I have noticed that few people hold the view that we can readily reduce AI-risk. Either they are very pessimistic (they see no viable solutions so reducing risk is hard) or they are optimistic (they assume AI will be aligned by default, so trying to improve the situation is superfluous).
Either way, this would argue against alignment research, since alignment work would not produce much change.
Strategically, it’s best to assume that alignment work does reduce AI-risk, since it is better to do too much alignment work (relative to doing too little alignment work and causing a catastrophe).
I have noticed that few people hold the view that we can readily reduce AI-risk. Either they are very pessimistic (they see no viable solutions so reducing risk is hard) or they are optimistic (they assume AI will be aligned by default, so trying to improve the situation is superfluous).
Either way, this would argue against alignment research, since alignment work would not produce much change.
Strategically, it’s best to assume that alignment work does reduce AI-risk, since it is better to do too much alignment work (relative to doing too little alignment work and causing a catastrophe).