I think the value of these debates lies in normalising this issue as one that is valid to have a debate about in the public sphere. These debates aren’t confined to LessWrong or in-the-know Twitter sniping anymore, and I think that’s unironically a good thing.
I agree.
I think you’re a bit too hasty to extrapolate what the ‘AI Safety Side’ strategy should be.
That may well be true.
Personally think that Stuart Russell would be a great spokesman for the AI-risk-is-serious side, impeccable credentials, has debated the issue before (see here vs Melanie), and I think his persepective on AI risk lends itself to a “slow-takeoff” framing rather than a “hard-takeoff” framing which Bengio/Hinton/Tegmark etc. seem to be pushing more.
I agree.
That may well be true.
Yes, he definitely would have been a good choice.