I think you misunderstood David’s point. See my post “Artificial General Intelligence”: an extremely brief FAQ. It’s not that technology increases conflict between humans, but rather that the arrival of AGI amounts to the the arrival of a new intelligent species on our planet. There is no direct precedent for the arrival of a new intelligent species on our planet, apart from humans themselves, which did in fact turn out very badly for many existing species. The arrival of Europeans in North America is not quite “a new species”, but it’s at least “a new lineage”, and it also turned out very badly for the Native Americans.
Of course, there are also many disanalogies between the arrival of Europeans in the Americas, versus the arrival of AGIs on Earth. But I think it’s a less bad starting point than talking about shoe factories and whatnot!
(Like, if the Native Americans had said to each other, “well, when we invented such-and-such basket weaving technology, that turned out really good for us, so if Europeans arrive on our continent, that’s probably going to turn out good as well” … then that would be a staggering non sequitur, right? Likewise if they said “well, basket weaving and other technologies have not increased conflict between our Native American tribes so far, so if Europeans arrive, that will also probably not increase conflict, because Europeans are kinda like a new technology”. …That’s how weird your comparison feels, from my perspective :) .)
Thanks for clarifying, Steven! I am happy to think about advanced AI agents as a new species too. However, in this case, I would model them as mind children of humanity evolved through intelligent design, not Darwinian natural selection that would lead to a very adversarial relationship with humans.
I think you misunderstood David’s point. See my post “Artificial General Intelligence”: an extremely brief FAQ. It’s not that technology increases conflict between humans, but rather that the arrival of AGI amounts to the the arrival of a new intelligent species on our planet. There is no direct precedent for the arrival of a new intelligent species on our planet, apart from humans themselves, which did in fact turn out very badly for many existing species. The arrival of Europeans in North America is not quite “a new species”, but it’s at least “a new lineage”, and it also turned out very badly for the Native Americans.
Of course, there are also many disanalogies between the arrival of Europeans in the Americas, versus the arrival of AGIs on Earth. But I think it’s a less bad starting point than talking about shoe factories and whatnot!
(Like, if the Native Americans had said to each other, “well, when we invented such-and-such basket weaving technology, that turned out really good for us, so if Europeans arrive on our continent, that’s probably going to turn out good as well” … then that would be a staggering non sequitur, right? Likewise if they said “well, basket weaving and other technologies have not increased conflict between our Native American tribes so far, so if Europeans arrive, that will also probably not increase conflict, because Europeans are kinda like a new technology”. …That’s how weird your comparison feels, from my perspective :) .)
Thanks for clarifying, Steven! I am happy to think about advanced AI agents as a new species too. However, in this case, I would model them as mind children of humanity evolved through intelligent design, not Darwinian natural selection that would lead to a very adversarial relationship with humans.