I think this might be underestimating how the conservative/liberal axis correlates with scarcity/abundance axis. In an existential struggle against a zombie horde, the conservative policies are a lot more relevant—of course “our tribe first” is the only survivable answer, anybody who wants to “find themselves” when they are supposed to be guarding the entrance is an idiot and a traitor, deviating from proven strategies is a huge risk, etc. When all important resources are abundant, liberal policies become a lot more relevant—hoarding resources, and not sharing with neighbors is a mental illness, there is low risk in an kinds of experimentation and rule breaking, etc. Well, AI is very likely to drastically move us away from scarcity and towards abundance, so need to consider how it affects which policies would make more sense.
“AI is very likely to drastically move us away from scarcity and towards abundance”
That makes a huge number of assumptions about the values and goals of the AI, and is certainly not obvious—unless you’ve already assumed things about the shape of the likely future, and the one we desire. But that’s a large part of what we’re questioning.
How about this—in most non-disaster scenarios, AI would make the abundance a lot easier to achieve. And conservative or liberal, it’s basic human nature to go for abundance in such situations.
I don’t think this is true in the important sense; yes, we’ll plausibly get material abundance, but we will still have just as much conflict because humans want scarcity, and they want conflict. So which resources are “important” will shift. (I should note that Eliezer made something like this point in a tweet, where he said “And yet somehow there is a Poverty Equilibrium which beat a 100-fold increase in productivity plus everything else that went right over the last thousand years”—but his version assumes that once all the necessities are available, poverty would be gone. I think that we view clearly impossible past luxuries, like internet connectivity and access to laundry machines as minimal requirements, showing that the hedonic treadmill is stronger than wealth generation!)
I think this might be underestimating how the conservative/liberal axis correlates with scarcity/abundance axis. In an existential struggle against a zombie horde, the conservative policies are a lot more relevant—of course “our tribe first” is the only survivable answer, anybody who wants to “find themselves” when they are supposed to be guarding the entrance is an idiot and a traitor, deviating from proven strategies is a huge risk, etc. When all important resources are abundant, liberal policies become a lot more relevant—hoarding resources, and not sharing with neighbors is a mental illness, there is low risk in an kinds of experimentation and rule breaking, etc. Well, AI is very likely to drastically move us away from scarcity and towards abundance, so need to consider how it affects which policies would make more sense.
That makes a huge number of assumptions about the values and goals of the AI, and is certainly not obvious—unless you’ve already assumed things about the shape of the likely future, and the one we desire. But that’s a large part of what we’re questioning.
How about this—in most non-disaster scenarios, AI would make the abundance a lot easier to achieve. And conservative or liberal, it’s basic human nature to go for abundance in such situations.
I don’t think this is true in the important sense; yes, we’ll plausibly get material abundance, but we will still have just as much conflict because humans want scarcity, and they want conflict. So which resources are “important” will shift. (I should note that Eliezer made something like this point in a tweet, where he said “And yet somehow there is a Poverty Equilibrium which beat a 100-fold increase in productivity plus everything else that went right over the last thousand years”—but his version assumes that once all the necessities are available, poverty would be gone. I think that we view clearly impossible past luxuries, like internet connectivity and access to laundry machines as minimal requirements, showing that the hedonic treadmill is stronger than wealth generation!)