Headline finding: I audited 17 AI Safety Talent programmes. Zero of 17 have published any comparison group, rejected-applicant follow-up, matched control or randomisation. Not one. Every programme that mentions a counterfactual does it by asking participants to self-report.
Background
At least $70 million...
Author: Grace Ryba (she/her), Executive Director
TL;DR:
* BluePerch is a new animal welfare grantmaker.
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In celebration of still being alive and fighting, we are giving away 1,000 Amazon e-books of “If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies”. Feel free to send a copy to yourself, a loved one, or a friend—we need all hands on deck.
Today marks exactly one year since If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All, by Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soare...
Two neglected X-risks
I've been going through various listings of x-risks (and GCR's, to account for some uncertainty re: climate and nuclear) by prominent organisations, and after a brief scanning have found that the usual list includes:
No list that I came across (explicitly) includes either:
I would make the case that both of these are potential X-risks, and should be taken seriously as objects of research. There appears to be credible reasons to believe that APM is not currently an urgent risk (see https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/gjEbymta6w8yqNQnE/risks-from-atomically-precise-manufacturing by Michael Aird), but the same cannot be said of SETI/METI. After reading through some longtermist/EA and non-EA community research into SETI/METI risks, it seems to be an open question as to just how probable the risk of finding/being found by hostile ETI might be.
In the face of deep uncertainty around a number of key questions (one of which is the small matter of how likely it is that ETI's exist and their likely proximity to us, another of which is a question of ETI behaviour which we must investigate and estimate based on a sample size of 0), I suggest that this risk be considered alongside the 'big four', both due to its potentially devastating scope and its potentially high likelihood.
We need to spend time fully researching this risk and identifying the most prudent course of action, even if the end result is that we find it can be safely discounted.