This doesn’t contribute to fighting existential risk in any way that I can see.
Poor countries are growing rich. There are many people there. These people will want to move around. They might be tempted to do it using cars. That would be bad in terms of resource consumption, energy consumption, and, for a while, carbon emission. Trains represent a much more energy and resource-efficient solution. Such solutions are good for the sustained existence of humankind at population levels close to the current one.
then there are probably career choices that are much better in that respect.
I am quite open to suggestiona. Reduction of existential risk is the most important thing in the world to me, at least when thinking in far-mode.
Such solutions are good for the sustained existence of humankind at population levels close to the current one.
This is not what “existential risk” means. If some disaster was guaranteed in wiping out 99.9% of all population, but not more, it poses no existential risk at all (assuming it’s possible to rebuild eventually). For this reason, it doesn’t seem likely that things like global warming or resource scarcity pose existential risk.
For this reason, it doesn’t seem likely that things like global warming or resource scarcity pose existential risk.
In so far as unstable societies make for dealing with existential risk much more difficult this contributes to existential risk. There’s been some discussion also of whether in general rebuilding is possible given how much we’ve consumed in easily accessible, non-renewable resources in order to bootstrap our way to our current tech level. CarlShulman and I discussed this here a while ago, with Carl arguing that it wasn’t much of an issue.
I think the general point is that a big population crash may well leave a remnant which is unable to re-industrialise (too few to make key inventions, too scattered, too many other problems). Or the remnant may have strong cultural pressures against re-industrialising, given it was such a disaster last time.
The small residual population would eventually go extinct from natural causes, or evolve into something non-human. So the crash is an existential risk.
That aside, what are the occupations you would suggest for an engineer with a wish to adress existential risk? Did you have anything specific in mind when you said “then there are probably career choices that are much better in that respect”? Name three of those.
Did you have anything specific in mind when you said “then there are probably career choices that are much better in that respect”?
No. My observation was that this particular choice seems to be of no value for existential risk reduction, that if there are some choices that provide some value, that’s much better than no value at all (actually, this is faulty step, as even if a “better” choice is much better in relative value, its absolute value may still be low, so that it does almost no good), and that there probably are some (saying which ones can be expected to be useful and are plausible choices for a career needs considerably more research than I can think up for a comment, and I don’t know of a reference that already answers this question). If you go with professional philanthropy, optimize for money. This is generally an easier choice, as you can switch donation target without retraining and based on future knowledge about which organizations and kinds of activities become effective.
Poor countries are growing rich. There are many people there. These people will want to move around. They might be tempted to do it using cars. That would be bad in terms of resource consumption, energy consumption, and, for a while, carbon emission. Trains represent a much more energy and resource-efficient solution. Such solutions are good for the sustained existence of humankind at population levels close to the current one.
I am quite open to suggestiona. Reduction of existential risk is the most important thing in the world to me, at least when thinking in far-mode.
This is not what “existential risk” means. If some disaster was guaranteed in wiping out 99.9% of all population, but not more, it poses no existential risk at all (assuming it’s possible to rebuild eventually). For this reason, it doesn’t seem likely that things like global warming or resource scarcity pose existential risk.
In so far as unstable societies make for dealing with existential risk much more difficult this contributes to existential risk. There’s been some discussion also of whether in general rebuilding is possible given how much we’ve consumed in easily accessible, non-renewable resources in order to bootstrap our way to our current tech level. CarlShulman and I discussed this here a while ago, with Carl arguing that it wasn’t much of an issue.
Though note that Bostrom actually does list “Resource depletion or ecological destruction” as one possible type of x-risk in the linked article.
I think the general point is that a big population crash may well leave a remnant which is unable to re-industrialise (too few to make key inventions, too scattered, too many other problems). Or the remnant may have strong cultural pressures against re-industrialising, given it was such a disaster last time. The small residual population would eventually go extinct from natural causes, or evolve into something non-human. So the crash is an existential risk.
That aside, what are the occupations you would suggest for an engineer with a wish to adress existential risk? Did you have anything specific in mind when you said “then there are probably career choices that are much better in that respect”? Name three of those.
No. My observation was that this particular choice seems to be of no value for existential risk reduction, that if there are some choices that provide some value, that’s much better than no value at all (actually, this is faulty step, as even if a “better” choice is much better in relative value, its absolute value may still be low, so that it does almost no good), and that there probably are some (saying which ones can be expected to be useful and are plausible choices for a career needs considerably more research than I can think up for a comment, and I don’t know of a reference that already answers this question). If you go with professional philanthropy, optimize for money. This is generally an easier choice, as you can switch donation target without retraining and based on future knowledge about which organizations and kinds of activities become effective.