You allude to self-deceptive reasoning in the introduction; What’s your perspective on the extent to which prominent figures in AI safety (both now and historically) who have acted in ways you describe as power-seeking were doing so consciously vs subconsciously? This feels like a pretty load-bearing distinction, especially when it comes to thinking about how to intervene to make things better (conscious ⇒ get better at trusting the right people and put prominent figures under more scrutiny, unconscious ⇒ that + much more self-reflection amongst other things).
You allude to self-deceptive reasoning in the introduction; What’s your perspective on the extent to which prominent figures in AI safety (both now and historically) who have acted in ways you describe as power-seeking were doing so consciously vs subconsciously? This feels like a pretty load-bearing distinction, especially when it comes to thinking about how to intervene to make things better (conscious ⇒ get better at trusting the right people and put prominent figures under more scrutiny, unconscious ⇒ that + much more self-reflection amongst other things).