Comment by benrutter
4 hours ago
> I don't think that's how the market works
I think you're sort of right, but then I'd have found it very strange / deeply suspicious, if during the time of slavery being legal, advocates of abolitionism were practicing slave-owners.
If you think AI is going to destroy humanity, it still feels absolutely crazy to leap to "well I might as well be the one to profit from destroying humanity".
Quick search does suggest to me that a number of - even prominent - abolitionists were slave owners, but I'll be honest, the topic is hardly my specialty.
As for the other point, crazy, cynical, and even unethical as it may come off, it is hardly inconsistent with how people generally behave when met with hard limits (i.e. making the most of what's available, and approximating the desired state if that is unattainable). This is just a variation on the same.
Something could be said about "what if they're mistaken", but if all players are making a mistake, then that makes little practical difference; it may as well be real.
A quick search suggests to me that those same abolitionists were born into families that were slave owners, but rejected their upbringing to become abolitionists. It doesn't suggest that a large fraction of practicing abolitionists were contemporary slave owners.