Anyone know of anything more on deliberate relinquishment? I have seen some serious discussion by Bill McKibben in his book Enough but that’s about it.
In the linked post on the government controlling AGI development, the arguments say that it’s hard to narrowly tailor the development of specific technologies. Information technology was advancing rapidly and cryptography proved impossible to control. The government putting specific restrictions on “soft AI” amid otherwise advancing IT similarly seems far-fetched. But there are other routes. Instead we could enact policies that would deliberately slow growth in broad sectors like IT, biotechnology, and anything leading to self-replicating nanotechnology. Or maybe slow economic growth entirely and have the government direct resources at SIRCS. One can hardly argue that it is impossible to slow or even stop economic growth. We are in the middle of a worldwide economic slowdown as we type. The United States has seen little growth for at least the past ten years. I think broad relinquishment certainly cannot be dismissed without extensive discussion and to me it seems the natural way to deal with existential risk.
One can hardly argue that it is impossible to slow or even stop economic growth. We are in the middle of a worldwide economic slowdown as we type. The United States has seen little growth for at least the past ten years.
Yes, but most governments are doing their best to undo that slowdown: you’d need immense political power in order to make them encourage it.
Given some of today’s policy debates you might need less power than one might think. I think many governments, Europe being a clear case, are not doing their best to undo the slowdown. Rather, they are publicly proclaiming to be doing their best while actually setting very far from optimal policies. In a democracy you must always wear at least a cloak of serving the perceived public interest but that does not necessarily mean that you truly work in that perceived interest.
So when your Global Stasis Party wins 1% of the vote, you do not have 1% of people trying to bring about stasis and 99% trying to increase growth. Instead, already 50% of politicians may publicly proclaim to want increased growth but actually pursue growth reducing policies, and your 1% breaks the logjam and creates a 51% majority against growth. This assumes that you understand which parties are actually for and against growth, that is, you are wise enough to see through people’s facades.
I wonder how today’s policymakers would react to challengers seriously favoring no-growth economics. Would this have the effect of shifting the Overton Window? This position is so radically different from anything I’ve heard of that perhaps a small dose would have outsized effects.
You’re right about that. And there is already the degrowth movement, plus lately I’ve been hearing even some less radical politicians talking about scaling down economic growth (due to it not increasing well-being in the developed countries anymore). So perhaps something could in fact be done about that.
Anyone know of anything more on deliberate relinquishment? I have seen some serious discussion by Bill McKibben in his book Enough but that’s about it.
In the linked post on the government controlling AGI development, the arguments say that it’s hard to narrowly tailor the development of specific technologies. Information technology was advancing rapidly and cryptography proved impossible to control. The government putting specific restrictions on “soft AI” amid otherwise advancing IT similarly seems far-fetched. But there are other routes. Instead we could enact policies that would deliberately slow growth in broad sectors like IT, biotechnology, and anything leading to self-replicating nanotechnology. Or maybe slow economic growth entirely and have the government direct resources at SIRCS. One can hardly argue that it is impossible to slow or even stop economic growth. We are in the middle of a worldwide economic slowdown as we type. The United States has seen little growth for at least the past ten years. I think broad relinquishment certainly cannot be dismissed without extensive discussion and to me it seems the natural way to deal with existential risk.
Yes, but most governments are doing their best to undo that slowdown: you’d need immense political power in order to make them encourage it.
Given some of today’s policy debates you might need less power than one might think. I think many governments, Europe being a clear case, are not doing their best to undo the slowdown. Rather, they are publicly proclaiming to be doing their best while actually setting very far from optimal policies. In a democracy you must always wear at least a cloak of serving the perceived public interest but that does not necessarily mean that you truly work in that perceived interest.
So when your Global Stasis Party wins 1% of the vote, you do not have 1% of people trying to bring about stasis and 99% trying to increase growth. Instead, already 50% of politicians may publicly proclaim to want increased growth but actually pursue growth reducing policies, and your 1% breaks the logjam and creates a 51% majority against growth. This assumes that you understand which parties are actually for and against growth, that is, you are wise enough to see through people’s facades.
I wonder how today’s policymakers would react to challengers seriously favoring no-growth economics. Would this have the effect of shifting the Overton Window? This position is so radically different from anything I’ve heard of that perhaps a small dose would have outsized effects.
You’re right about that. And there is already the degrowth movement, plus lately I’ve been hearing even some less radical politicians talking about scaling down economic growth (due to it not increasing well-being in the developed countries anymore). So perhaps something could in fact be done about that.
And of course there is Bill Joy’s essay. I forgot about that. But seems like small potatoes.