The point of the post was to not lionize them over everyone else. The target audience I had in mind (which may not even exist at this point) was people who wanted to become alignment researchers because that’s where the front lines are. My point is that that may not be the best idea in some cases. At the end of the day, if we solve the alignment problem it will be directly thanks to those researchers, that’s what I mean.
As for the politics thing that’s interesting, I hadn’t thought of it horribly backfiring in that way. I mean the goal would be to explain to them why alignment is necessary, which shouldn’t be an impossible task. There’s a lot of legal and economic power coming from the government, so just ignoring that actor seems like a mistake.
The point of the post was to not lionize them over everyone else. The target audience I had in mind (which may not even exist at this point) was people who wanted to become alignment researchers because that’s where the front lines are. My point is that that may not be the best idea in some cases. At the end of the day, if we solve the alignment problem it will be directly thanks to those researchers, that’s what I mean.
As for the politics thing that’s interesting, I hadn’t thought of it horribly backfiring in that way. I mean the goal would be to explain to them why alignment is necessary, which shouldn’t be an impossible task. There’s a lot of legal and economic power coming from the government, so just ignoring that actor seems like a mistake.
Thanks for the feedback!