Yes, that’s interesting and plausibly very useful to understand better. Might also affect some EAs at some point.
Power changes your incentives so much that it corrupts all but the strongest. The difference with the last one is that value drift is almost immediate upon getting power.
The hedonic treadmill might be part of it. You get used to the personal perks quickly, so you still feel motivated & justified to still put ~90% of your energy into problems that affect you personally → removing threats to your rule, marginal status-improvements, getting along with people close to you
And some discussion about the backwards causation idea is here in an oldie from Yudkowsky: Why Does Power Corrupt?
Yes, that’s interesting and plausibly very useful to understand better. Might also affect some EAs at some point.
The hedonic treadmill might be part of it. You get used to the personal perks quickly, so you still feel motivated & justified to still put ~90% of your energy into problems that affect you personally → removing threats to your rule, marginal status-improvements, getting along with people close to you
And some discussion about the backwards causation idea is here in an oldie from Yudkowsky: Why Does Power Corrupt?