I think the example with the detached lever is Yudkowsky being overconfident. Come on, it is an alien technology, way beyond our technical capabilities. Why should we assume that the mechanism responsible for dematerializing the ship is not in the lever? Just because the humans would not do it that way? Maybe the alien ships are built in a way that makes them easy to configure on purpose. That would be actually the smart way to do this.
Somewhere, in a tribe that has seen automobile for the first time, a local shaman is probably composing an essay on a Detached CD Player Fallacy.
I think the example with the detached lever is Yudkowsky being overconfident. Come on, it is an alien technology, way beyond our technical capabilities. Why should we assume that the mechanism responsible for dematerializing the ship is not in the lever? Just because the humans would not do it that way? Maybe the alien ships are built in a way that makes them easy to configure on purpose. That would be actually the smart way to do this.
Somewhere, in a tribe that has seen automobile for the first time, a local shaman is probably composing an essay on a Detached CD Player Fallacy.
(just kidding)