Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

Bill Gates is still kickin'. There are credible independent estimates that his funding has saved tens of millions of lives that would've been lost to malaria, AIDS, and other diseases.

Effective altruism and other New Age garbage pseudo philosophy can't hold a candle to that.





> Bill Gates is still kickin'.

And he's retired, so the money is no longer useful to him for maintaining control over the company he runs or expanding it, which is when it traditionally starts going to charities.


In my opinion, one of the things that most reveals a person's biases and worldview is which tech oligarchs they revere and which they loathe

To reveal my own bias / worldview, I loathe and detest Bill Gates in nearly every way and have done so for over three decades. I think he has had a massively negative impact on humanity, mainly by making the computer industry so shitty for 4+ decades but in other more controversial areas as well.

With Elon Musk, while perceiving a number of big faults in the man, I also acknowledge that he has helped advance some very beneficial technologies (like electric vehicles and battery storage). So I have a mixed opinion on him, while with Gates, he is almost all evil and has had a massive negative impact on the planet.


What if you think they're all evil?

Yeah, that's cool. I loathe almost all of them too (e.g. Zuckerberg, Altman, Hoffman, Ellison, etc)

I guess what I'm saying is that when people only fixate on one oligarch, which one they mostly focus on can be quite telling.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: