(To answer your direct Q, re: “Have you ever seen someone prominent pushing a case for “optimism” on the basis of causal trade with aliens / acaual trade?”, I have heard “well I don’t think it will actually kill everyone because of acausal trade arguments” enough times that I assumed the people discussing those cases thought the argument was substantial. I’d be a bit surprised if none of the ECLW folks thought it was a substantial reason for optimism. My impression from the discussions was that you & others of similar prominence were in that camp. I’m heartened to hear that you think it’s insubstantial. I’m a little confused why there’s been so much discussion around it if everyone agrees it’s insubstantial, but have updated towards it just being a case of people who don’t notice/buy that it’s washed out by sale to hubble-volume aliens and who are into pedantry. Sorry for falsely implying that you & others of similar prominence thought the argument was substantial; I update.)
(I mean, I think it’s a substantial reason to think that “literally everyone dies” is considerably less likely and makes me not want to say stuff like “everyone dies”, but I just don’t think it implies much optimism exactly because the chance of death still seems pretty high and the value of the future is still lost. Like I don’t consider “misaligned AIs have full control and 80% of humans survive after a violent takeover” to be a good outcome.)
(To answer your direct Q, re: “Have you ever seen someone prominent pushing a case for “optimism” on the basis of causal trade with aliens / acaual trade?”, I have heard “well I don’t think it will actually kill everyone because of acausal trade arguments” enough times that I assumed the people discussing those cases thought the argument was substantial. I’d be a bit surprised if none of the ECLW folks thought it was a substantial reason for optimism. My impression from the discussions was that you & others of similar prominence were in that camp. I’m heartened to hear that you think it’s insubstantial. I’m a little confused why there’s been so much discussion around it if everyone agrees it’s insubstantial, but have updated towards it just being a case of people who don’t notice/buy that it’s washed out by sale to hubble-volume aliens and who are into pedantry. Sorry for falsely implying that you & others of similar prominence thought the argument was substantial; I update.)
(I mean, I think it’s a substantial reason to think that “literally everyone dies” is considerably less likely and makes me not want to say stuff like “everyone dies”, but I just don’t think it implies much optimism exactly because the chance of death still seems pretty high and the value of the future is still lost. Like I don’t consider “misaligned AIs have full control and 80% of humans survive after a violent takeover” to be a good outcome.)