On the skeptical side, I think the most likely way(s) space colonization doesn’t happen are that costs to do it would be too high for people to ever be able to afford or want to do it on a large scale (given opportunity costs), or at least before we go extinct for some other reason. Furthermore, if there’s little interest or active opposition to allowing AIs (or artificial sentience) to colonize space on their own, then costs may increase significantly to feed biological humans and ensure there’s enough oxygen for them, although it could still be more AIs than humans going.
I don’t think assigning probability > 50% to these possibilities together is unreasonable, nor is assigning probabilities < 50%. If you forced me to choose a single number, I’d probably choose something close to 50-50 on whether large scale space colonization happens at all, because of how uncertain I am now. Something like only a 10% chance on each side would be about the limit for what I would consider for decision-making (except to illustrate) if I wanted to provide a range of cost-effectiveness estimates for any intervention related to this. I’m not sure I’d say anything outside this 10-90% range is unreasonable, but just outside what I’d consider worth entertaining for myself. I would want to see a really strong argument to entertain something as extreme as 1% on either side.
I mostly agree with your assessments.
On the skeptical side, I think the most likely way(s) space colonization doesn’t happen are that costs to do it would be too high for people to ever be able to afford or want to do it on a large scale (given opportunity costs), or at least before we go extinct for some other reason. Furthermore, if there’s little interest or active opposition to allowing AIs (or artificial sentience) to colonize space on their own, then costs may increase significantly to feed biological humans and ensure there’s enough oxygen for them, although it could still be more AIs than humans going.
I don’t think assigning probability > 50% to these possibilities together is unreasonable, nor is assigning probabilities < 50%. If you forced me to choose a single number, I’d probably choose something close to 50-50 on whether large scale space colonization happens at all, because of how uncertain I am now. Something like only a 10% chance on each side would be about the limit for what I would consider for decision-making (except to illustrate) if I wanted to provide a range of cost-effectiveness estimates for any intervention related to this. I’m not sure I’d say anything outside this 10-90% range is unreasonable, but just outside what I’d consider worth entertaining for myself. I would want to see a really strong argument to entertain something as extreme as 1% on either side.