TL;DR: it seems to me that I am unable to do anything useful on the AI issue other than being informed. I feel bad about it.
Naive extrapolations point to extreme superintelligence in a year; I'll be 23 at that point. I keep reading about Really Trying and Getting Involved so that we hopefully don't die.
It is unclear to me that there's anything at all I can do in that regard.
Why I believe that:
I am a 22yo undergraduate student at the only AI undergrad program in my country (Italy). I am not particularly technically or academically skilled, with Cs on average. I pass the class and move on.
I have no money, as in, zero income at all; I can't move to London or the U.S.
My country as a whole is not particularly influential or informed on the topic, and there is essentially no community around this. I may very realistically be one of 100-1,000 people in Italy who knows about the intellectual, forecasting and existential side of AI.
Even the people at my own university (the literal only undergrads in Italy on AI) are stuck at GPT-4o levels. Anecdotally, they are not aware that AI can code at a professional level.
Here is what I am doing:
I stay informed as much as possible. I regularly read LessWrong, Zvi, METR, Yudkowsky/Soares/CSET/others, as well as the various forecasts and proposals (AI 2027, AI 2040 and so on). Anything that seems useful to understand.
I chat with people (as in, family and few friends/acquaintances) about AI, but it's not like they have much interest, and after a few minutes you've got to change the subject anyways.
That's it. I don't what else to do. Any way I spin it in my head, it appears to me that I am powerless to take any action.
I don't even want to work in AI. I already have career plans and goals in life, all of which are unrelated to AI. This post has been mostly hopeless, but I only feel that way about the current AI existential situation; things are otherwise going well.
I read 80,000 Hours' calls to use your career to help, and people's posts to get heavily involved... but I want to just go on with my life as planned. Maybe that's a fault in my character. I genuinely wonder.
Given the urgency and importance of the situation, I feel like I have to act; then I see the lineup of problems and constraints I have; then I think that if I really wanted to, I'd find a way; but I like my life the way it is, and I don't act. I feel a duty to help, and both huge obstacles against it and a lack of desire to do so. This makes me feel like a bad person. Perhaps it is an accurate assessment, perhaps it isn't.
I would like your opinion on this situation. There is no one else I can talk to about this.
This site is an important nexus in AI culture. Numerous researchers, activists, and employees of frontier AI companies read it and even participate. You can learn what they think and know, and thoughts you express here have a chance of entering their minds...
TL;DR: it seems to me that I am unable to do anything useful on the AI issue other than being informed. I feel bad about it.
Naive extrapolations point to extreme superintelligence in a year; I'll be 23 at that point. I keep reading about Really Trying and Getting Involved so that we hopefully don't die.
It is unclear to me that there's anything at all I can do in that regard.
Why I believe that:
Here is what I am doing:
That's it. I don't what else to do. Any way I spin it in my head, it appears to me that I am powerless to take any action.
I don't even want to work in AI. I already have career plans and goals in life, all of which are unrelated to AI. This post has been mostly hopeless, but I only feel that way about the current AI existential situation; things are otherwise going well.
I read 80,000 Hours' calls to use your career to help, and people's posts to get heavily involved... but I want to just go on with my life as planned. Maybe that's a fault in my character. I genuinely wonder.
Given the urgency and importance of the situation, I feel like I have to act; then I see the lineup of problems and constraints I have; then I think that if I really wanted to, I'd find a way; but I like my life the way it is, and I don't act. I feel a duty to help, and both huge obstacles against it and a lack of desire to do so. This makes me feel like a bad person. Perhaps it is an accurate assessment, perhaps it isn't.
I would like your opinion on this situation. There is no one else I can talk to about this.