If we knew he was not a sociopath, sadist, or reckless ideologue,
He is also old, which means you must also ask about his age related cognitive and personality change. There were rumours that during covid he had become scared and rigid.
Personally, I think we need to focus not on his character but on 1) how much he cares, as this will decide how much he delegates 2) how much he understands, as we all risk death, but many do not understand or agree with this 3) how competent he currently is to execute his goals.
Xi rules China so thoroughly that he would personally make key decisions regarding AGI
Even if he had absolute power, it doesn’t mean he won’t delegate. After all, his time is limited.
So, does anyone know of good work addressing his character and personal beliefs? Or is this an interesting research topic for anyone?
This is hard to find the truth here because we have state level information warfare obscuring the truth. That means there is propaganda designed to deceive and obscure even a professional analyst with access to secret information. However we do have some state level analysis, available through WikiLeaks we can look at what the US diplomats think, in the leaked diplomatic cables ( alsoand )
(C) According to a well connected Embassy contact, Politburo Standing Committee Member and Vice President Xi Jinping is “exceptionally ambitious,” confident and focused, and has had his “eye on the prize” from early adulthood.
PolOff’s contact (“the professor”) and Xi Jinping were both born in 1953 and grew up in similar circumstances. … The professor did not know Xi personally until they had both reached their late teens,
(C) In the professor’s view, Xi Jinping is supremely pragmatic, a realist, driven not by ideology but by a combination of ambition and “self-protection.” The professor saw Xi’s early calculations to carefully lay out a realistic career path as an illustration of his pragmatism.
(C) Xi is a true “elitist” at heart,
I don’t know how reliable these cables are, but they represent an interesting source.
The things you mention are all important too, but I think we have better guesses on all of those.
Xi is widely considered to be highly intelligent. We also have reason to believe he understands why AGI could be a real x-risk (I don’t remember the link for “is Xi Jinping a doomer?” or similar).
That’s enough to guess that he understands (or will soon enough).
I’d be shocked if he just didn’t care about the future of humanity. Getting to control that would tempt most people, let alone those who seek power. I’d be shocked if he (or anyone) delegated decisions on AGI if they remotely understood their possible consequences (although you’d certainly delegate people to help think about them. That could be important if he was stupid or malleable, which Xi is not—unless he becomes senile or paranoiac, which he might).
The Wikileaks information parallels the informed speculation I’ve found on his character. None of that really helps much to establish whether he’s sociopathic, sadistic, or risk-taking enough to doom us all.
(I tend to think that 99% of humanity is probably sane and empathetic enough to get good results from an intent-aligned AGI (since it can help them think about the issue), but it’s hard to know since nobody has ever been in that position, ever.)
He is also old, which means you must also ask about his age related cognitive and personality change. There were rumours that during covid he had become scared and rigid.
Personally, I think we need to focus not on his character but on 1) how much he cares, as this will decide how much he delegates 2) how much he understands, as we all risk death, but many do not understand or agree with this 3) how competent he currently is to execute his goals.
Even if he had absolute power, it doesn’t mean he won’t delegate. After all, his time is limited.
This is hard to find the truth here because we have state level information warfare obscuring the truth. That means there is propaganda designed to deceive and obscure even a professional analyst with access to secret information. However we do have some state level analysis, available through WikiLeaks we can look at what the US diplomats think, in the leaked diplomatic cables ( also and )
I don’t know how reliable these cables are, but they represent an interesting source.
The things you mention are all important too, but I think we have better guesses on all of those.
Xi is widely considered to be highly intelligent. We also have reason to believe he understands why AGI could be a real x-risk (I don’t remember the link for “is Xi Jinping a doomer?” or similar).
That’s enough to guess that he understands (or will soon enough).
I’d be shocked if he just didn’t care about the future of humanity. Getting to control that would tempt most people, let alone those who seek power. I’d be shocked if he (or anyone) delegated decisions on AGI if they remotely understood their possible consequences (although you’d certainly delegate people to help think about them. That could be important if he was stupid or malleable, which Xi is not—unless he becomes senile or paranoiac, which he might).
The Wikileaks information parallels the informed speculation I’ve found on his character. None of that really helps much to establish whether he’s sociopathic, sadistic, or risk-taking enough to doom us all.
(I tend to think that 99% of humanity is probably sane and empathetic enough to get good results from an intent-aligned AGI (since it can help them think about the issue), but it’s hard to know since nobody has ever been in that position, ever.)