I just wanted to share my gratitude for finding this community. To paraphrase The Rolling Stones, I didn't get what I wanted, what I was actually looking for, but I certainly needed this.

The very existence of LW has restored my faith in humanity. I have been "here" every day since I accidentally found my way here (thank you internet strange attractors for that). Normally pre-teen wizards do nothing for me (braced for shocked gasps and evil looks) so I am very surprised about how much I have also been enjoying the fan fiction! Thank you Eliezer.

So how do you ensure that the self-aware AI comes here for a rational discussion prior to switching mankind's lights off? And do you keep a list of people who would like to defect to the other side?

I have a similar kind of session when I run DBT skills courses for the emotion regulation section, but this adds so much, thank you.

What often comes up in these sessions is that there is an accompanying derogatory internal dialogue, or repetitive intrusive thoughts / images / flashbacks, and these drive the continuation of the "difficult" emotion.

I have at times attempted to explain this in terms of the evolutionary model with some part of you (your subconscious mind being an eager helpful puppy?) is desperately searching for evidence to explain how you're feeling at the time. For example, if you're feeling scared for no apparent reason your eager puppy may remind you of scary situations you had been in previously (trauma and so on), or horrible things in the news and that these things could happen to your family etc. And given these scenarios it would make sense that you were scared. Good job pup, have a dog biscuit!

I would welcome your thoughts on this. Thanks 😊