I think it’s uncharitable to psychoanalyze why people upvoted John’s comment; his object-level point about GoF seems good and merits an upvote IMO. Really, I don’t know what to make of GoF. It’s not just that governments have failed to ban it, they haven’t even stopped funding it, or in the USA case they stopped funding it and then restarted I think. My mental models can’t explain that. Anyone on the street can immediately understand why GoF is dangerous. GoF is a threat to politicians and national security. GoF has no upsides that stand up to scrutiny, and has no politically-powerful advocates AFAIK. And we’re just getting over a pandemic which consumed an extraordinary amount of money, comfort, lives, and attention for the past couple years, and which was either a direct consequence of GoF research, or at the very least the kind of thing that GoF research could have led to. And yet, here we are, with governments funding GoF research right now. Again, I can’t explain this, and pending a detailed model that can, the best I can do right now is say “Gee I guess I should just be way more cynical about pretty much everything.”
Anyway, back to your post, if Option 1 is unilateral pivotal act and Option 2 is government-supported pivotal outcome, then one ought to try to weigh the pros and cons (particularly, probability of failure) of both options; your post was only about why Option 1 might fail but IIRC didn’t say anything about whether Option 2 might fail too. Maybe every option is doomed and the task is to choose the slightly-less-doomed option, right?
I’m not an expert, and maybe you have a gears-y model in which it’s natural & expected that governments are funding GoF right now and also simultaneously in which it’s natural & expected that the government-sanctioned-EMP-thing story you told in your post is likely to actually happen. (Or at least, less likely to fail than Option 1.) If so, I would be very interested for you to share that model!
I think it’s uncharitable to psychoanalyze why people upvoted John’s comment; his object-level point about GoF seems good and merits an upvote IMO. Really, I don’t know what to make of GoF. It’s not just that governments have failed to ban it, they haven’t even stopped funding it, or in the USA case they stopped funding it and then restarted I think. My mental models can’t explain that. Anyone on the street can immediately understand why GoF is dangerous. GoF is a threat to politicians and national security. GoF has no upsides that stand up to scrutiny, and has no politically-powerful advocates AFAIK. And we’re just getting over a pandemic which consumed an extraordinary amount of money, comfort, lives, and attention for the past couple years, and which was either a direct consequence of GoF research, or at the very least the kind of thing that GoF research could have led to. And yet, here we are, with governments funding GoF research right now. Again, I can’t explain this, and pending a detailed model that can, the best I can do right now is say “Gee I guess I should just be way more cynical about pretty much everything.”
Anyway, back to your post, if Option 1 is unilateral pivotal act and Option 2 is government-supported pivotal outcome, then one ought to try to weigh the pros and cons (particularly, probability of failure) of both options; your post was only about why Option 1 might fail but IIRC didn’t say anything about whether Option 2 might fail too. Maybe every option is doomed and the task is to choose the slightly-less-doomed option, right?
I’m not an expert, and maybe you have a gears-y model in which it’s natural & expected that governments are funding GoF right now and also simultaneously in which it’s natural & expected that the government-sanctioned-EMP-thing story you told in your post is likely to actually happen. (Or at least, less likely to fail than Option 1.) If so, I would be very interested for you to share that model!