Manifest Man

4 hours ago

Manifest is a conference for the rationalist community, focusing on topics like AI, prediction markets, and self-improvement.
Sessions included unusual exercises, such as a 'reinforcement learning' workshop where men attempted to become more desirable by receiving feedback, but it often ended in failure.
Attendees aim to optimize their lives, treating social interactions and even reproduction as problems to be solved through data and markets, like selecting embryos for higher IQ.
Prediction markets are central to the community, with advocates like Robin Hanson promoting 'futarchy'—using markets to make political and personal decisions.
The culture combines hedonism (e.g., public cuddling, ketamine use) with a distrust of traditional institutions, seeking to replace expert control with market-driven knowledge.
Despite its anti-establishment vibe, Manifest has ties to power, including figures from tech and finance, and aspires to become a more influential version of elite gatherings like Davos.
The movement believes in radical transparency, using markets to reveal personal information (e.g., relationship odds, sexual desires), which is seen as a way to improve outcomes through 'annealing.'

Hasty Briefsbeta