Haven’t you considered extrapolating the volition of a single person if CEV for many people looks like it won’t work out, or will take significantly longer? Three out of three non-vegetarian LessWrongers (my best model for MIRI employees, present and future, aside from you) I have discussed it with say they care about something besides sentience, like sapience. Because they have believed that that’s what they care about for a while, I think it has become their true value, and CEV based on them alone would not act on concern for sentience without sapience. These are people who take MWI and cryonics seriously, probably because you and Robin Hansen do and have argued in favor of them. And you could probably change the opinion of these people, or at least people on the road to becoming like them with a few of blog posts.
Because in HPMOR you used the word “sentience,” which is typically used in sci fi to mean sapience, (instead of using something like “having consciousness”) I am worried you are sending people down that path by letting them think HPJEV draws the moral-importance line at sapience, besides my concern that you are showing others that a professional rationalist thinks animals aren’t sentient.
Haven’t you considered extrapolating the volition of a single person if CEV for many people looks like it won’t work out, or will take significantly longer? Three out of three non-vegetarian LessWrongers (my best model for MIRI employees, present and future, aside from you) I have discussed it with say they care about something besides sentience, like sapience. Because they have believed that that’s what they care about for a while, I think it has become their true value, and CEV based on them alone would not act on concern for sentience without sapience. These are people who take MWI and cryonics seriously, probably because you and Robin Hansen do and have argued in favor of them. And you could probably change the opinion of these people, or at least people on the road to becoming like them with a few of blog posts.
Because in HPMOR you used the word “sentience,” which is typically used in sci fi to mean sapience, (instead of using something like “having consciousness”) I am worried you are sending people down that path by letting them think HPJEV draws the moral-importance line at sapience, besides my concern that you are showing others that a professional rationalist thinks animals aren’t sentient.