I was curious so I read this comment thread, and am genuinely confused why Tsvi is so annoyed by the interaction (maybe I am being dumb and missing something). My interpretation of Wei Dai’s point is the following:
Tsvi is saying something like:
People have a tendency to defer too much (though deferring sometimes is necessary). They should consider deferring less and thinking for themselves more.
When one does defer, it’s good to be explicit about that fact, both to oneself and others.
As an example to illustrate his point, Tsvi mentions a case where he deferred to Yudkowsky. This is used as an example because Yudkowsky is considered a particularly good thinker on the topic Tsvi (and many others) deferred on, but nevertheless there was too much deference.
Wei Dai points out that he thinks the example is misleading, because to him it looks more like being wrong about who it’s worth deferring to, rather than deferring too much. The more general version of his point is “You, Tsvi, are noticing problems that occur from people deferring. However, I think these problems may be at least partially due to them deferring to the wrong people, rather than deferring at all.”
(If this is indeed the point Wei Dai is making, I happen to think Tsvi is more correct, but I don’t think WD’s contribution is meaningless or in bad faith.)
because to him it looks more like being wrong about who it’s worth deferring to,
Except in his first comment he said:
In other words, if you were going to spend your career on AI x-safety, of course you could have become an expert on these questions first.
Which seems to say exactly “defer less” not “defer to a different person”.
Anyway, like I’ve said, what’s annoying is not his thesis, but the fact that he fabricated a disagreement by imagining a position I held (which I didn’t) and then not updating when I clarified (which I did), seemingly in order to talk about his thing that he cares about rather than the topic of the post.
Yeah that’s fair. I didn’t follow the “In other words” sentence (it doesn’t seem to be restating the rest of the comment in other words, but rather making a whole new (flawed) point).
I was curious so I read this comment thread, and am genuinely confused why Tsvi is so annoyed by the interaction (maybe I am being dumb and missing something). My interpretation of Wei Dai’s point is the following:
Tsvi is saying something like:
People have a tendency to defer too much (though deferring sometimes is necessary). They should consider deferring less and thinking for themselves more.
When one does defer, it’s good to be explicit about that fact, both to oneself and others.
As an example to illustrate his point, Tsvi mentions a case where he deferred to Yudkowsky. This is used as an example because Yudkowsky is considered a particularly good thinker on the topic Tsvi (and many others) deferred on, but nevertheless there was too much deference.
Wei Dai points out that he thinks the example is misleading, because to him it looks more like being wrong about who it’s worth deferring to, rather than deferring too much. The more general version of his point is “You, Tsvi, are noticing problems that occur from people deferring. However, I think these problems may be at least partially due to them deferring to the wrong people, rather than deferring at all.”
(If this is indeed the point Wei Dai is making, I happen to think Tsvi is more correct, but I don’t think WD’s contribution is meaningless or in bad faith.)
Except in his first comment he said:
Which seems to say exactly “defer less” not “defer to a different person”.
Anyway, like I’ve said, what’s annoying is not his thesis, but the fact that he fabricated a disagreement by imagining a position I held (which I didn’t) and then not updating when I clarified (which I did), seemingly in order to talk about his thing that he cares about rather than the topic of the post.
Yeah that’s fair. I didn’t follow the “In other words” sentence (it doesn’t seem to be restating the rest of the comment in other words, but rather making a whole new (flawed) point).