Rationality realism seems like a good thing to point out which might be a crux for a lot of people, but it doesn’t seem to be a crux for me.
I don’t think there’s a true rationality out there in the world, or a true decision theory out there in the world, or even a true notion of intelligence out there in the world. I work on agent foundations because there’s still something I’m confused about even after that, and furthermore, AI safety work seems fairly hopeless while still so radically confused about the-phenomena-which-we-use-intelligence-and-rationality-and-agency-and-decision-theory-to-describe. And, as you say, “from a historical point of view I’m quite optimistic about using maths to describe things in general”.
Rationality realism seems like a good thing to point out which might be a crux for a lot of people, but it doesn’t seem to be a crux for me.
I don’t think there’s a true rationality out there in the world, or a true decision theory out there in the world, or even a true notion of intelligence out there in the world. I work on agent foundations because there’s still something I’m confused about even after that, and furthermore, AI safety work seems fairly hopeless while still so radically confused about the-phenomena-which-we-use-intelligence-and-rationality-and-agency-and-decision-theory-to-describe. And, as you say, “from a historical point of view I’m quite optimistic about using maths to describe things in general”.