Your comment and Vaniver’s (paraphrasing) “not surprised by the results of this work, so why do it?” especially helpful. EY (or others) assessing concrete research directions with detailed explanations would be even more helpful.
I agree with Rohin’s general question of “Can you tell a story where your research helps solve a specific alignment problem?”, and if you have other heuristics when assessing research, that would be good to know.
Note: GOFAI = Good Old Fashioned AI
Your comment and Vaniver’s (paraphrasing) “not surprised by the results of this work, so why do it?” especially helpful. EY (or others) assessing concrete research directions with detailed explanations would be even more helpful.
I agree with Rohin’s general question of “Can you tell a story where your research helps solve a specific alignment problem?”, and if you have other heuristics when assessing research, that would be good to know.