That is, the ELK solution probably would have to be at least as smart (or smarter) than the plan-generator.
[...]
But anyways, in the moment of realization, my suspension of disbelief got unsuspended. I snapped. I thought “there is actually no way that any of this is on the real path to solving alignment, this is just too insane.”
In my work I don’t shy away from exotic problems (I often find them useful as extreme cases to illustrate some principle). At the same time, I’m aiming for mundane solutions and optimistic about finding them.
I think those positions are consistent because my intermediate goal is to ensure that the oversight process is able to leverage all of the capabilities developed by the model — so if the model develops exotic capabilities which pose exotic challenges, then we get an exotic oversight process automatically
The main hope is to have the ELK solution be at least as smart as the plan-generator. See mundane solutions to exotic problems: