I notice someone added the “AI risk skepticism” tag to this post. That seems reasonable, because I do express skepticism of the extreme certainty that some have about misalignment risk, even though I think that risk is real.
But my main goal with this post is to argue for, not against, the reality of a certain type of catastrophic AI risk that I believe many are largely ignoring and inadvertently worsening: the risk that AI is a powerful technology which can enable a permanent authoritarian lock-in over the human future, and that draconian controls over the enabling resources of that technology, especially in a time of rapid democratic backsliding, could help bring into existence.
I notice someone added the “AI risk skepticism” tag to this post. That seems reasonable, because I do express skepticism of the extreme certainty that some have about misalignment risk, even though I think that risk is real.
But my main goal with this post is to argue for, not against, the reality of a certain type of catastrophic AI risk that I believe many are largely ignoring and inadvertently worsening: the risk that AI is a powerful technology which can enable a permanent authoritarian lock-in over the human future, and that draconian controls over the enabling resources of that technology, especially in a time of rapid democratic backsliding, could help bring into existence.