Every word can be true but It seems overwhelmingly pessimistic in a way that is not helpful, mainly due to nothing in it being actionable.
I’m thinking of this as ‘step one is to figure out our situation; step two is to figure out what to do about it’. Trying too hard to make things actionable from the get-go can interfere with the model-building part.
The position of timelines being too short and the best alignment research being too weak / too slow, while having no avenues or ideas to make things better, with no institution to trust, to the point where we are doomed now, doesn’t lead to a lot of wanting to do anything, which is a guaranteed failure.
Eliezer’s view is ‘the odds of success are low, and I’m pretty uncertain about what paths have the highest EV’, not ‘we’re doomed / the odds of success are negligible’.
I’m thinking of this as ‘step one is to figure out our situation; step two is to figure out what to do about it’. Trying too hard to make things actionable from the get-go can interfere with the model-building part.
Eliezer’s view is ‘the odds of success are low, and I’m pretty uncertain about what paths have the highest EV’, not ‘we’re doomed / the odds of success are negligible’.