I’m sticking this in comments (not answers) section, because this doesn’t directly bear on the OP’s (1) and (2), nor on Eliezer in particular. But: a different important aspect of public, and private, communication, is that they have direct effects on what the speaker learns, and on whether others can see how the speaker is seeing the world. I mean: communication is sometimes about communicating, rather than about having consequentialist effects on those one is talking to.
Leo Szilard is in the running for all time best rationalists IMO, and one of the “ten commandments” he tried to live by was
Speak to all men as you do to yourself, with no concern for the effect you make, so that you do not shut them out from your world; lest in isolation the meaning of life slips out of sight and you lose the belief in the perfection of creation.
I think this is an important perspective, especially for understanding Eliezer, who places a high value on truth/honesty, often directly over consequentialist concerns.
While this explains true but unpleasant statements like “[Individual] has substantially decreased humanity’s odds of survival”, it doesn’t seem to explain statements like the potted plant one or other obviously-not-literally-true statements, unless one takes the position that full honesty also requires saying all the false and irrational things that pass through one’s head as well. (And even then, I’d expect to see an immediate follow-up of “that’s not true of course”).
I appreciate the comment, and agree the case for venting feelings, allowing one’s own status-beliefs to be visible, etc., is worth considering separately from the case for sharing facts accurately.
I do think the quote from Szilard, above, is discussing more than facts / [things with a truth value]. And I think there’s real “virtue of having more actual contact with the world, and with other people” in sharing more of one’s thoughts/feelings/attitudes/etc. Not, as you say, “all the false and irrational things that pass through one’s head,” because all kinds of unimportant nonsense passes through my head sometimes. But I do see some real “virtue of non-consequentialist communication” value to e.g. sharing those feelings, attitudes, viewpoints, ambitions, etc that are the persistent causes of my other thoughts and actions, and to sometimes trying to convey these via direct/poetical images (“smarter than a potted plant”) rather than clinical self-description (“I seem to be annoyed”).
Main upside to doing this:
They say things I’m not expecting; I say things they’re not expecting; and we can more see through each others’ eyes. (And then e.g. they help me notice ways I’ve been being unfair, or help me figure out what it is that’s weirding me out about a particular thing, or are changed by some aspect of how I’m seeing things in a way that seems reality-contact-increasing, or etc.)
(I agree not all triggered sentences are a good idea to say, because sometimes everybody goes haywire in a useless+damaging way, and sometimes other people don’t want to have to deal with my nonsense and shouldn’t need to, and there’s a whole art to this, but I don’t think it’s an art based in asking whether communication will have good effects.)
I like this perspective. I would agree that there is more to knowing and being known by others than simply Aumann Agreement on empirical fact. I also probably have a tendency to expect more explicit goal-seeking from others than myself.
I haven’t thought this through before, but I notice two things that affect how open I am. The first is how much the communication is private, has non-verbal cues, and has an existing relationship. So right now, I’m not writing this with a desired consequence in mind, but I am filtering some things out subconsciously—like if we were in person talking right now, I might launch into a random anecdote, but while writing online I stay on a narrower path.
The second is that I generally only start running my “consequentialist program” once I anticipate that someone may be upset by what I say. The anticipation of offense is what triggers me to think either “but it still needs to be said” or “saying this won’t help”. So maybe my implicit question was less “why does Eliezer not aim all his communication at his goals” and more “why doesn’t he seem to have the same guardrail I do about only causing offense if it will help”, which is a more subjective standard.
I’d note that Szilard also convinced Fermi not to publish results on nuclear chain reactions, to keep them out of Nazi hands. So presumably he also understood that this ideal was an approximation that must sometimes give way to consequentialist concerns.
Yes; a different one of the “ten commandments” Szilard tried to live by (they’re really short and are worth reading IMO, will take you 3 min) was “never lie without need.” (This ofc suggests there are times when one does need to; and Szilard helped many Jewish families get out of Nazi Germany at the last minute, in addition to convincing Fermi to not publish; so I would guess he navigated many actual such needs).
In terms of what’s a “need” to lie: IMO the differentiator between “worth lying” and “worth telling the truth” isn’t the stakes (AI existential risk is of course extremely high stakes); it’s more like, how much one needs to avoid “isolation” / having “the meaning of life slip through your fingers” vs how much one needs to get people to do something very specific and local that one already has a sufficient map of, e.g. to walk away from the attic containing Anne Frank. This claim is similar to the claim that AI risk is not well-served by some “emergencies”-suited heuristics, despite being hugely urgent and important.
I’m sticking this in comments (not answers) section, because this doesn’t directly bear on the OP’s (1) and (2), nor on Eliezer in particular. But: a different important aspect of public, and private, communication, is that they have direct effects on what the speaker learns, and on whether others can see how the speaker is seeing the world. I mean: communication is sometimes about communicating, rather than about having consequentialist effects on those one is talking to.
Leo Szilard is in the running for all time best rationalists IMO, and one of the “ten commandments” he tried to live by was
I think there’s something to that.
I think this is an important perspective, especially for understanding Eliezer, who places a high value on truth/honesty, often directly over consequentialist concerns.
While this explains true but unpleasant statements like “[Individual] has substantially decreased humanity’s odds of survival”, it doesn’t seem to explain statements like the potted plant one or other obviously-not-literally-true statements, unless one takes the position that full honesty also requires saying all the false and irrational things that pass through one’s head as well. (And even then, I’d expect to see an immediate follow-up of “that’s not true of course”).
I appreciate the comment, and agree the case for venting feelings, allowing one’s own status-beliefs to be visible, etc., is worth considering separately from the case for sharing facts accurately.
I do think the quote from Szilard, above, is discussing more than facts / [things with a truth value]. And I think there’s real “virtue of having more actual contact with the world, and with other people” in sharing more of one’s thoughts/feelings/attitudes/etc. Not, as you say, “all the false and irrational things that pass through one’s head,” because all kinds of unimportant nonsense passes through my head sometimes. But I do see some real “virtue of non-consequentialist communication” value to e.g. sharing those feelings, attitudes, viewpoints, ambitions, etc that are the persistent causes of my other thoughts and actions, and to sometimes trying to convey these via direct/poetical images (“smarter than a potted plant”) rather than clinical self-description (“I seem to be annoyed”).
Main upside to doing this:
They say things I’m not expecting; I say things they’re not expecting; and we can more see through each others’ eyes. (And then e.g. they help me notice ways I’ve been being unfair, or help me figure out what it is that’s weirding me out about a particular thing, or are changed by some aspect of how I’m seeing things in a way that seems reality-contact-increasing, or etc.)
(I agree not all triggered sentences are a good idea to say, because sometimes everybody goes haywire in a useless+damaging way, and sometimes other people don’t want to have to deal with my nonsense and shouldn’t need to, and there’s a whole art to this, but I don’t think it’s an art based in asking whether communication will have good effects.)
I like this perspective. I would agree that there is more to knowing and being known by others than simply Aumann Agreement on empirical fact. I also probably have a tendency to expect more explicit goal-seeking from others than myself.
I haven’t thought this through before, but I notice two things that affect how open I am. The first is how much the communication is private, has non-verbal cues, and has an existing relationship. So right now, I’m not writing this with a desired consequence in mind, but I am filtering some things out subconsciously—like if we were in person talking right now, I might launch into a random anecdote, but while writing online I stay on a narrower path.
The second is that I generally only start running my “consequentialist program” once I anticipate that someone may be upset by what I say. The anticipation of offense is what triggers me to think either “but it still needs to be said” or “saying this won’t help”. So maybe my implicit question was less “why does Eliezer not aim all his communication at his goals” and more “why doesn’t he seem to have the same guardrail I do about only causing offense if it will help”, which is a more subjective standard.
Agreed with this, good point.
I’d note that Szilard also convinced Fermi not to publish results on nuclear chain reactions, to keep them out of Nazi hands. So presumably he also understood that this ideal was an approximation that must sometimes give way to consequentialist concerns.
Yes; a different one of the “ten commandments” Szilard tried to live by (they’re really short and are worth reading IMO, will take you 3 min) was “never lie without need.” (This ofc suggests there are times when one does need to; and Szilard helped many Jewish families get out of Nazi Germany at the last minute, in addition to convincing Fermi to not publish; so I would guess he navigated many actual such needs).
In terms of what’s a “need” to lie: IMO the differentiator between “worth lying” and “worth telling the truth” isn’t the stakes (AI existential risk is of course extremely high stakes); it’s more like, how much one needs to avoid “isolation” / having “the meaning of life slip through your fingers” vs how much one needs to get people to do something very specific and local that one already has a sufficient map of, e.g. to walk away from the attic containing Anne Frank. This claim is similar to the claim that AI risk is not well-served by some “emergencies”-suited heuristics, despite being hugely urgent and important.