OK, so if I’m getting this correctly, the idea is that there are different capabilities, and the low hanging fruit hypothesis applies separately to each one, and not all capabilities are being pursued successfully at all times, so when a new capability starts being pursued successfully there is a burst of rapid progress as low-hanging fruit is picked. Thus, progress should proceed jumpily, with some capabilities stagnant or nonexistent for a while and then quickly becoming great and then levelling off. Is this what you have in mind?
That is correct. And since different players start with different capabilities and are in different local environments under the soft takeoff assumption, I really can’t imagine a scenario where everyone winds up in the same place (or even tries to get there—I strongly expect optimizing for different capabilities depending on the environment, too).
OK, I think I agree with this picture to some extent. It’s just that if things like taking over the world require lots of different capabilities, maybe jumpy progress in specific capabilities distributed unevenly across factions all sorta averages out thanks to law of large numbers into smooth progress in world-takeover-ability distributed mostly evenly across factions.
Or not. Idk. I think this is an important variable to model and forecast, thanks for bringing it up!
OK, so if I’m getting this correctly, the idea is that there are different capabilities, and the low hanging fruit hypothesis applies separately to each one, and not all capabilities are being pursued successfully at all times, so when a new capability starts being pursued successfully there is a burst of rapid progress as low-hanging fruit is picked. Thus, progress should proceed jumpily, with some capabilities stagnant or nonexistent for a while and then quickly becoming great and then levelling off. Is this what you have in mind?
That is correct. And since different players start with different capabilities and are in different local environments under the soft takeoff assumption, I really can’t imagine a scenario where everyone winds up in the same place (or even tries to get there—I strongly expect optimizing for different capabilities depending on the environment, too).
OK, I think I agree with this picture to some extent. It’s just that if things like taking over the world require lots of different capabilities, maybe jumpy progress in specific capabilities distributed unevenly across factions all sorta averages out thanks to law of large numbers into smooth progress in world-takeover-ability distributed mostly evenly across factions.
Or not. Idk. I think this is an important variable to model and forecast, thanks for bringing it up!