This was a hasty and not exactly beautifully-written post. It didn’t get much traction here on LW, but it had more engagement on its EA Forum crosspost (some interesting debate in the comments).
I still endorse the key messages, which are:
don’t rule out international and inter-bloc cooperation!
it’s realistic and possible, though it hangs in the balance
You don’t win by capturing the dubious accolade of nominally belonging to the bloc which directly destroys everything!
Not long after writing these, I became a civil servant (not something I ever expected!) at the AI Safety Institute (UK), so I’ve generally steered clear from public comment in the area of AI+politics since then.
That said, I’ve been really encouraged by the progress on international cooperation, which as I say remains ‘realistic and possible’! For example, in late 2023 we had the Bletchley declaration, signed by US, China, and many others, which stated (among other things):
We affirm that, whilst safety must be considered across the AI lifecycle, actors developing frontier AI capabilities… have a particularly strong responsibility for ensuring the safety of these AI systems… in particular to prevent misuse and issues of control, and the amplification of other risks.
Of course there’s also continued conflict and competition for hardware and talent, and a competitive element to countries’ approaches to AI. It’s in the balance!
At the very least, my takeaway from this is that if someone argues (descriptively or prescriptively) in favour of outright competition without at least acknowledging the above progress, they’re some combination of ill-informed, or wilfully or inadvertently censoring the evidence. Don’t let that be you!
This was a hasty and not exactly beautifully-written post. It didn’t get much traction here on LW, but it had more engagement on its EA Forum crosspost (some interesting debate in the comments).
I still endorse the key messages, which are:
don’t rule out international and inter-bloc cooperation!
it’s realistic and possible, though it hangs in the balance
it might be our only hope
lazy generalisations have power
us-vs-them rhetoric is self-reinforcing
Not content with upbraiding CAIS, I also went after Scott Alexander later in the month for similar lazy wording.
Not long after writing these, I became a civil servant (not something I ever expected!) at the AI Safety Institute (UK), so I’ve generally steered clear from public comment in the area of AI+politics since then.
That said, I’ve been really encouraged by the progress on international cooperation, which as I say remains ‘realistic and possible’! For example, in late 2023 we had the Bletchley declaration, signed by US, China, and many others, which stated (among other things):
Since then we’ve had AI safety appearing among top Chinese priorities, official dialogues between US and China on AI policy, track 2 discussions in Thailand and the UK, two international dialogues on AI safety in Venice and Beijing, and meaningful AI safety research from prominent Chinese academics, and probably many other encouraging works of diplomacy—it’s not my area of expertise, and I haven’t even been trying that hard to look for evidence here.
Of course there’s also continued conflict and competition for hardware and talent, and a competitive element to countries’ approaches to AI. It’s in the balance!
At the very least, my takeaway from this is that if someone argues (descriptively or prescriptively) in favour of outright competition without at least acknowledging the above progress, they’re some combination of ill-informed, or wilfully or inadvertently censoring the evidence. Don’t let that be you!