On the âthird wayâ approach, taking on the mission of making the transition to a post-AGI society go well, the menu might be more like this (though note this is meant to be illustrative rather than exhaustive, is not in any priority order, and in practice these wouldnât all get equal weight[4]):
AI for better reasoning, decision-making and coordination
the risk of (AI-enabled) human coups
democracy preservation
gradual disempowerment
biorisk
space governance
s-risks
macrostrategy
meta
Not wild animal welfare? You mentioned AI welfare, and I estimate increasing the welfare of soil animals will remain much more cost-effective than increasing digital welfare over at least the next few decades. You mention factory-farming, and I calculate that soil ants, termites, mites, springtails, and nematodes together:
Have 13.5 k (= 1.76*10^23/â(1.30*10^19)) times as many neurons as cattle, hens, broilers, and farmed black soldier fly (BSF) larvae and mealworms, finfishes, and shrimps together.
Have 395 k (= â7.00*10^15/â(-1.77*10^10)) times as much welfare as the above farmed animals for welfare per animal-year proportional to ânumber of neurons as a fraction of that of humansâ^0.5.
Thanks for the post, Will.
Not wild animal welfare? You mentioned AI welfare, and I estimate increasing the welfare of soil animals will remain much more cost-effective than increasing digital welfare over at least the next few decades. You mention factory-farming, and I calculate that soil ants, termites, mites, springtails, and nematodes together:
Have 13.5 k (= 1.76*10^23/â(1.30*10^19)) times as many neurons as cattle, hens, broilers, and farmed black soldier fly (BSF) larvae and mealworms, finfishes, and shrimps together.
Have 395 k (= â7.00*10^15/â(-1.77*10^10)) times as much welfare as the above farmed animals for welfare per animal-year proportional to ânumber of neurons as a fraction of that of humansâ^0.5.