“We should do [X], because people who are [bad quality] are trying to do [X] and if they succeed the consequences will be disastrous.”
Usually [X] is some dual use strategy (acquire wealth and power, lie to their audience, build or use dangerous tech) and [bad quality] is something like being reckless, malicious, psychopathic etc. Sometimes the consequence is zero sum (they get more power to use to do Bad Things relative to us, the Good People) and sometimes the consequence is negative sum (Bad Things will happen)
As someone pointed out on the twitter replies to the mechanize essay, this kind of argument basically justifies selling crack or any other immoral action provided you can imagine a hypothetical worse person doing the same thing. See also its related cousin, “If I don’t do [X] someone else will do it anyways”, which (as Vitalik points out) assumes a perfectly liquid labour market that usually does not exist except in certain industries.
Follow up to https://vitalik.eth.limo/general/2025/11/07/galaxybrain.html
Here is a galaxy brain argument I see a lot:
“We should do [X], because people who are [bad quality] are trying to do [X] and if they succeed the consequences will be disastrous.”
Usually [X] is some dual use strategy (acquire wealth and power, lie to their audience, build or use dangerous tech) and [bad quality] is something like being reckless, malicious, psychopathic etc. Sometimes the consequence is zero sum (they get more power to use to do Bad Things relative to us, the Good People) and sometimes the consequence is negative sum (Bad Things will happen)
As someone pointed out on the twitter replies to the mechanize essay, this kind of argument basically justifies selling crack or any other immoral action provided you can imagine a hypothetical worse person doing the same thing. See also its related cousin, “If I don’t do [X] someone else will do it anyways”, which (as Vitalik points out) assumes a perfectly liquid labour market that usually does not exist except in certain industries.
I leave it to the reader to furnish examples.