I want to push back on calling 20+ years “long timelines”. It’s a linguistic shift which implicitly privileges a pretty radical position, in a way which is likely to give people a mistaken impression of general consensus.
I think that if it’s OK to call my view short timelines, it should be OK to call 20+ years long timelines. Insofar as one is implicitly priveleging something, so is the other, and which one is radical or consensus-busting depends on who you ask.
For example, if you ask me, the people with reasonable views worthy of respect have timelines medians ranging from, like, +2 years to +40 years. People who are like “It’s 50+ years away” are both (a) relatively rare among timelines experts, and (b) pretty silly.
The most comprehensive (perhaps only comprehensive?) investigation into this says median +35 years, with 35% credence on 50+, and surveys of experts in ML give even higher numbers. I don’t know who you’re counting as a timelines expert, but I haven’t seen any summaries/surveys of their opinions which justifies less than 20 years being the default option.
I’m not saying that this makes your view unreasonable. But presenting your view as consensus without presenting any legible evidence for that consensus is the sort of thing which makes me concerned about information cascades—particularly given the almost-total lack of solid public (or even private, to my knowledge) defences of that view.
I’m not presenting my view as consensus. There is no consensus of any sort on the matter of AI timelines, at least not a publicly legible one. (There’s the private stuff, like the one I mentioned about how everyone who I deem to be reasonable fits within a certain range). This is a symmetric consideration; if you have a problem with me calling 20+ year timelines “long” then you should also have a problem with people calling 10 year timelines “short.” Insofar as the former is illicitly claiming there exists a consensus and it supports a certain view, so is the latter.
I’d actually be fine with a solution where we all agree to stop using the terms “long timelines” and “short timelines” and just use numbers instead. How does that sound?
EDIT: Minor point: Ajeya’s report says median 2050, no? It’s been a while since I read it but I’m pretty sure that was what she said. Has it changed to 2055? I thought it updated down to 2045 or so after the bees investigation?
EDIT EDIT: Information cascades are indeed a big problem; I think they are one of the main reasons why people’s timelines are on average as long as they are. I think if information cascades didn’t exist people would have shorter timelines on average, at least in our community. One weak piece of evidence for this is that in my +12 OOMs post I polled people asking for their “inside views” and their “all things considered views” and their inside views were notably shorter-timelines. Another weak piece of evidence for this is that there is an asymmetry in public discourse, where people with <15 year timelines often don’t say so in public, or if they do they take care to be evasive about their arguments, for infohazard reasons. Another asymmetry is that generally speaking shorter timelines are considered by the broader public to be crazier, weirder, etc. There’s more of a stigma against having them.
I’d actually be fine with a solution where we all agree to stop using the terms “long timelines” and “short timelines” and just use numbers instead. How does that sound?
Yeah, that sounds very reasonable; let’s do that.
Ajeya’s report says median 2050, no?
I just checked, and it’s at 2055 now. Idk what changed.
I’d actually be fine with a solution where we all agree to stop using the terms “long timelines” and “short timelines” and just use numbers instead. How does that sound?
I want to push back on calling 20+ years “long timelines”. It’s a linguistic shift which implicitly privileges a pretty radical position, in a way which is likely to give people a mistaken impression of general consensus.
I think that if it’s OK to call my view short timelines, it should be OK to call 20+ years long timelines. Insofar as one is implicitly priveleging something, so is the other, and which one is radical or consensus-busting depends on who you ask.
For example, if you ask me, the people with reasonable views worthy of respect have timelines medians ranging from, like, +2 years to +40 years. People who are like “It’s 50+ years away” are both (a) relatively rare among timelines experts, and (b) pretty silly.
The most comprehensive (perhaps only comprehensive?) investigation into this says median +35 years, with 35% credence on 50+, and surveys of experts in ML give even higher numbers. I don’t know who you’re counting as a timelines expert, but I haven’t seen any summaries/surveys of their opinions which justifies less than 20 years being the default option.
I’m not saying that this makes your view unreasonable. But presenting your view as consensus without presenting any legible evidence for that consensus is the sort of thing which makes me concerned about information cascades—particularly given the almost-total lack of solid public (or even private, to my knowledge) defences of that view.
I’m not presenting my view as consensus. There is no consensus of any sort on the matter of AI timelines, at least not a publicly legible one. (There’s the private stuff, like the one I mentioned about how everyone who I deem to be reasonable fits within a certain range). This is a symmetric consideration; if you have a problem with me calling 20+ year timelines “long” then you should also have a problem with people calling 10 year timelines “short.” Insofar as the former is illicitly claiming there exists a consensus and it supports a certain view, so is the latter.
I’d actually be fine with a solution where we all agree to stop using the terms “long timelines” and “short timelines” and just use numbers instead. How does that sound?
EDIT: Minor point: Ajeya’s report says median 2050, no? It’s been a while since I read it but I’m pretty sure that was what she said. Has it changed to 2055? I thought it updated down to 2045 or so after the bees investigation?
EDIT EDIT: Information cascades are indeed a big problem; I think they are one of the main reasons why people’s timelines are on average as long as they are. I think if information cascades didn’t exist people would have shorter timelines on average, at least in our community. One weak piece of evidence for this is that in my +12 OOMs post I polled people asking for their “inside views” and their “all things considered views” and their inside views were notably shorter-timelines. Another weak piece of evidence for this is that there is an asymmetry in public discourse, where people with <15 year timelines often don’t say so in public, or if they do they take care to be evasive about their arguments, for infohazard reasons. Another asymmetry is that generally speaking shorter timelines are considered by the broader public to be crazier, weirder, etc. There’s more of a stigma against having them.
Yeah, that sounds very reasonable; let’s do that.
I just checked, and it’s at 2055 now. Idk what changed.
All right, sounds good! This feels right to me. I’ll taboo “short” and “long” when talking timelines henceforth!
I think this could be excellent.