"Please don't fulminate."
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
This kind of comment doesn't help, even in the case that you're right.
Edit: you've unfortunately been doing this repeatedly. We ban that sort of account, so please stop. We've already had to ask you more than once about this.
That’s just me personally, and I wouldn’t judge others by what I would do, but many people do.
it is sad existence for these people, one of mono-culture, and cult like adherence to a single political dogma
Lada researches and develops biological tools to better visualize and manage biology at the molecular level.”
Um this is pretty cool. Don’t know why you’re categorically dismissive.
B) By that logic, isn't all money tainted? And everyone of us? And every thing?
This is the starting point of every person's decisions regarding being ethical.
How far back do you need to "follow the money" before you consider it "ethical"?
That is up to every person. Theil has actively engaged in dubious ethics, I won't belabor them again. With him it is one hop to "dubious", compared to other organizations where you have to make several graph node hops to get to something dubius. This is a personal choice and everyone has to do their own research if they care about it.
Just to be clear, this is what you said that I was responding to:
> I think the concern is that they are taking money from someone with highly debatable/questionable ethics.
Some investors in almost all public companies have highly debatable ethics.
But that is why I said it is up to the individual. Some people could care less, other people at least want to know if the board is ethical.
I would put in the effort to know if any shady people were on the board of the company I'm taking money from. And if new information came to light after the fact, I would cease taking money.
You can't know everything about everything, and not even attempting to be ethical because you don't have all the information without doing any research is, IMHO, cowardly. It's the "if we can't fix this one big thing why bother doing any of these other things" fallacy. But that's just me and my ilk.
It's easy to make fun of someone trying to be ethical or who cares, because you can't know everything. That's what trolls do for fun. But I think it takes courage to try to stand for something you believe in. Again, that's just me and my ilk.
I'd definitely not want to work for a company that takes Thiel's money or has any of his acolytes or close associates on board, though.
I don't think it's fair to assume that startup founders who have applied to a Thiel Fellowship did so because of ignorance (or because they are young or "foreign").
This is an amazing opportunity for many people and highly competitive. I even see an upside to companies automatically being able to filter their hiring for people that don't get hung up on this. If someone won't work for a company because a particular VC funded it, I can imagine there a much higher probability of that person causing trouble wherever they end up
My assumption is they obviously know he's a "titan of industry" and that's obviously why they applied for the fellowship. They may not know or care about his politics, and (yes, partially due to the fact that the bulk of these events transpired when they were much younger) may not be aware of some of his more loathsome antics.
I'm not condemning these people, or saying they're stupid. If anything I'm trying to give them the benefit of the doubt, here.
If someone won't work for a company because a particular VC funded it, I can imagine there a much higher probability of that person causing trouble wherever they end up.
It's called ethical backbone. It is perfectly acceptable to not want to work for companies that are engaged in any manner of unethical practices. Or for people who are basically unethical and/or toxic. Or for companies they fund.
If this kind of stance falls under the rubric of "causing trouble" then well, that's the world you chose to live in.