The plots state that their x axes show capabilities on log scale, but what scales were intended for the y axes?
We might expect that the y axes are on linear (untransformed) scale. However, this would imply that multiplicative increases in AI capability can be addressed safely by making only additive amounts of progress in alignment (dashed green line on plots).
In general, multiplicative outmatches additive. How can we be confident that additive alignment progress would be enough?
Alternatively, we could view y axes as being on log scale. Yet, then the gap between “actual” (solid green line) and “what we need” (dashed green line) can be much larger than visually apparent on the plots, especially for dates in the future, leaving a big space for the region helpfully labeled, “A lot of bad shit can still happen [here].”
Many people may feel we are in your scenario A under a log y axis, with a big gap between “actual” and “what we need” appearing in future if current trends persist. In particular, people with fragile world concerns may place more “Everybody dies” dots in that gap, considering how large it could be.
Thank you for the plots! I hope I did not misinterpret them.
I was deliberately vague, but I would say that some version of log Y axis might make sense, since as capability scale up by a factor 10, you want to reduce the probability of error by some factor C.
So, yes the reason why I said “a lot” in the “a lot of bad shit can happen” is that this gap could indeed bite us. It could be potentially ameliorated by people limiting how AI can be deployed in high-stakes setting or increasing investment in safety—this is basically what happened in other industries like aviation safety. But this is also where the fourth graph on societal readiness comes in
The societal readiness plot doesn’t seem to have a log-ish y axis, considering the shapes of the trend lines.
If the alignment plots were also drawn without a log-ish y axis, then they might look as bad as the societal readiness plot or—if not equally bad—then at least substantially worse than they do now.
I’m questioning plotting decisions for fake plots …I know. This may seem like splitting hairs. However, to me, there is a major difference between requiring linear vs. exponential power law improvement in alignment, to take us to “what we need”.
The plots state that their x axes show capabilities on log scale, but what scales were intended for the y axes?
We might expect that the y axes are on linear (untransformed) scale. However, this would imply that multiplicative increases in AI capability can be addressed safely by making only additive amounts of progress in alignment (dashed green line on plots).
In general, multiplicative outmatches additive. How can we be confident that additive alignment progress would be enough?
Alternatively, we could view y axes as being on log scale. Yet, then the gap between “actual” (solid green line) and “what we need” (dashed green line) can be much larger than visually apparent on the plots, especially for dates in the future, leaving a big space for the region helpfully labeled, “A lot of bad shit can still happen [here].”
Many people may feel we are in your scenario A under a log y axis, with a big gap between “actual” and “what we need” appearing in future if current trends persist. In particular, people with fragile world concerns may place more “Everybody dies” dots in that gap, considering how large it could be.
Thank you for the plots! I hope I did not misinterpret them.
I was deliberately vague, but I would say that some version of log Y axis might make sense, since as capability scale up by a factor 10, you want to reduce the probability of error by some factor C.
So, yes the reason why I said “a lot” in the “a lot of bad shit can happen” is that this gap could indeed bite us. It could be potentially ameliorated by people limiting how AI can be deployed in high-stakes setting or increasing investment in safety—this is basically what happened in other industries like aviation safety. But this is also where the fourth graph on societal readiness comes in
Thank you for explaining.
The societal readiness plot doesn’t seem to have a log-ish y axis, considering the shapes of the trend lines.
If the alignment plots were also drawn without a log-ish y axis, then they might look as bad as the societal readiness plot or—if not equally bad—then at least substantially worse than they do now.
I’m questioning plotting decisions for fake plots …I know. This may seem like splitting hairs. However, to me, there is a major difference between requiring linear vs.
exponentialpower law improvement in alignment, to take us to “what we need”.