Followup: Matthew and I ended up talking about it in person. tl;dr of my position is that
Falsifiability is a symmetric two-place relation; one cannot say “X is unfalsifiable,” except as shorthand for saying “X and Y make the same predictions,” and thus Y is equally unfalsifiable. When someone is going around saying “X is unfalsifiable, therefore not-X,” that’s often a misuse of the concept—what they should say instead is “On priors / for other reasons (e.g. deference) I prefer not-X to X; and since both theories make the same predictions, I expect to continue thinking this instead of updating, since there won’t be anything to update on
.What is the point of falsifiability-talk then? Well, first of all, it’s quite important to track when two theories make the same predictions, or the same-predictions-till-time-T. It’s an important part of the bigger project of extracting predictions from theories so they can be tested. It’s exciting progress when you discover that two theories make different predictions, and nail it down well enough to bet on. Secondly, it’s quite important to track when people are making this worse rather than easier—e.g. fortunetellers and pundits will often go out of their way to avoid making any predictions that diverge from what their interlocutors already would predict. Whereas the best scientists/thinkers/forecasters, the ones you should defer to, should be actively trying to find alpha and then exploit it by making bets with people around them. So falsifiability-talk is useful for evaluating people as epistemically virtuous or vicious. But note that if this is what you are doing, it’s all a relative thing in a different way—in the case of MIRI, for example, the question should be “Should I defer to them more, or less, than various alternative thinkers A B and C? --> Are they generally more virtuous about making specific predictions, seeking to make bets with their interlocutors, etc. than A B or C?”
So with that as context, I’d say that (a) It’s just wrong to say ‘MIRI’s theories of doom are unfalsifiable.’ Instead say ‘unfortunately for us (not for the plausibility of the theories), both MIRI’s doom theories and (insert your favorite non-doom theories here) make the same predictions until it’s basically too late.’ (b) One should then look at MIRI and be suspicious and think ‘are they systematically avoiding making bets, making specific predictions, etc. relative to the other people we could defer to? Are they playing the sneaky fortuneteller or pundit’s game?’ to which I think the answer is ‘no not at all, they are actually more epistemically virtuous in this regard than the average intellectual. That said, they aren’t the best either—some other people in the AI risk community seem to be doing better than them in this regard, and deserve more virtue points (and possibly deference points) therefore.’ E.g. I think both Matthew and I have more concrete forecasting track records than Yudkowsky?
Followup: Matthew and I ended up talking about it in person. tl;dr of my position is that
Falsifiability is a symmetric two-place relation; one cannot say “X is unfalsifiable,” except as shorthand for saying “X and Y make the same predictions,” and thus Y is equally unfalsifiable. When someone is going around saying “X is unfalsifiable, therefore not-X,” that’s often a misuse of the concept—what they should say instead is “On priors / for other reasons (e.g. deference) I prefer not-X to X; and since both theories make the same predictions, I expect to continue thinking this instead of updating, since there won’t be anything to update on
.What is the point of falsifiability-talk then? Well, first of all, it’s quite important to track when two theories make the same predictions, or the same-predictions-till-time-T. It’s an important part of the bigger project of extracting predictions from theories so they can be tested. It’s exciting progress when you discover that two theories make different predictions, and nail it down well enough to bet on. Secondly, it’s quite important to track when people are making this worse rather than easier—e.g. fortunetellers and pundits will often go out of their way to avoid making any predictions that diverge from what their interlocutors already would predict. Whereas the best scientists/thinkers/forecasters, the ones you should defer to, should be actively trying to find alpha and then exploit it by making bets with people around them. So falsifiability-talk is useful for evaluating people as epistemically virtuous or vicious. But note that if this is what you are doing, it’s all a relative thing in a different way—in the case of MIRI, for example, the question should be “Should I defer to them more, or less, than various alternative thinkers A B and C? --> Are they generally more virtuous about making specific predictions, seeking to make bets with their interlocutors, etc. than A B or C?”
So with that as context, I’d say that (a) It’s just wrong to say ‘MIRI’s theories of doom are unfalsifiable.’ Instead say ‘unfortunately for us (not for the plausibility of the theories), both MIRI’s doom theories and (insert your favorite non-doom theories here) make the same predictions until it’s basically too late.’ (b) One should then look at MIRI and be suspicious and think ‘are they systematically avoiding making bets, making specific predictions, etc. relative to the other people we could defer to? Are they playing the sneaky fortuneteller or pundit’s game?’ to which I think the answer is ‘no not at all, they are actually more epistemically virtuous in this regard than the average intellectual. That said, they aren’t the best either—some other people in the AI risk community seem to be doing better than them in this regard, and deserve more virtue points (and possibly deference points) therefore.’ E.g. I think both Matthew and I have more concrete forecasting track records than Yudkowsky?