Multiplier effects: Delaying timelines by 1 year gives the entire alignment community an extra year to solve the problem.
This is the most and fastest I’ve updated on a single sentence as far back as I can remember. Probably the most important thing I’ve ever read on the EA forum. I am deeply gratefwl for learning this, and it’s definitely worth Taking Seriously. Hoping to look into it in January unless stuff gets in the way.
(Update: I’m much substantially less optimistic about time-buying than I was when I wrote this comment, but I still think it’s high priority to look into.)
I have one objection to claim 3a, however: Buying-time interventions are plausibly more heavy-tailed than alignment research in some cases because 1) the bottleneck for buying time is social influence and 2) social influence follows a power law due to preferential attachment. Luckily, the traits that make for top alignment researchers have limited (but not insignificant) overlap with the traits that make for top social influencers. So I think top alignment researchers should still not switch in most cases on the margin.
This is the most and fastest I’ve updated on a single sentence as far back as I can remember. Probably the most important thing I’ve ever read on the EA forum. I am deeply gratefwl for learning this, and it’s definitely worth Taking Seriously. Hoping to look into it in January unless stuff gets in the way.
(Update: I’m much substantially less optimistic about time-buying than I was when I wrote this comment, but I still think it’s high priority to look into.)
I have one objection to claim 3a, however: Buying-time interventions are plausibly more heavy-tailed than alignment research in some cases because 1) the bottleneck for buying time is social influence and 2) social influence follows a power law due to preferential attachment. Luckily, the traits that make for top alignment researchers have limited (but not insignificant) overlap with the traits that make for top social influencers. So I think top alignment researchers should still not switch in most cases on the margin.
Can you be more specific about “the bottleneck for buying time is social influence”?
I basically agree with this breakdown from the post: