As a bystander who can understand this, and find the arguments and conclusions sound, I must say I feel very hopeless and “kinda” scared at this point. I’m living in at least an environment, if not a world, where even explaining something comparatively simple like how life extension is a net good is a struggle. Explaining or discussing this is definitely impossible—I’ve tried with the cleverer, more transhumanistic/rationalistic minded people I know, and it just doesn’t click for them, to the contrary, I find people like to push in the other direction, as if it were a game.
And at the same time, I realize it is unlikely I can contribute anything remotely significant to a solution myself. So I can only spectate. This is literally maddening, especially so when most everyone seems to underreact.
This might sound absurd, but I legit think that there’s something that most people can do. Being something like radically publicly honest and radically forgiving and radically threat-aware, in your personal life, could contribute to causing society in general to be radically honest and forgiving and threat-aware, which might allow people poised to press the Start button on AGI to back off.
ETA: In general, try to behave in a way such that if everyone behaved that way, the barriers to AGI researchers noticing that they’re heading towards ending the world would be lowered / removed. You’ll probably run up against some kind of resistance; that might be a sign that some social pattern is pushing us into cultural regimes where AGI researchers are pushed to do world-ending stuff.
Vincent Fagot: Where do you live (in general terms if you can provide it, feel free not to dox yourself if you don’t want to)? I live in countryside Brazil, so I can strongly relate.
As a bystander who can understand this, and find the arguments and conclusions sound, I must say I feel very hopeless and “kinda” scared at this point. I’m living in at least an environment, if not a world, where even explaining something comparatively simple like how life extension is a net good is a struggle. Explaining or discussing this is definitely impossible—I’ve tried with the cleverer, more transhumanistic/rationalistic minded people I know, and it just doesn’t click for them, to the contrary, I find people like to push in the other direction, as if it were a game.
And at the same time, I realize it is unlikely I can contribute anything remotely significant to a solution myself. So I can only spectate. This is literally maddening, especially so when most everyone seems to underreact.
If it’s any consolation, you would not feel more powerful or less scared if you were myself.
Well, obviously, it won’t be consolation enough, but I can certainly revel in some human warmth inside by knowing I’m not alone in feeling like this.
This might sound absurd, but I legit think that there’s something that most people can do. Being something like radically publicly honest and radically forgiving and radically threat-aware, in your personal life, could contribute to causing society in general to be radically honest and forgiving and threat-aware, which might allow people poised to press the Start button on AGI to back off.
ETA: In general, try to behave in a way such that if everyone behaved that way, the barriers to AGI researchers noticing that they’re heading towards ending the world would be lowered / removed. You’ll probably run up against some kind of resistance; that might be a sign that some social pattern is pushing us into cultural regimes where AGI researchers are pushed to do world-ending stuff.
Vincent Fagot: Where do you live (in general terms if you can provide it, feel free not to dox yourself if you don’t want to)? I live in countryside Brazil, so I can strongly relate.