I think I agree with this general approach to thinking about this.
From what I’ve seen of AI risk discussions, I think I’d stand by my prior statement, which I’d paraphrase now as: There are a variety of different types of AI catastrophe scenario that have been discussed. Some seem like they might be more likely or similarly likely to totally wipe us out that to cause a 5-25% death toll. But some don’t. And I haven’t seen super strong arguments for considering the former much more likely than the latter. And it seems like the AI safety community as a whole has become more diverse in their thinking on this sort of thing over the last few years.
For engineered pandemics, it still seems to me that literally 100% of people dying from the pathogens themselves seems much less likely than a very high number dying, perhaps even enough to cause existential catastrophe slightly “indirectly”. However “well” engineered, pathogens themselves aren’t agents which explicitly seek the complete extinction of humanity. (Again, Defence in Depth seems relevant here.) Though this is slightly different from a conversation about the relative likelihood of 10% vs other percentages. (Also, I feel hesitant to discuss this in great deal, for vague information hazards reasons.)
I agree regarding accidental physics risks. But I think the risks from those is far lower than the risks from AI and bio, and probably nanotech, nuclear, etc. (I don’t really bring any independent evidence to the table; this is just based on the views I’ve seen from x-risk researchers.)
from the track record of known risks, it seems that probably there are many diverse unknown risks, and so probably at least a few of them do not have common mini-versions.
I think that’d logically follow from your prior statements. But I’m not strongly convinced about those statements, except regarding accidental physics risks, which seem very unlikely.
And by the argument you just gave, the “unknown” risks that have common mini-versions won’t actually be unknown, since we’ll see their mini-versions. So “unknown” risks are going to be disproportionately the kind of risk that doesn’t have common mini-versions.
I think this is an interesting point. It does tentatively update me towards thinking that, conditional on there indeed being “unknown risks” that are already “in play”, they’re more likely than I’d otherwise thing to jump straight to 100%, without “mini versions”.
However, I think the most concerning source of “unknown risks” are new technologies or new actions (risks that aren’t yet “in play”). The unknown equivalents of risks from nanotech, space exploration, unprecedented consolidation of governments across the globe, etc. “Drawing a new ball from the urn”, in Bostrom’s metaphor. So even if such risks do have “common mini-versions”, we wouldn’t yet have seen them.
Also, regarding the portion of unknown risks that are in play, it seems to be appropriate to respond to the argument “Most risks have common mini-versions, but we haven’t seen these for unknown risks (pretty much by definition)” partly by updating towards thinking the unknown risks lack such common mini-versions, but also partly by updating towards thinking unknown risks are unlikely. We aren’t forced to fully take the former interpretation.
Tobias’ original point was ” Also, if engineered pandemics, or “unforeseen” and “other” anthropogenic risks have a chance of 3% each of causing extinction, wouldn’t you expect to see smaller versions of these risks (that kill, say, 10% of people, but don’t result in extinction) much more frequently? But we don’t observe that. ”
Thus he is saying there aren’t any “unknown” risks that do have common mini-versions but just haven’t had time to develop yet. That’s way too strong a claim, I think. Perhaps in my argument against this claim I ended up making claims that were also too strong. But I think my central point is still right: Tobias’ argument rules out things arising in the future that clearly shouldn’t be ruled out, because if we had run that argument in the past it would have ruled out various things (e.g. AI, nukes, physics risks, and come to think of it even asteroid strikes and pandemics if we go far enough back in the past) that in fact happened.
1. I interpreted the original claim—“wouldn’t you expect”—as being basically one in which observation X was evidence against hypothesis Y. Not conclusive evidence, just an update. I didn’t interpret it as “ruling things out” (in a strong way) or saying that there aren’t any unknown risks without common mini-versions (just that it’s less likely that there are than one would otherwise think). Note that his point seemed to be in defence of “Ord’s estimates seem too high to me”, rather than “the risks are 0″.
2. I do think that Tobias’s point, even interpreted that way, was probably too strong, or missing a key detail, in that the key sources of risks are probably emerging or new things, so we wouldn’t expect to have observed their mini-versions yet. Though I do tentatively think I’d expect to see mini-versions before the “full thing”, once the new things do start arising. (I’m aware this is all pretty hand-wavey phrasing.)
3i. As I went into more in my other comment, I think the general expectation that we’ll expect to see very small versions before and more often than small ones, which we expect to see before and more often than medium, which we expect to see before and more often than large, etc., probably would’ve served well in the past. There was progressively more advanced tech before AI, and AI is progressively advancing more. There were progressively more advanced weapons, progressively more destructive wars, progressively larger numbers of nukes, etc. I’d guess the biggest pandemics and asteroid strikes weren’t the first, because the biggest are rare.
3ii. AI is the least clear of those examples, because:
(a) it seems like destruction from AI so far has been very minimal (handful of fatalities from driverless cars, the “flash crash”, etc.), yet it seems plausible major destruction could occur in future
(b) we do have specific arguments, though of somewhat unclear strength, that the same AI might actively avoid causing any destruction for a while, and then suddenly seize decisive strategic advantage etc.
But on (a), I do think most relevant researchers would say the risk this month from AI is extremely low; the risks will rise in future as systems become more capable. So there’s still time in which we may see mini-versions.
And on (b), I’d consider that a case where a specific argument updates us away from a generally pretty handy prior that we’ll see small things earlier and more often than extremely large things. And we also don’t yet have super strong reason to believe that those arguments are really painting the right picture, as far as I’m aware.
3iii. I think if we interpreted Tobias’s point as something like “We’ll never see anything that’s unlike the past”, then yes, of course that’s ridiculous. So as I mentioned elsewhere, I think it partly depends on how we carve up reality, how we define things, etc. E.g., do we put nukes in a totally new bucket, or consider it a part of trends in weaponry/warfare/explosives?
But in any case, my interpretation of Tobias’s point, where it’s just about it being unlikely to see extreme things before smaller versions, would seem to work with e.g. nukes, even if we put them in their own special category—we’d be surprise by the first nuke, but we’d indeed see there’s one nuke before there are thousands, and there are two detonations on cities before there’s a full-scale nuclear war (if there ever is one, which hopefully and plausibly there won’t be).
In general I think you’ve thought this through more carefully than me so without having read all your points I’m just gonna agree with you.
So yeah, I think the main problem with Tobias’ original point was that unknown risks are probably mostly new things that haven’t arisen yet and thus the lack of observed mini-versions of them is no evidence against them. But I still think it’s also true that some risks just don’t have mini-versions, or rather are as likely or more likely to have big versions than mini-versions. I agree that most risks are not like this, including some of the examples I reached for initially.
I think I agree with this general approach to thinking about this.
From what I’ve seen of AI risk discussions, I think I’d stand by my prior statement, which I’d paraphrase now as: There are a variety of different types of AI catastrophe scenario that have been discussed. Some seem like they might be more likely or similarly likely to totally wipe us out that to cause a 5-25% death toll. But some don’t. And I haven’t seen super strong arguments for considering the former much more likely than the latter. And it seems like the AI safety community as a whole has become more diverse in their thinking on this sort of thing over the last few years.
For engineered pandemics, it still seems to me that literally 100% of people dying from the pathogens themselves seems much less likely than a very high number dying, perhaps even enough to cause existential catastrophe slightly “indirectly”. However “well” engineered, pathogens themselves aren’t agents which explicitly seek the complete extinction of humanity. (Again, Defence in Depth seems relevant here.) Though this is slightly different from a conversation about the relative likelihood of 10% vs other percentages. (Also, I feel hesitant to discuss this in great deal, for vague information hazards reasons.)
I agree regarding accidental physics risks. But I think the risks from those is far lower than the risks from AI and bio, and probably nanotech, nuclear, etc. (I don’t really bring any independent evidence to the table; this is just based on the views I’ve seen from x-risk researchers.)
I think that’d logically follow from your prior statements. But I’m not strongly convinced about those statements, except regarding accidental physics risks, which seem very unlikely.
I think this is an interesting point. It does tentatively update me towards thinking that, conditional on there indeed being “unknown risks” that are already “in play”, they’re more likely than I’d otherwise thing to jump straight to 100%, without “mini versions”.
However, I think the most concerning source of “unknown risks” are new technologies or new actions (risks that aren’t yet “in play”). The unknown equivalents of risks from nanotech, space exploration, unprecedented consolidation of governments across the globe, etc. “Drawing a new ball from the urn”, in Bostrom’s metaphor. So even if such risks do have “common mini-versions”, we wouldn’t yet have seen them.
Also, regarding the portion of unknown risks that are in play, it seems to be appropriate to respond to the argument “Most risks have common mini-versions, but we haven’t seen these for unknown risks (pretty much by definition)” partly by updating towards thinking the unknown risks lack such common mini-versions, but also partly by updating towards thinking unknown risks are unlikely. We aren’t forced to fully take the former interpretation.
Tobias’ original point was ” Also, if engineered pandemics, or “unforeseen” and “other” anthropogenic risks have a chance of 3% each of causing extinction, wouldn’t you expect to see smaller versions of these risks (that kill, say, 10% of people, but don’t result in extinction) much more frequently? But we don’t observe that. ”
Thus he is saying there aren’t any “unknown” risks that do have common mini-versions but just haven’t had time to develop yet. That’s way too strong a claim, I think. Perhaps in my argument against this claim I ended up making claims that were also too strong. But I think my central point is still right: Tobias’ argument rules out things arising in the future that clearly shouldn’t be ruled out, because if we had run that argument in the past it would have ruled out various things (e.g. AI, nukes, physics risks, and come to think of it even asteroid strikes and pandemics if we go far enough back in the past) that in fact happened.
1. I interpreted the original claim—“wouldn’t you expect”—as being basically one in which observation X was evidence against hypothesis Y. Not conclusive evidence, just an update. I didn’t interpret it as “ruling things out” (in a strong way) or saying that there aren’t any unknown risks without common mini-versions (just that it’s less likely that there are than one would otherwise think). Note that his point seemed to be in defence of “Ord’s estimates seem too high to me”, rather than “the risks are 0″.
2. I do think that Tobias’s point, even interpreted that way, was probably too strong, or missing a key detail, in that the key sources of risks are probably emerging or new things, so we wouldn’t expect to have observed their mini-versions yet. Though I do tentatively think I’d expect to see mini-versions before the “full thing”, once the new things do start arising. (I’m aware this is all pretty hand-wavey phrasing.)
3i. As I went into more in my other comment, I think the general expectation that we’ll expect to see very small versions before and more often than small ones, which we expect to see before and more often than medium, which we expect to see before and more often than large, etc., probably would’ve served well in the past. There was progressively more advanced tech before AI, and AI is progressively advancing more. There were progressively more advanced weapons, progressively more destructive wars, progressively larger numbers of nukes, etc. I’d guess the biggest pandemics and asteroid strikes weren’t the first, because the biggest are rare.
3ii. AI is the least clear of those examples, because:
(a) it seems like destruction from AI so far has been very minimal (handful of fatalities from driverless cars, the “flash crash”, etc.), yet it seems plausible major destruction could occur in future
(b) we do have specific arguments, though of somewhat unclear strength, that the same AI might actively avoid causing any destruction for a while, and then suddenly seize decisive strategic advantage etc.
But on (a), I do think most relevant researchers would say the risk this month from AI is extremely low; the risks will rise in future as systems become more capable. So there’s still time in which we may see mini-versions.
And on (b), I’d consider that a case where a specific argument updates us away from a generally pretty handy prior that we’ll see small things earlier and more often than extremely large things. And we also don’t yet have super strong reason to believe that those arguments are really painting the right picture, as far as I’m aware.
3iii. I think if we interpreted Tobias’s point as something like “We’ll never see anything that’s unlike the past”, then yes, of course that’s ridiculous. So as I mentioned elsewhere, I think it partly depends on how we carve up reality, how we define things, etc. E.g., do we put nukes in a totally new bucket, or consider it a part of trends in weaponry/warfare/explosives?
But in any case, my interpretation of Tobias’s point, where it’s just about it being unlikely to see extreme things before smaller versions, would seem to work with e.g. nukes, even if we put them in their own special category—we’d be surprise by the first nuke, but we’d indeed see there’s one nuke before there are thousands, and there are two detonations on cities before there’s a full-scale nuclear war (if there ever is one, which hopefully and plausibly there won’t be).
In general I think you’ve thought this through more carefully than me so without having read all your points I’m just gonna agree with you.
So yeah, I think the main problem with Tobias’ original point was that unknown risks are probably mostly new things that haven’t arisen yet and thus the lack of observed mini-versions of them is no evidence against them. But I still think it’s also true that some risks just don’t have mini-versions, or rather are as likely or more likely to have big versions than mini-versions. I agree that most risks are not like this, including some of the examples I reached for initially.