This IS me going beyond the surface. The obvious question here is "who is this foundation and are they working with the AI labs". I answered both.

The headline in this piece made it look like maybe a foundation was trying to help mathematician's push back against the unwanted assault on their profession by the AI labs. The section I quoted shows that's not the case.

Also not sure how you interpreted "foundation started by the Renaissance Technology hedge fund billionaire" as a mindless boost.

▲

danielmarkbruce 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Respectfully, you didn't answer either. Jim Simons was a brilliant mathematician, has done a lot for math and people involved in math. If you assume they are "pro math and pro math people", the why is simple too.

▲

simonw 3 hours ago | parent [-]

I assumed Hacker News commenters would find the extra contextual information useful in the same way that I did. I didn't assume they would come to the same conclusions, and I've not come to conclusions myself.

I'm going to defend my comment. I said:

> The obvious question here is "who is this foundation and are they working with the AI labs". I answered both.

You said:

> Respectfully, you didn't answer either.

My first comment started by quoting:

> Under a partnership, the Simons Foundation, Anthropic and OpenAI will commit $15 million in combined funding and resources

That answer the question: are they working with the AI labs?

And then I said:

> The foundation was started in 1994, Wikipedia says "one of the largest charitable organizations in the United States with assets of over $5 billion in 2022" - Jim Simons founded the Renaissance Technologies hedge fund.

I think that's a pretty solid starting answer to "who are they", and it tips people off that Wikipedia can answer in more detail.

It also leaves opportunity for people like yourself to speak to Jim Simons' reputation and fill in more gaps.

▲

danielmarkbruce 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Fair enough. It just makes him and the foundation sound so soulless. We need more folks like him, not less.

	▲	simonw an hour ago \| parent [-]
		He does appear to have been a proper nerd in the best way.