It’s always possible to say, solving the single/single alignment problem will prevent anything like that from happening in the first place, but why put all your hopes on plan A, when plan B is relatively neglected?
The OP writes “contributions to AI alignment are also generally unhelpful to existential safety.” I don’t think I’m taking a strong stand in favor of putting all our hopes on plan A, I’m trying to understand the perspective on which plan B is much more important even before considering neglectedness.
It seems premature to say, in advance of actually seeing what such research uncovers, whether the relevant mechanisms and governance improvements are exactly the same as the improvements we need for good governance generally, or different.
I agree that would be premature. That said, I still found it notable that OP saw such a large gap between the importance of CSC and other areas on and off the list (including MARL). Given that I would have these things in a different order (before having thought deeply), it seemed to illustrate a striking difference in perspective. I’m not really trying to take a strong stand, just using it to illustrate and explore that difference in perspective.
The OP writes “contributions to AI alignment are also generally unhelpful to existential safety.” I don’t think I’m taking a strong stand in favor of putting all our hopes on plan A, I’m trying to understand the perspective on which plan B is much more important even before considering neglectedness.
I agree that would be premature. That said, I still found it notable that OP saw such a large gap between the importance of CSC and other areas on and off the list (including MARL). Given that I would have these things in a different order (before having thought deeply), it seemed to illustrate a striking difference in perspective. I’m not really trying to take a strong stand, just using it to illustrate and explore that difference in perspective.