There’s a somewhat standard argument I’ve heard before that we shouldn’t separate these out because they’re already covered by existential risks. For example, this is already a complaint lobbied against s-risks since they’re a subtype of x-risk. Trying to focus on a subtype seems like mostly a bid to allow something to rise to higher importance than it would otherwise be under standard x-risk framings.
For example, many people try to claim climate change is an extinction risk because fast, significant climate change could cause an extinction event, but that doesn’t mean all of life on Earth dies, just that some large percentage of species are wiped out. Existential risk helps keep the lines clear, since climate change is generally not considered an existential risk since plenty of life would be left around after major climate change since that’s what’s happened in every past instance of major climate change on Earth.
Not having an acronym for extinction risk seems fine then since I think existential risks matter much more, and we should do what we can as EAs to focus on the highest leverage stuff rather than get distracted by things that might kill lots of species but not wipe out all life, since in comparison this is a lower priority type of risk due to lesser impact.
For example, this is already a complaint lobbied against s-risks since they’re a subtype of x-risk.
I don’t necessarily think s-risks and extinction risks are strictly subtypes of x-risks (if by subtype you mean subset), although it seems like the community may have a few definitions swirling around for each term.
Trying to focus on a subtype seems like mostly a bid to allow something to rise to higher importance than it would otherwise be under standard x-risk framings
Does giving something an acronym = trying to focus on? It could explicitly help you focus less on it by clarifying via making it easier to communicate, for example. Even if it adds focus, if it also adds clarity (which it totally may not), there is at least the notion of some tradeoff.
rather than get distracted by things that might kill lots of species but not wipe out all life, since in comparison this is a lower priority type of risk due to lesser impact.
This still seems more important than almost anything else that isn’t an x-risk to me. So is the implication here that existential risk is the sole term that gets an acronym? I feel ok about letting the global dev and animal welfare communities have acronyms (conditioning on acronyms being useful) even though one might say they are orders of magnitude less important than x-risk reduction.
There’s a somewhat standard argument I’ve heard before that we shouldn’t separate these out because they’re already covered by existential risks. For example, this is already a complaint lobbied against s-risks since they’re a subtype of x-risk. Trying to focus on a subtype seems like mostly a bid to allow something to rise to higher importance than it would otherwise be under standard x-risk framings.
For example, many people try to claim climate change is an extinction risk because fast, significant climate change could cause an extinction event, but that doesn’t mean all of life on Earth dies, just that some large percentage of species are wiped out. Existential risk helps keep the lines clear, since climate change is generally not considered an existential risk since plenty of life would be left around after major climate change since that’s what’s happened in every past instance of major climate change on Earth.
Not having an acronym for extinction risk seems fine then since I think existential risks matter much more, and we should do what we can as EAs to focus on the highest leverage stuff rather than get distracted by things that might kill lots of species but not wipe out all life, since in comparison this is a lower priority type of risk due to lesser impact.
I don’t necessarily think s-risks and extinction risks are strictly subtypes of x-risks (if by subtype you mean subset), although it seems like the community may have a few definitions swirling around for each term.
Does giving something an acronym = trying to focus on? It could explicitly help you focus less on it by clarifying via making it easier to communicate, for example. Even if it adds focus, if it also adds clarity (which it totally may not), there is at least the notion of some tradeoff.
This still seems more important than almost anything else that isn’t an x-risk to me. So is the implication here that existential risk is the sole term that gets an acronym? I feel ok about letting the global dev and animal welfare communities have acronyms (conditioning on acronyms being useful) even though one might say they are orders of magnitude less important than x-risk reduction.