Forethought's view that improving the future conditional on survival is more important than ensuring survival goes against the dominant view in EA for many years that we need to reduce extinction risk. Two questions on this:
How far away from the optimal allocation of (longtermist) resources do you think the community currently is?
For example, should we be radically reducing investment in things like addressing biorisk or nuclear risk? Do we need to be rethinking the allocation of resources within AI risk?
Do you think there is anything that is being prioritized in the community that is actually harmful?
For example, could certain AI alignment approaches be bad for future digital sentience?
I haven't yet got past the 1.4. Arguments for Value of Variety section because I'm just a bit unconvinced.
You could reword the intuition pump section like this:
Imagine some truly terrible moment — say extreme torture. Suppose that this torture is far more terrible than anything that humanity has experienced to date: you or I would give up years of ordinary happy life just to avoid such a peak of despair. But now suppose that this torture is just ever so slightly less bad than some other torture approach that is the worst thing that could conceivably be produced, with the same resources. For example, a radically different device is used which leads to an experience that is ever so slightly more painful.
What is better? The worst possible torture alternating with the slightly less bad torture? Or just the slightly less bad torture for the rest of time?
I suppose I can imagine someone saying the former, but I wouldn't. I just want less suffering! You can dismiss this rewrite by saying variety is only good if it's variety of good things, but this would introduce an asymmetry and I'm unsure that is justified. I feel like people say they like variety because we have repeatedly experienced it to be pleasurable, and that introduces a bias that we struggle to avoid when we are asked to judge scenarios that aren't different in terms of welfare. For the same reason I'm a little unconvinced by the intrapersonal variety argument.
On the realisation-value argument. I don't really think there is intrinsic value of things being realized. If in the distant arctic some polar bear walks a route that no polar bear has walked before but which is the exact same in every welfare-relevant way, I just don't really care. Which is another way of me saying, realizing new things can indeed be great, but only when we can enjoy them for being new.
On the benefits for axiology point. This doesn't so much seem an argument for variety as it seems a direct argument for the saturation view. If the saturation view allows us to avoid lots of other unpalatable conclusions then it may be worth adopting for that alone!
cluelessness about some effects (like those in the far future) doesn’t override the obligations given to us by the benefits we’re not clueless about, such as the immediate benefits of our donations to the global poor
What makes you think that? Are you embracing a non-consequentialist or non-impartial view to come to that conclusion? Or do you think it's justified under impartial consequentialism?
cluelessness about some effects (like those in the far future) doesn’t override the obligations given to us by the benefits we’re not clueless about, such as the immediate benefits of our donations to the global poor
I do reject this thinking because it seems to imply either:
Embracing non-consequentialist views: I don't have zero credence in deontology or virtue ethics, but to just ignore far future effects I feel I would have to have very low credence in consequentialism, given the expected vastness of the future.
Rejecting impartiality: For example, saying that effects closer in time are inherently worth more than those farther away. For me, utility is utility regardless of who enjoys it or when.
The background assumption in this post is that there are no such interventions.
There's certainly a lot of stuff out there I still need to read (thanks for sharing the resources), but I tend to agree with Hilary Greaves that the way to avoid cluelessness is to target interventions whose intended long-run impact dominates plausible unintended effects.
For example, I don't think I am clueless about the value of spreading concern for digital sentience (in a thoughtful way). The intended effect is to materially reduce the probability of vast future suffering in scenarios that I assign non-trivial probability. Plausible negative effects, for example people feeling preached to about something they see as stupid leading to an even worse outcome, seem like they can be mitigated / just don't compete overall with the possibility that we would be alerting society to a potentially devastating moral catastrophe. I'm not saying I'm certain it would go well (there is always ex-ante uncertainty), but I don't feel clueless about whether it's worth doing or not.
And if we are helplessly clueless about everything, then I honestly think the altruistic exercise is doomed and we should just go and enjoy ourselves.
I feel this post is just saying you can solve the problem of cluelessness by ignoring that it exists, even though you know it still does. It just doesn't seem like a satisfactory response to me.
Wouldn't the better response be to find things we aren't clueless about—perhaps because we think the indirect effects are smaller in expected magnitude than the direct effects. I think this is probably the case with elevating the moral status of digital minds (for example).
His secret? “It’s mostly luck,” he says, but “another part is what I think of as maximising my luck surface area.”
It's worth noting that Neel has two gold and one bronze medal from the International Mathematical Olympiad. In other words, he's a genius. That's got to help a lot in succeeding in this field.
I think generally GHW people don’t think you can predictably influence the far future because effects “wash out” over time, or think trying to do so is fanatical (you’re betting on an extremely small chance of very large payoff).
If you look at, for example, GiveWell’s cost-effectiveness analyses, effects in the far future don’t feature. If they thought most of the value of saving a life was in the far future you would think they would incorporate that. Same goes for analyses by Animal Charity Evaluators.
Longtermists think they can find interventions that avoid the washing out objection. Essay 4 of the series goes into this, also see the shorter summary.
That's a great question. Longtermists look to impact the far future (even thousands/million of years in the future) rather than the nearish future because they think the future could be very long, so there's a lot more value at stake looking far out.
They also think there are tangible, near-term decisions (e.g. about AI, space governance etc.) that could lock in values or institutions and shape civilization’s long-run trajectory in predictable ways. You can read more on this in essay 4 "Persistent Path-Dependence".
Ultimately, it just isn't clear how things like saving/improving lives now will influence the far future trajectory, so these aren't typically prioritized by longtermists.
Is your claim that they really really don't want to die in the next ten years, but they are fine dying in the next hundred years? (Else I don't see how you're dismissing the anti-aging vs sports team example.)
Dying when you're young seems much worse than dying when you're old for various reasons:
Quality of life is worse when you're old
When you're old you will have done much more of what you wanted in life (e.g. have kids and grandkids)
It's very normal/expected to die when old
Also, I'd imagine people don't want to fund anti-aging research for various (valid) reasons:
Skepticism it is very cost-effective
Public goods problem means under provision (everyone can benefit from the research even if you don't fund it yourself)
From a governmental perspective living longer is actually a massive societal issue as it introduces serious fiscal challenges as you need to fund pensions etc. From an individual perspective living longer just means having to work longer to support yourself for longer. So does anyone see anti-aging as that great?
People discount the future
Having said all this, I actually agree with you that x-risk could be fairly high due to a failure of rationality. Primarily because we've never gone extinct so people naturally think it's really unlikely, but x-risk is rising as we get more technologically powerful.
BUT, I agree with Will's core point that working towards the best possible future is almost certainly more neglected than reducing x-risk, partly because it's just so wacky. People think about good futures where we are very wealthy and have lots of time to do fun stuff, but do they think about futures where we create loads of digital minds that live maximally-flourishing lives? I doubt it.
Forethought's view that improving the future conditional on survival is more important than ensuring survival goes against the dominant view in EA for many years that we need to reduce extinction risk. Two questions on this:
I haven't yet got past the 1.4. Arguments for Value of Variety section because I'm just a bit unconvinced.
You could reword the intuition pump section like this:
Imagine some truly terrible moment — say extreme torture. Suppose that this torture is far more terrible than anything that humanity has experienced to date: you or I would give up years of ordinary happy life just to avoid such a peak of despair. But now suppose that this torture is just ever so slightly less bad than some other torture approach that is the worst thing that could conceivably be produced, with the same resources. For example, a radically different device is used which leads to an experience that is ever so slightly more painful.
What is better? The worst possible torture alternating with the slightly less bad torture? Or just the slightly less bad torture for the rest of time?
I suppose I can imagine someone saying the former, but I wouldn't. I just want less suffering! You can dismiss this rewrite by saying variety is only good if it's variety of good things, but this would introduce an asymmetry and I'm unsure that is justified. I feel like people say they like variety because we have repeatedly experienced it to be pleasurable, and that introduces a bias that we struggle to avoid when we are asked to judge scenarios that aren't different in terms of welfare. For the same reason I'm a little unconvinced by the intrapersonal variety argument.
On the realisation-value argument. I don't really think there is intrinsic value of things being realized. If in the distant arctic some polar bear walks a route that no polar bear has walked before but which is the exact same in every welfare-relevant way, I just don't really care. Which is another way of me saying, realizing new things can indeed be great, but only when we can enjoy them for being new.
On the benefits for axiology point. This doesn't so much seem an argument for variety as it seems a direct argument for the saturation view. If the saturation view allows us to avoid lots of other unpalatable conclusions then it may be worth adopting for that alone!
I'll read those. Can I ask regarding this:
What makes you think that? Are you embracing a non-consequentialist or non-impartial view to come to that conclusion? Or do you think it's justified under impartial consequentialism?
I do reject this thinking because it seems to imply either:
There's certainly a lot of stuff out there I still need to read (thanks for sharing the resources), but I tend to agree with Hilary Greaves that the way to avoid cluelessness is to target interventions whose intended long-run impact dominates plausible unintended effects.
For example, I don't think I am clueless about the value of spreading concern for digital sentience (in a thoughtful way). The intended effect is to materially reduce the probability of vast future suffering in scenarios that I assign non-trivial probability. Plausible negative effects, for example people feeling preached to about something they see as stupid leading to an even worse outcome, seem like they can be mitigated / just don't compete overall with the possibility that we would be alerting society to a potentially devastating moral catastrophe. I'm not saying I'm certain it would go well (there is always ex-ante uncertainty), but I don't feel clueless about whether it's worth doing or not.
And if we are helplessly clueless about everything, then I honestly think the altruistic exercise is doomed and we should just go and enjoy ourselves.
I feel this post is just saying you can solve the problem of cluelessness by ignoring that it exists, even though you know it still does. It just doesn't seem like a satisfactory response to me.
Wouldn't the better response be to find things we aren't clueless about—perhaps because we think the indirect effects are smaller in expected magnitude than the direct effects. I think this is probably the case with elevating the moral status of digital minds (for example).
It's worth noting that Neel has two gold and one bronze medal from the International Mathematical Olympiad. In other words, he's a genius. That's got to help a lot in succeeding in this field.
Thanks, I’ll have a listen!
I think generally GHW people don’t think you can predictably influence the far future because effects “wash out” over time, or think trying to do so is fanatical (you’re betting on an extremely small chance of very large payoff).
If you look at, for example, GiveWell’s cost-effectiveness analyses, effects in the far future don’t feature. If they thought most of the value of saving a life was in the far future you would think they would incorporate that. Same goes for analyses by Animal Charity Evaluators.
Longtermists think they can find interventions that avoid the washing out objection. Essay 4 of the series goes into this, also see the shorter summary.
That's a great question. Longtermists look to impact the far future (even thousands/million of years in the future) rather than the nearish future because they think the future could be very long, so there's a lot more value at stake looking far out.
They also think there are tangible, near-term decisions (e.g. about AI, space governance etc.) that could lock in values or institutions and shape civilization’s long-run trajectory in predictable ways. You can read more on this in essay 4 "Persistent Path-Dependence".
Ultimately, it just isn't clear how things like saving/improving lives now will influence the far future trajectory, so these aren't typically prioritized by longtermists.
Dying when you're young seems much worse than dying when you're old for various reasons:
Also, I'd imagine people don't want to fund anti-aging research for various (valid) reasons:
Having said all this, I actually agree with you that x-risk could be fairly high due to a failure of rationality. Primarily because we've never gone extinct so people naturally think it's really unlikely, but x-risk is rising as we get more technologically powerful.
BUT, I agree with Will's core point that working towards the best possible future is almost certainly more neglected than reducing x-risk, partly because it's just so wacky. People think about good futures where we are very wealthy and have lots of time to do fun stuff, but do they think about futures where we create loads of digital minds that live maximally-flourishing lives? I doubt it.