for political groups. this isn’t hard to spot, but you must be critical and you can’t let yourself be impressed by perceived celebrity, popularity, or production values.
if you respect science, you have to demand accountability. science is actively under attack and if we don’t do anything to defend it, we will be in a new dark age. this is the moment, and you don’t have to do much. you just have to be very loud and very unforgiving.
@zzt "shame on Green but he's just a poor helpless mediocre white guy" is the only string of words that makes sense in this context
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@zzt "shame on Green but he's just a poor helpless mediocre white guy" is the only string of words that makes sense in this context
This is why I am done being told who to like. This is why security matters. This is why trust matters.
We need a different model
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@cyberquixote might I recommend the Autism Model
encounter new thing, spend a significant period of time in consideration of thing before deciding to engage in an uncritical analysis of thing, learn about history of usage and funding of thing before committing to thing, which leads you to using or caring about fewer thing
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@zzt I remember when Scishow put out a dumb/incorrect video about knitting last year that some people speculated that his team had used AI to write it. It was definitely "phoned in" one way or another. So the current controversy isn't as surprising to me as it might've been.
I wish more people recognized that the AI boosters and AI doomers are both on the same team.
@giflian @zzt
I ran into a reaction video about the current controversy (if it can be called that) and thought about that bs knitting video and other links YouTube has shown me that smelled like further bs.I have no stake in this, having never heard of him before the knitting one. If anything, I feel happy my bs detector has been validated.
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@hipsterelectron @davidgerard there are many more types of addicts than substance abuse addicts
an LLM addiction is close in mechanism and outcome to a gambling addiction. a gambler in the throes of their addiction is absolutely making dogshit decisions. I don’t feel an overwhelming urge to have sympathy for an active gambler or an active LLM addict, as both are still doing damage to the people around them.
maybe that’s unkind of me. I don’t know if kindness helps here. in my lifetime I’ve physically dragged multiple people away from slot machines before they spent money they really shouldn’t, and I’ve lent a couple hundred bucks to a friend who spent the last of their grocery money on Overwatch loot boxes (yes really). the latter was more kind, but it sure as fuck didn’t stop them from hurting me.
@zzt I've dealt with people addicted to things that aren't substances. Video games, pornography...Those things invite lying, misuse of finances, and an inability to function as a full human being just like other addictive substances we would recognize.
(And, as an indie author, I also recognize that much of the advice around ebooks involves feeding an addiction.)
I'm sorry if Green is suffering from addiction to LLMs. But he's not getting a walk on all else.
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hey so about your favorite boy hank green. it’s such a shame that he went overboard with the LLM stuff, that was impossible to see coming, good on him for realizing he was addicted right? well wishes for the good boy!
anyway there’s smoking gun evidence that he was paid by effective altruists to do marketing for the “AI is so dangerous but so revolutionary” flavor of critihype. this is alleged by hank green expert hank green in the washington post, as well as an EA in charge of influencer marketing. he was literally being paid by TESCREALs.
someone in the same community ran a program where TikTokers were required to post an AI critihype video a day in a cult-like environment where they were subjected to “voluntary” waterboarding and other forms of indoctrination. I’m not kidding, this literal thing happened.
here’s @davidgerard’s pivot to AI with the evidence linked: https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/08/06/the-ai-doomsday-cult-recruits-social-media-influencers/
Re: the waterboarding
Unsatisfied with reinventing the train and the taxi, tech bros have now moved on to reinventing the bdsm scene!
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@cyberquixote might I recommend the Autism Model
encounter new thing, spend a significant period of time in consideration of thing before deciding to engage in an uncritical analysis of thing, learn about history of usage and funding of thing before committing to thing, which leads you to using or caring about fewer thing
