On a linguistic level I think “risk-averse” is the wrong term, since it usually, as I understand it, describes an agent which is intrinsically averse to taking risks, and will pay some premium for a sure-thing. (This is typically characterized as a bias, and violates VNM rationality.) Whereas it sounds like Will is talking about diminishing returns from resources, which is, I think, extremely common and natural and we should expect AIs to have this property for various reasons.
That’s not quite right. ‘Risk-averse with respect to quantity X’ just means that, given a choice between two lotteries A and B with the same expected value of X, the agent prefers the lottery with less spread. Diminishing marginal utility from extra resources is one way to get risk aversion with respect to resources. Risk-weighted expected utility theory is another. Only RWEUT violates VNM. When economists talk about ‘risk aversion,’ they almost always mean diminishing marginal utility.
diminishing returns from resources… is, I think, extremely common and natural and we should expect AIs to have this property for various reasons.
Can you say more about why?
Making a deal with humans to not accumulate as much power as possible is likely an extremely risky move for multiple reasons, including that other AIs might come along and eat the lightcone.
But AIs with sharply diminishing marginal utility to extra resources wouldn’t care much about this. They’d be relevantly similar to humans with sharply diminishing marginal utility to extra resources, who generally prefer collecting a salary over taking a risky shot at eating the lightcone. (Will and I are currently writing a paper about getting AIs to be risk-averse as a safety strategy, where we talk about stuff like this in more detail.)
That’s not quite right. ‘Risk-averse with respect to quantity X’ just means that, given a choice between two lotteries A and B with the same expected value of X, the agent prefers the lottery with less spread. Diminishing marginal utility from extra resources is one way to get risk aversion with respect to resources. Risk-weighted expected utility theory is another. Only RWEUT violates VNM. When economists talk about ‘risk aversion,’ they almost always mean diminishing marginal utility.
Can you say more about why?
But AIs with sharply diminishing marginal utility to extra resources wouldn’t care much about this. They’d be relevantly similar to humans with sharply diminishing marginal utility to extra resources, who generally prefer collecting a salary over taking a risky shot at eating the lightcone. (Will and I are currently writing a paper about getting AIs to be risk-averse as a safety strategy, where we talk about stuff like this in more detail.)