If you are looking at presidential candidates, why restrict your analysis to AI alignment?
If you’re super focused on that issue, then it will definitely be better to spend your money on actual AI research, or on some kind of direct effort to push the government to consider the issue (if such an effort exists).
When judging among the presidential candidates, other issues matter too! And in this context, they should be weighted more by their sheer importance than by philanthropic neglectedness. So AI risk is not obviously the most important.
With some help from other people I comprehensively reviewed 2020 candidates here: https://t.co/kMby2RDNDx
The conclusion is that yes, Yang is one of the best candidates to support—alongside Booker, Buttigieg, and Republican primary challengers. Partially due to his awareness of AI risk. But in the updates I’ve made for the 8th edition (and what I’m about to change now, seeing some other comments here about the lack of tractability for this issue), Buttigieg seems to move ahead to being the best Democrat by a small margin. Of course these judgments are pretty uncertain so you could argue that they are wrong if you find some flaw or omission in the report. Very early on, I decided that both Yang and Buttigieg were not good candidates, but that changed as I gathered new information about them.
But it’s wrong to judge a presidential candidate merely by their point of view on any single issue, including AI alignment.
If you’re super focused on that issue, then it will definitely be better to spend your money on actual AI research, or on some kind of direct effort to push the government to consider the issue (if such an effort exists).
I am, and that’s what I’m wondering. The “definitely” isn’t so obvious to me. Another $20 million to MIRI vs. an increase in the probability of Yang’s presidency by, let’s say, 5%--I don’t think it’s clear cut. (And I think MIRI is the best place to fund research).
What about simply growing the EA movement? That clearly seems like a more efficient way to address x-risk, and something where funding could be used more readily.
That is plausible. But “definitely” definitely wouldn’t be called for when comparing Yang with Grow EA. How many EA people who could be sold on an AI PhD do you think could recruited with $20 million?
I meant that it’s definitely more efficient to grow the EA movement than to grow Yang’s constituency. That’s how it seems to me, at least. It takes millions of people to nominate a candidate.
Well, there are >100 million people who have to join some constituency (i.e. pick a candidate), whereas potential EA recruits aren’t otherwise picking between a small set of cults philosophical movements. Also, AI PhD-ready people are in much shorter supply than, e.g. Iowans, and they’d be giving up much much much more than someone just casting a vote for Andrew Yang.
There are numerous minor, subtle ways that EAs reduce AI risk. Small in comparison to a research career, but large in comparison to voting. (Voting can actually be one of them.)
Your analysis seems to rely heavily on the judgement of r/neoliberal.
Can you explain to a dummy like me, isn’t this a serious weakpoint in your analysis.
I’m sure this is overly simplifying things, but I would have thought that actually it’s the social democracies which follow very technocratic keynesian economics that produce better economic outcomes (idk, greater growth, less unemployment, more entrepreneurship, haha I have no idea how true any of this is tbh—I just presume). Espescially now considering that the US/globe is facing possible recession, I would think fiscal stimulus would be even more ideal.
I can’t seem to find anywhere that neoliberalism holds some kind of academic consensus.
Your analysis seems to rely heavily on the judgement of r/neoliberal.
Very little, actually. Only time I actually cite the group is the one thread where people are discussing baby bonds.
It’s true that in many cases, we’ve arrived at similar points of view, but I have real citations in those cases.
As I say in the beginning of the “evaluations of sources” sections, a group like that is more for “secondary tasks such as learning different perspectives and locating more reliable sources.” The kind of thing that usually doesn’t get mentioned at all in references. I’m just doing more work to make all of it explicit.
And frankly I don’t spend much time there anyway. I haven’t gone to their page in months.
Do you think that they are poor even by the standards of social media groups? Like, compared to r/irstudies or others?
I would have thought that actually it’s the social democracies which follow very technocratic keynesian economics that produce better economic outcomes (idk, greater growth, less unemployment, more entrepreneurship, haha I have no idea how true any of this is tbh—I just presume).
It seems like most economists approve of them in times of recession (New Keynesianism), but don’t believe in blasting stimulus all the time (which would be post-Keynesianism). I’m a little unsure of the details here and may be oversimplifying. Frankly, it’s beyond my credentials to get into the weeds of macroeconomic theory (though if someone has such credentials, they are welcome to become involved...). I’m more concerned about the judgment of specific policy choices—it’s not like any of the candidates have expressed views on macroeconomic theory, they just talk about policies.
I found research indicating that countries with more public spending have less economic growth:
Perhaps the post-Keynesian economists have some reasons to disagree with this work, but I would need to see that they have some substantive critique or counterargument.
In any case, if 90% of the field believes something and 10% disagrees, we must still go by the majority, unless somehow we discover that the minority really has all the best arguments and evidence.
Of course, just because economic growth is lower, doesn’t mean that a policy is bad. Sometimes it’s okay to sacrifice growth for things like redistribution and public health. But remember that (a) we are really focusing on the long run here, where growth is a bit more important, and (b) we also have to consider the current fiscal picture. Debt in the US is quite bad right now, and higher spending would worsen the matter.
Espescially now considering that the US/globe is facing possible recession, I would think fiscal stimulus would be even more ideal.
Candidates are going to come into office in January 2021 - no one has a clue what the economy will look like at that time. Now if a candidate says “it’s good to issue large economic stimulus packages in times of recession,” I suppose I would give them points for that, but none have recently made such a statement as far as I know. For those politicians who were around circa 2009, I could look to see whether they endorsed the Recovery and Reinvestment Act (and, on a related note, TARP)… maybe I will add that, now that you mention it, I’ll think about it/look into it.
So Sorry for replying so late—I’ve been caught up with life/ exams.
Yes, sorry I did misrepresent you by thinking you relied heavily on r/neoliberal.
From digging around I totally understand and sympathise with why you chose to rely on partly on r/neoliberal—There are surprisingly few places where ecomonic discussion is occuring on the primary election where it is accessible to non-economists. But nonetheless they are a subreddit.
In a lot of your analysis though, you do seem to caricature Keynesian economics as non-mainstream. Is that … true? I don’t think this is at all correct. Isn’t Keynesian economics the backbone of mainstream economics alongside neoclassical economics?
I have some other points, I will try run them by you later.
Can I say one thing, Thank You for championing Onedrive. MY God, I am so sick to death of Google Drive. It is a blight upon our species. HAHA
In a lot of your analysis though, you do seem to caricature Keynesian economics as non-mainstream.
In the old version of the report, in maybe a couple of sentences, I incorrectly conflated the status of Keynesianism in general with Post-Keynesian in particular. In reality, New Keynesianism is accepted whereas Post-Keynesian ideas are heterodox, as I describe in the above comment. I have already updated the language in revisions. But this error of mine didn’t matter anyway because I wasn’t yet judging politicians for their stances on economic stimulus bills (although it is something to be added in the future). If I had been judging politicians on Keynesian stimulus then I would have looked more carefully before judging anything.
If Post-Keynesian ideas are correct, that could change a lot of things because it would mean that lots of government spending all the time will stimulate the economy. However, I am pretty sure this is not commonly accepted.
If you are looking at presidential candidates, why restrict your analysis to AI alignment?
If you’re super focused on that issue, then it will definitely be better to spend your money on actual AI research, or on some kind of direct effort to push the government to consider the issue (if such an effort exists).
When judging among the presidential candidates, other issues matter too! And in this context, they should be weighted more by their sheer importance than by philanthropic neglectedness. So AI risk is not obviously the most important.
With some help from other people I comprehensively reviewed 2020 candidates here: https://t.co/kMby2RDNDx
The conclusion is that yes, Yang is one of the best candidates to support—alongside Booker, Buttigieg, and Republican primary challengers. Partially due to his awareness of AI risk. But in the updates I’ve made for the 8th edition (and what I’m about to change now, seeing some other comments here about the lack of tractability for this issue), Buttigieg seems to move ahead to being the best Democrat by a small margin. Of course these judgments are pretty uncertain so you could argue that they are wrong if you find some flaw or omission in the report. Very early on, I decided that both Yang and Buttigieg were not good candidates, but that changed as I gathered new information about them.
But it’s wrong to judge a presidential candidate merely by their point of view on any single issue, including AI alignment.
I am, and that’s what I’m wondering. The “definitely” isn’t so obvious to me. Another $20 million to MIRI vs. an increase in the probability of Yang’s presidency by, let’s say, 5%--I don’t think it’s clear cut. (And I think MIRI is the best place to fund research).
What about simply growing the EA movement? That clearly seems like a more efficient way to address x-risk, and something where funding could be used more readily.
That is plausible. But “definitely” definitely wouldn’t be called for when comparing Yang with Grow EA. How many EA people who could be sold on an AI PhD do you think could recruited with $20 million?
I meant that it’s definitely more efficient to grow the EA movement than to grow Yang’s constituency. That’s how it seems to me, at least. It takes millions of people to nominate a candidate.
Well, there are >100 million people who have to join some constituency (i.e. pick a candidate), whereas potential EA recruits aren’t otherwise picking between a small set of cults philosophical movements. Also, AI PhD-ready people are in much shorter supply than, e.g. Iowans, and they’d be giving up much much much more than someone just casting a vote for Andrew Yang.
There are numerous minor, subtle ways that EAs reduce AI risk. Small in comparison to a research career, but large in comparison to voting. (Voting can actually be one of them.)
Hey Kbog,
Your analysis seems to rely heavily on the judgement of r/neoliberal.
Can you explain to a dummy like me, isn’t this a serious weakpoint in your analysis.
I’m sure this is overly simplifying things, but I would have thought that actually it’s the social democracies which follow very technocratic keynesian economics that produce better economic outcomes (idk, greater growth, less unemployment, more entrepreneurship, haha I have no idea how true any of this is tbh—I just presume). Espescially now considering that the US/globe is facing possible recession, I would think fiscal stimulus would be even more ideal.
I can’t seem to find anywhere that neoliberalism holds some kind of academic consensus.
Very little, actually. Only time I actually cite the group is the one thread where people are discussing baby bonds.
It’s true that in many cases, we’ve arrived at similar points of view, but I have real citations in those cases.
As I say in the beginning of the “evaluations of sources” sections, a group like that is more for “secondary tasks such as learning different perspectives and locating more reliable sources.” The kind of thing that usually doesn’t get mentioned at all in references. I’m just doing more work to make all of it explicit.
And frankly I don’t spend much time there anyway. I haven’t gone to their page in months.
Do you think that they are poor even by the standards of social media groups? Like, compared to r/irstudies or others?
It seems like most economists approve of them in times of recession (New Keynesianism), but don’t believe in blasting stimulus all the time (which would be post-Keynesianism). I’m a little unsure of the details here and may be oversimplifying. Frankly, it’s beyond my credentials to get into the weeds of macroeconomic theory (though if someone has such credentials, they are welcome to become involved...). I’m more concerned about the judgment of specific policy choices—it’s not like any of the candidates have expressed views on macroeconomic theory, they just talk about policies.
I found research indicating that countries with more public spending have less economic growth:
https://journalistsresource.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Govt-Size-and-Growth.pdf
http://rcea.org/RePEc/pdf/wp18-01.pdf
Perhaps the post-Keynesian economists have some reasons to disagree with this work, but I would need to see that they have some substantive critique or counterargument.
In any case, if 90% of the field believes something and 10% disagrees, we must still go by the majority, unless somehow we discover that the minority really has all the best arguments and evidence.
Of course, just because economic growth is lower, doesn’t mean that a policy is bad. Sometimes it’s okay to sacrifice growth for things like redistribution and public health. But remember that (a) we are really focusing on the long run here, where growth is a bit more important, and (b) we also have to consider the current fiscal picture. Debt in the US is quite bad right now, and higher spending would worsen the matter.
Candidates are going to come into office in January 2021 - no one has a clue what the economy will look like at that time. Now if a candidate says “it’s good to issue large economic stimulus packages in times of recession,” I suppose I would give them points for that, but none have recently made such a statement as far as I know. For those politicians who were around circa 2009, I could look to see whether they endorsed the Recovery and Reinvestment Act (and, on a related note, TARP)… maybe I will add that, now that you mention it, I’ll think about it/look into it.
So Sorry for replying so late—I’ve been caught up with life/ exams.
Yes, sorry I did misrepresent you by thinking you relied heavily on r/neoliberal.
From digging around I totally understand and sympathise with why you chose to rely on partly on r/neoliberal—There are surprisingly few places where ecomonic discussion is occuring on the primary election where it is accessible to non-economists. But nonetheless they are a subreddit.
In a lot of your analysis though, you do seem to caricature Keynesian economics as non-mainstream. Is that … true? I don’t think this is at all correct. Isn’t Keynesian economics the backbone of mainstream economics alongside neoclassical economics?
I have some other points, I will try run them by you later.
Can I say one thing, Thank You for championing Onedrive. MY God, I am so sick to death of Google Drive. It is a blight upon our species. HAHA
In the old version of the report, in maybe a couple of sentences, I incorrectly conflated the status of Keynesianism in general with Post-Keynesian in particular. In reality, New Keynesianism is accepted whereas Post-Keynesian ideas are heterodox, as I describe in the above comment. I have already updated the language in revisions. But this error of mine didn’t matter anyway because I wasn’t yet judging politicians for their stances on economic stimulus bills (although it is something to be added in the future). If I had been judging politicians on Keynesian stimulus then I would have looked more carefully before judging anything.
If Post-Keynesian ideas are correct, that could change a lot of things because it would mean that lots of government spending all the time will stimulate the economy. However, I am pretty sure this is not commonly accepted.
I am glad you agree on Drive vs OneDrive.