I think this justification for doing research now is valid. However, I think that as the systems developed further, researchers would be forced to shift their arguments for risk anyway, since the concrete ways that the systems go wrong would be readily apparent. It’s possible that by that time it would be “too late” as the problems of safety are just too hard and researchers would have wished they made conceptual progress sooner (I’m pretty skeptical of this though).
I think this justification for doing research now is valid. However, I think that as the systems developed further, researchers would be forced to shift their arguments for risk anyway, since the concrete ways that the systems go wrong would be readily apparent. It’s possible that by that time it would be “too late” as the problems of safety are just too hard and researchers would have wished they made conceptual progress sooner (I’m pretty skeptical of this though).