FWIW, here’s an introduction to longtermism and AI risks I wrote for a friend. (My friend has some technical background, he had read Doing Good Better but not engaged further with EA, and I thought he’d be a good fit for AI Policy research but not technical research.)
Longtermism: Future people matter, and there might be lots of them, so the moral value of our actions is significantly determined by their effects on the long-term future. We should prioritize reducing “existential risks” like nuclear war, climate change, and pandemics that threaten to drive humanity to extinction, preventing the possibility of a long and beautiful future.
Academic paper arguing that future people matter morally, and we have tractable ways to help them, from the Doing Good Better philosopher
Best resource on this topic: The Precipice, a book explaining what risks could drive us to extinction and how we can combat them, released earlier this year by another Oxford philosophy professor
Artificial intelligence might transform human civilization within the next century, presenting incredible opportunities and serious potential problems
Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, and many leading AI researchers worry that extremely advanced AI poses an existential threat to humanity (Vox)
Best resource on this topic: Human Compatible, a book explaining the threats, existential and otherwise, posed by AI. Written by Stuart Russell, CS professor at UC Berkeley and author of the leading textbook on AI. Daniel Kahneman calls it “the most important book I have read in quite some time”. (Or this podcast with Russell)
CS paper giving the technical explanation of what could go wrong (from Google/OpenAI/Berkeley/Stanford)
(AI is less morally compelling if you don’t care about the long-term future. If you want to focus on the present, maybe focus on other causes: global poverty, animal welfare, grantmaking, or researching altruistic priorities.)
Generally, I’d like to hear more about how different people introduce the ideas of EA, longtermism, and specific cause areas. There’s no clear cut canon, and effectively personalizing an intro can difficult, so I’d love to hear how others navigate it.
Generally, I’d like to hear more about how different people introduce the ideas of EA, longtermism, and specific cause areas. There’s no clear cut canon, and effectively personalizing an intro can difficult, so I’d love to hear how others navigate it.
This seems like a promising topic for an EA Forum question. I would consider creating one and reposting your comment as an answer to it. A separate question is probably also a better place to collect answers than this thread, which is best reserved for questions addressed to Ben and for Ben’s answers to those questions.
More broadly, should AMA threads be reserved for direct questions to the respondent and the respondent’s answers? Or should they encourage broader discussion of those questions and ideas by everyone?
I’d lean towards AMAs as a starting point for broader discussion, rather than direct Q&A. Good examples include the AMAs by Buck Shlegeris and Luke Muehlhauser. But it does seem that most AMAs are more narrow, focusing on direct question and answer.
[For example, this question isn’t really directed towards Ben, but I’m asking anyways because the context and motivations are clearer here than they would be elsewhere, making productive discussion more likely. But I’m happy to stop distracting if there’s consensus against this.]
I personally would lean towards the “most AMAs” approach of having most dialogue be with the AMA-respondent. It’s not quite “questions after a talk”, since question-askers have much more capacity to respond and have a conversation, but I feel like it’s more in that direction than, say, a random EA social. Maybe something like the vibe of a post-talk mingling session?
I think this is probably more important early in a comment tree than later. Directly trying to answer someone else’s question seems odd/out-of-place to me, whereas chiming in 4 levels down seems less so. I think this mirrors how the “post-talk mingling” would work: if I was talking to a speaker at such an event, and I asked them a question, someone else answering before them would be odd/annoying – “sorry, I wasn’t talking to you”. Whereas someone else chiming in after a little back-and-forth would be much more natural.
Of course, you can have multiple parallel comment threads here, which alters things quite a bit. But that’s the kind of vibe that feels natural to me, and Pablo’s comment above suggests I’m not alone in this.
FWIW, here’s an introduction to longtermism and AI risks I wrote for a friend. (My friend has some technical background, he had read Doing Good Better but not engaged further with EA, and I thought he’d be a good fit for AI Policy research but not technical research.)
Longtermism: Future people matter, and there might be lots of them, so the moral value of our actions is significantly determined by their effects on the long-term future. We should prioritize reducing “existential risks” like nuclear war, climate change, and pandemics that threaten to drive humanity to extinction, preventing the possibility of a long and beautiful future.
Quick intro to longtermism and existential risks from 80,000 Hours
Academic paper arguing that future people matter morally, and we have tractable ways to help them, from the Doing Good Better philosopher
Best resource on this topic: The Precipice, a book explaining what risks could drive us to extinction and how we can combat them, released earlier this year by another Oxford philosophy professor
Artificial intelligence might transform human civilization within the next century, presenting incredible opportunities and serious potential problems
Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, and many leading AI researchers worry that extremely advanced AI poses an existential threat to humanity (Vox)
Best resource on this topic: Human Compatible, a book explaining the threats, existential and otherwise, posed by AI. Written by Stuart Russell, CS professor at UC Berkeley and author of the leading textbook on AI. Daniel Kahneman calls it “the most important book I have read in quite some time”. (Or this podcast with Russell)
CS paper giving the technical explanation of what could go wrong (from Google/OpenAI/Berkeley/Stanford)
How you can help by working on US AI policy, explains 80,000 Hours
(AI is less morally compelling if you don’t care about the long-term future. If you want to focus on the present, maybe focus on other causes: global poverty, animal welfare, grantmaking, or researching altruistic priorities.)
Generally, I’d like to hear more about how different people introduce the ideas of EA, longtermism, and specific cause areas. There’s no clear cut canon, and effectively personalizing an intro can difficult, so I’d love to hear how others navigate it.
This seems like a promising topic for an EA Forum question. I would consider creating one and reposting your comment as an answer to it. A separate question is probably also a better place to collect answers than this thread, which is best reserved for questions addressed to Ben and for Ben’s answers to those questions.
Good idea, thanks! I’ve posted a question here.
More broadly, should AMA threads be reserved for direct questions to the respondent and the respondent’s answers? Or should they encourage broader discussion of those questions and ideas by everyone?
I’d lean towards AMAs as a starting point for broader discussion, rather than direct Q&A. Good examples include the AMAs by Buck Shlegeris and Luke Muehlhauser. But it does seem that most AMAs are more narrow, focusing on direct question and answer.
[For example, this question isn’t really directed towards Ben, but I’m asking anyways because the context and motivations are clearer here than they would be elsewhere, making productive discussion more likely. But I’m happy to stop distracting if there’s consensus against this.]
I personally would lean towards the “most AMAs” approach of having most dialogue be with the AMA-respondent. It’s not quite “questions after a talk”, since question-askers have much more capacity to respond and have a conversation, but I feel like it’s more in that direction than, say, a random EA social. Maybe something like the vibe of a post-talk mingling session?
I think this is probably more important early in a comment tree than later. Directly trying to answer someone else’s question seems odd/out-of-place to me, whereas chiming in 4 levels down seems less so. I think this mirrors how the “post-talk mingling” would work: if I was talking to a speaker at such an event, and I asked them a question, someone else answering before them would be odd/annoying – “sorry, I wasn’t talking to you”. Whereas someone else chiming in after a little back-and-forth would be much more natural.
Of course, you can have multiple parallel comment threads here, which alters things quite a bit. But that’s the kind of vibe that feels natural to me, and Pablo’s comment above suggests I’m not alone in this.