I think the framework from “Dictator’s Handbook” can be applied: citizens get as much freedom an benefits as is (short-term) optimal for the rulers. For example, if a country needs skilled labor and transportation to create tax revenue, then you can predict the govt will fund schools, roads and maybe even hospitals. OTOH if the country has rich deposits of gold located near the ports, then there’s no need for any of that.
Since reading this book I am also very worried by scenarios of human disempowerment. I’ve tried to ask some questions around it:
I wonder if this is somehow harder to understand for citizens of USA, than for someone from a country which didn’t care about its citizens at all. For example, after Lukashenko was “elected” in Belarus, people went to the streets to protest, yet, this didn’t make any impression on the rulers. They didn’t have any bargaining power, it seems.
I think the framework from “Dictator’s Handbook” can be applied: citizens get as much freedom an benefits as is (short-term) optimal for the rulers. For example, if a country needs skilled labor and transportation to create tax revenue, then you can predict the govt will fund schools, roads and maybe even hospitals. OTOH if the country has rich deposits of gold located near the ports, then there’s no need for any of that.
Since reading this book I am also very worried by scenarios of human disempowerment. I’ve tried to ask some questions around it:
Can homo-sapiens sustain an economy parallel to AIs?
How politics interacts with AI? (for some reason: negative 18 votes)
I wonder if this is somehow harder to understand for citizens of USA, than for someone from a country which didn’t care about its citizens at all. For example, after Lukashenko was “elected” in Belarus, people went to the streets to protest, yet, this didn’t make any impression on the rulers. They didn’t have any bargaining power, it seems.
importantly, in the dictators handbook case, some humans do actually get the power.
This is why I was stating the scenario in the paper cannot really lead to existential catastrophe, at least without other assumptions here.