See my response to Eliezer. I don’t think it’s one shot—I think there are going to be both successes and failures along the way that would give us information that we will be able to use.
Even self improvement is not a singular event—already AI scientists are using tools such as codex or claude code to improve their own productivity. As models grow in capability, the benefit of such tools will grow, but it is not necessarily one event. Also, I think that we would likely require this improvement just to sustain the exponential at its current rate- it would not be sustainable to continue the growth in hiring and so increasing productivity via AI would be necessary.
Re the nit: In page 205 they say “Imagine that evert competing AI company is climbing a ladder in the dark. At every rung but the top one, they get five times as much money … But if anyone reaches the top rung, the ladder explodes and kills everyone. Also nobody knows where the ladder ends.”
I’ll edit a bit the text so it’s clear you don’t know when it ends.
See my response to Eliezer. I don’t think it’s one shot—I think there are going to be both successes and failures along the way that would give us information that we will be able to use.
Even self improvement is not a singular event—already AI scientists are using tools such as codex or claude code to improve their own productivity. As models grow in capability, the benefit of such tools will grow, but it is not necessarily one event. Also, I think that we would likely require this improvement just to sustain the exponential at its current rate- it would not be sustainable to continue the growth in hiring and so increasing productivity via AI would be necessary.
Re the nit: In page 205 they say “Imagine that evert competing AI company is climbing a ladder in the dark. At every rung but the top one, they get five times as much money … But if anyone reaches the top rung, the ladder explodes and kills everyone. Also nobody knows where the ladder ends.”
I’ll edit a bit the text so it’s clear you don’t know when it ends.
(Appreciate the correction re my nit, edited mine as well)