anaguma's Shortform

anaguma

anaguma's Shortform — LessWrong

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A notable section from Ilya Sutskever's recent deposition:

WITNESS SUTSKEVER: Right now, my view is that, with very few exceptions, most likely a person who is going to be in charge is going to be very good with the way of power. And it will be a lot like choosing between different politicians.
ATTORNEY EDDY: The person in charge of what?
WITNESS SUTSKEVER: AGI.
ATTORNEY EDDY: And why do you say that?
ATTORNEY AGNOLUCCI: Object to form.
WITNESS SUTSKEVER: That's how the world seems to work. I think it's very -- I think it's not impossible, but I think it's very hard for someone who would be described as a saint to make it. I think it's worth trying. I just think it's -- it's like choosing between different politicians. Who is going to be the head of the state?

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1LWLW1y

Another reply, sorry I just think what you said is super interesting. The insight you shared about Eastern spirituality affecting attitudes towards AI is beautiful. I do wonder if our own Western attitudes towards AI are due to our flawed spiritual beliefs. Particularly the idea of a wrathful, judgemental Abrahamic god. I’m not sure if it’s a coincidence that someone who was raised as an Orthodox Jew (Eliezer) came to fear AI so much. On another note, the Old Testament is horrible (I was raised reform/californian Jewish, I guess I’m just mentioning this because I don’t want to come across as antisemitic). It imbues what should be the greatest source of beauty with our weakest, most immature impulses. The New Testament’s emphasis on mercy is a big improvement/beautiful, but even then I don’t like the Book of Revelation talking about casting the sinners into a lake of fire.

mishka1y20

I think we do tend to underestimate differences between people.

We know theoretically that people differ a lot, but we usually don’t viscerally feel how strong those differences are. One of the most remarkable examples of that is described here:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/NyiFLzSrkfkDW4S7o/why-it-s-so-hard-to-talk-about-consciousness

With AI existential safety, I think our progress is so slow because people mostly pursue anthropocentric approaches. Just like with astronomy, one needs a more invariant point of view to make progress.

I’ve done a bit of scri... (read more)

2mishka1y

Same here :-) I do see feasible scenarios where these things are sustainably nice. But whether we end up reaching those scenarios... who knows...

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