My timelines have now updated to something closer to fast takeoff. In a world like this, how valuable is educating the general public?
Claude claims science started worrying about the climate in the 50s/60s. It wasn’t until 2010s that we saw meaningful action beginning to take place.
Do we have the time to educate?
To be clear, this is more of a question than an opinion that I hold. I am working to form an opinion.
In my experience, most of the general public will verbally agree that AI X-risk is a big deal, but then go about their day (cause reasonably, they have no power). There’s no obvious social role/action to do in response to that.
For climate, people understand that they should recycle, not keep the water running, and if there’s a way to donate to clean the ocean on a Mr. Beast video, then some will even donate (sadly, none of these are very effective for solving the climate problem though! Gotta avoid that for our case).
Having a clear call-to-action seems relevant. For example, educating the public about AI taking jobs for the purpose of building support for UBI. It’s then clear what to communicate and the call-to-action.
I’d be curious to hear what you think an ask should be?
Alternatively, you could argue that generally informing folks on a wide scale about the risks involved will then allow general public to do what they believe is locally best. This could involve a documentary or realistic movie.
What do you mean with “meaningful action” regarding climate in the 2010s?
If you look at solar energy, panel prices go down largely in a straight (on a logarithmic scale) since 1975 with a short pause between 2005 to 2010. German pro-solar policy started in the 1990 and the biggest change in 2011 was the new five-year plan of th CCP which was probably driven more by economic justifications.
There are few people who currently think we should do whatever is possible to reduce temperature rise. Doing so would mean to have a plan for geoengineering. Climate activist often use climate as a justification to push for anticapitalist policies that they independently believe.
The fight for human flourishing doesn’t end at the initiation of takeoff [echo many points from Seth Herd here]. More generally, it’s very possible to win the fight and lose the war, and a broader base of people who are invested in AI issues will improve the situation.
(I also don’t think this is an accurate simplification of the climate movement or its successes/failures. But that’s tangential to the point I’d like to make.)
My timelines have now updated to something closer to fast takeoff. In a world like this, how valuable is educating the general public? Claude claims science started worrying about the climate in the 50s/60s. It wasn’t until 2010s that we saw meaningful action beginning to take place. Do we have the time to educate?
To be clear, this is more of a question than an opinion that I hold. I am working to form an opinion.
In my experience, most of the general public will verbally agree that AI X-risk is a big deal, but then go about their day (cause reasonably, they have no power). There’s no obvious social role/action to do in response to that.
For climate, people understand that they should recycle, not keep the water running, and if there’s a way to donate to clean the ocean on a Mr. Beast video, then some will even donate (sadly, none of these are very effective for solving the climate problem though! Gotta avoid that for our case).
Having a clear call-to-action seems relevant. For example, educating the public about AI taking jobs for the purpose of building support for UBI. It’s then clear what to communicate and the call-to-action.
I’d be curious to hear what you think an ask should be?
Alternatively, you could argue that generally informing folks on a wide scale about the risks involved will then allow general public to do what they believe is locally best. This could involve a documentary or realistic movie.
What do you mean with “meaningful action” regarding climate in the 2010s?
If you look at solar energy, panel prices go down largely in a straight (on a logarithmic scale) since 1975 with a short pause between 2005 to 2010. German pro-solar policy started in the 1990 and the biggest change in 2011 was the new five-year plan of th CCP which was probably driven more by economic justifications.
There are few people who currently think we should do whatever is possible to reduce temperature rise. Doing so would mean to have a plan for geoengineering. Climate activist often use climate as a justification to push for anticapitalist policies that they independently believe.
The fight for human flourishing doesn’t end at the initiation of takeoff [echo many points from Seth Herd here]. More generally, it’s very possible to win the fight and lose the war, and a broader base of people who are invested in AI issues will improve the situation.
(I also don’t think this is an accurate simplification of the climate movement or its successes/failures. But that’s tangential to the point I’d like to make.)