To operationalize, I claim that MIRI has been directed at a close enough target to yours that you probably should update on MIRI’s lack of progress at least as much as you would if MIRI was doing the same thing as you, but for half as long.
Which isn’t *that* large an update. The average number of agent foundations researchers (That are public facing enough that you can update on their lack of progress) at MIRI over the last decade is like 4.
Figuring out how to factor in researcher quality is hard, but it seems plausible to me that the amount of quality adjusted attention directed at your subgoal over the next decade is significantly larger than the amount of attention directed at your subgoal over the last decade. (Which would not all come from you. I do think that Agent Foundations today is non-trivially closer to John today that Agent Foundations 5 years ago is to John today.)
It seems accurate to me to say that Agent Foundations in 2014 was more focused on reflection, which shifted towards embeddedness, and then shifted towards abstraction, and that these things all flow together in my head, and so Scott thinking about abstraction will have more reflection mixed in than John thinking about abstraction. (Indeed, I think progress on abstraction would have huge consequences on how we think about reflection.)
In case it is not obvious to people reading, I endorse John’s research program. (Which can maybe be inferred by the fact that I am arguing that it is similar to my own). I think we disagree about what is the most likely path after becoming less confused about agency, but that part of both our plans is yet to be written, and I think the subgoal is enough of a simple concept that I don’t think disagreements about what to do next to have a strong impact on how to do the first step.
In particular, for folks reading, I symmetrically agree with this part:
In case it is not obvious to people reading, I endorse John’s research program. (Which can maybe be inferred by the fact that I am arguing that it is similar to my own). I think we disagree about what is the most likely path after becoming less confused about agency, but that part of both our plans is yet to be written, and I think the subgoal is enough of a simple concept that I don’t think disagreements about what to do next to have a strong impact on how to do the first step.
… i.e. I endorse Scott’s research program, mine is indeed similar, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if we disagree about what comes next but we’re pretty aligned on what to do now.
Also, I realize now that I didn’t emphasize it in the OP, but a large chunk of my “50/50 chance of success” comes from other peoples’ work playing a central role, and the agent foundations team at MIRI is obviously at the top of the list of people whose work is likely to fit that bill. (There’s also the whole topic of producing more such people, which I didn’t talk about in the OP at all, but I’m tentatively optimistic on that front too.)
To operationalize, I claim that MIRI has been directed at a close enough target to yours that you probably should update on MIRI’s lack of progress at least as much as you would if MIRI was doing the same thing as you, but for half as long.
Which isn’t *that* large an update. The average number of agent foundations researchers (That are public facing enough that you can update on their lack of progress) at MIRI over the last decade is like 4.
Figuring out how to factor in researcher quality is hard, but it seems plausible to me that the amount of quality adjusted attention directed at your subgoal over the next decade is significantly larger than the amount of attention directed at your subgoal over the last decade. (Which would not all come from you. I do think that Agent Foundations today is non-trivially closer to John today that Agent Foundations 5 years ago is to John today.)
It seems accurate to me to say that Agent Foundations in 2014 was more focused on reflection, which shifted towards embeddedness, and then shifted towards abstraction, and that these things all flow together in my head, and so Scott thinking about abstraction will have more reflection mixed in than John thinking about abstraction. (Indeed, I think progress on abstraction would have huge consequences on how we think about reflection.)
In case it is not obvious to people reading, I endorse John’s research program. (Which can maybe be inferred by the fact that I am arguing that it is similar to my own). I think we disagree about what is the most likely path after becoming less confused about agency, but that part of both our plans is yet to be written, and I think the subgoal is enough of a simple concept that I don’t think disagreements about what to do next to have a strong impact on how to do the first step.
This all sounds right.
In particular, for folks reading, I symmetrically agree with this part:
… i.e. I endorse Scott’s research program, mine is indeed similar, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if we disagree about what comes next but we’re pretty aligned on what to do now.
Also, I realize now that I didn’t emphasize it in the OP, but a large chunk of my “50/50 chance of success” comes from other peoples’ work playing a central role, and the agent foundations team at MIRI is obviously at the top of the list of people whose work is likely to fit that bill. (There’s also the whole topic of producing more such people, which I didn’t talk about in the OP at all, but I’m tentatively optimistic on that front too.)