… but this request isn’t for people who are doing alignment work while occasionally mournfully incurring a negative externality of pushing the capabilities frontier.
So then what’s the point of posting it?
Anyone that could possibly stumble across this post would not believe themselves to be the villain, just “occasionally mournfully incurring a negative externality of pushing the capabilities frontier”, in or outside of ‘alignment work’.
Obviously many people exist who think that pushing the capabilities frontier is not a cost but rather a benefit. Your comment, taken literally, is saying that such people “could [not] possibly stumble across this post”. You don’t really believe that, right? It’s a blog post on the internet, indexed by search engines etc. Anyone could stumble across it!
I was one of the people who upvoted but disagreed—I think it’s a good point you raise, M. Y. Zuo, that So8res’ qualifications blunt the blow and give people an out, a handy rationalization to justify continuing working on capabilities. However, there’s still a non-zero (and I’d argue substantial) effect remaining.
So then what’s the point of posting it?
Anyone that could possibly stumble across this post would not believe themselves to be the villain, just “occasionally mournfully incurring a negative externality of pushing the capabilities frontier”, in or outside of ‘alignment work’.
Obviously many people exist who think that pushing the capabilities frontier is not a cost but rather a benefit. Your comment, taken literally, is saying that such people “could [not] possibly stumble across this post”. You don’t really believe that, right? It’s a blog post on the internet, indexed by search engines etc. Anyone could stumble across it!
I was one of the people who upvoted but disagreed—I think it’s a good point you raise, M. Y. Zuo, that So8res’ qualifications blunt the blow and give people an out, a handy rationalization to justify continuing working on capabilities. However, there’s still a non-zero (and I’d argue substantial) effect remaining.