My concern about people and animals having net-negative lives has been related to what’s happening with my own depression. My concern is a lot stronger when I’m doing worse personally.
I share the experience that my concern is stronger when I am in a worse mood but I am not sure I share your conclusion.
My concern comes from an intuitive judgement when I am in a bad mood. When I am in a good mood it requires cognitive effort to remember how badly off many other people and animals are.
I don’t want to deprioritise the worst off in favour of creating many happy lives in the future just because I have a very privileged life and “forget” how badly off others are.
Oh, I don’t think either conclusion is clearly right. I do worry that me being happy makes it too easy for me to neglect important worries about what things are like for others.
But I think I was sloppy in rounding to “maybe AI ending everything wouldn’t be that bad,” partly because the world could well get better than it currently is, and partly because unaligned AI could make things worse.
Thank you for sharing!
I share the experience that my concern is stronger when I am in a worse mood but I am not sure I share your conclusion.
My concern comes from an intuitive judgement when I am in a bad mood. When I am in a good mood it requires cognitive effort to remember how badly off many other people and animals are.
I don’t want to deprioritise the worst off in favour of creating many happy lives in the future just because I have a very privileged life and “forget” how badly off others are.
Oh, I don’t think either conclusion is clearly right. I do worry that me being happy makes it too easy for me to neglect important worries about what things are like for others.
But I think I was sloppy in rounding to “maybe AI ending everything wouldn’t be that bad,” partly because the world could well get better than it currently is, and partly because unaligned AI could make things worse.
That makes sense, thank you!