I tend to concentrate on extinction, as the most massive and terrifying of risks. I think that smaller problems can be dealt with by the usual methods, like our society has dealt with lots of things. Which is not to say that they aren’t real problems, that do real harm, and require real solutions. My disagreement is with “You’re distracting people with your farfetched speculation.” I don’t think raising questions of existential risk makes it harder to deal with more quotidian problems. And even if it did, that’s not an argument against the reality of extinction risk.
I tend to concentrate on extinction, as the most massive and terrifying of risks. I think that smaller problems can be dealt with by the usual methods, like our society has dealt with lots of things. Which is not to say that they aren’t real problems, that do real harm, and require real solutions. My disagreement is with “You’re distracting people with your farfetched speculation.” I don’t think raising questions of existential risk makes it harder to deal with more quotidian problems. And even if it did, that’s not an argument against the reality of extinction risk.