HPMOR is weird and attracts weird people.
Meena Kumar
Karma: 10
Yudkowsky is not the right person to start this stuff in China.
I think a similar thing is true in India.
This is funny.
I’d like to see more work done on this myself. It is difficult to take blog posts seriously, especially for people who are already sceptics. “Oh, most of the writing is some books by people I’ve never heard of and a bunch blogposts? Sure sounds like bs”
“Sure, but in general, given enough adequate tools, most people contribute to keeping those things in check. ” What are you basing this on? And the issue is if the contributions will be enough. And not even making and providing adequate tools, but trying to figure out what tools will be adequate in the first place and then after that, getting people to actually use those tools. Still don’t see what this has to do with UBI.
Because we aren’t aligned.
And I don’t see how this has anything to do with UBI.
There are already people trying to make an AI that destroys humanity “for the lols”. Many people will try to use AI against each other. As they are now. E.g. militaries, scammers, revenge porn makers, etc.
One of the biggest problems in a world with UBI- the complete lack of power of the average person.
One worst things about the abuses of people in welfare by those in power (intentional abuse or not) is the utter disparity in power. And the deep psychological effects of that. Having been in such a position at one point, I felt humiliated, ashamed and really worthless. This is not how all people felt or do feel, but by and large, it is not good.
I think a much better alternative to UBI- but one that might be even harder to do- would be to work to make everyone self sufficient. E.g. if AI was used to design highly efficient, easily repairable solar panels and solar energy storage. Mini factories that everyone could own that can make parts from raw material. Greater ability to protect your own assets and purchase the things you need (through a combination of needing less things and things being cheaper) meaning not needing to rely on banks. Laws/policies to prevent Buy to Let schemes and the ability to launder money/evade taxes through properties, to lower housing prices. Laws/policies to close tax loopholes.
I think in a proper ‘utopia’ UBI would be completely unnecessary. And I don’t think UBI helps us get there- rather it does the opposite, by distracting from doing things like the above and giving an opposing argument to doing them (e.g.”Houses are expensive for loads of good reasons!! We should do UBI instead!!”)
The main thing seems to be money. How do we get more money into alignment in a way that is not detrimental or repulsive to people we want to attract to working there?