Good point: I was planning to amend my comment to say that I also support efforts to stop or hinder the AI project through ordinary political processes and that the “revolution in political affairs” is interesting to think about mainly because it might become apparent (years from now) that working within the political system has failed.
I also regret the choice of phrase, “tiny shred of hope”. I have a regrettable (mostly unconscious) motivation to direct people’s attention to the harsher aspects of the human condition, and I think I let some of that motivation creep into my previous comment. Nevertheless I really do think the global situation is quite alarming because of the AI project.
I’m very supportive of efforts to postpone the day when the AI project kills us all (or deprives us of the ability to influence our future) because that allows more time for us to be saved by some means that seems very unlikely to us now or that we are unable to even imagine now. I’m very skeptical of the policy of looking forward to or being neutral about the arrival of human-level AI because (according to proponents) then we can start more effective efforts at trying to align it, which I think has much less hope than a lot of people here think it does, which made me want to describe some alternative veins of hope.
Is this an accurate summary of your suggestions?
Realistic actions an AI Safety researcher can take to save the world:
✅ Pray for a global revolution
✅ Pray for an alien invasion
❌ Talk to your representative
Good point: I was planning to amend my comment to say that I also support efforts to stop or hinder the AI project through ordinary political processes and that the “revolution in political affairs” is interesting to think about mainly because it might become apparent (years from now) that working within the political system has failed.
I also regret the choice of phrase, “tiny shred of hope”. I have a regrettable (mostly unconscious) motivation to direct people’s attention to the harsher aspects of the human condition, and I think I let some of that motivation creep into my previous comment. Nevertheless I really do think the global situation is quite alarming because of the AI project.
I’m very supportive of efforts to postpone the day when the AI project kills us all (or deprives us of the ability to influence our future) because that allows more time for us to be saved by some means that seems very unlikely to us now or that we are unable to even imagine now. I’m very skeptical of the policy of looking forward to or being neutral about the arrival of human-level AI because (according to proponents) then we can start more effective efforts at trying to align it, which I think has much less hope than a lot of people here think it does, which made me want to describe some alternative veins of hope.