Criticism of longtermism and existential risk studies

TagLast edit: 6 Jun 2022 17:20 UTC by Leo

Criticism of longtermism and existential risk studies collects critical discussions of longtermism and existential risk studies.

Response to Recent Criticisms of Longtermism

ab13 Dec 2021 13:36 UTC

249 points

31 comments28 min readEA link

Response to Torres’ ‘The Case Against Longtermism’

HaydnBelfield8 Mar 2021 18:09 UTC

138 points

73 comments5 min readEA link

Excerpts from “Doing EA Better” on x-risk methodology

Eevee🔹26 Jan 2023 1:04 UTC

22 points

5 comments6 min readEA link

(forum.effectivealtruism.org)

Longtermists are perceived as power-seeking

OllieBase20 Jun 2023 8:39 UTC

133 points

43 comments2 min readEA link

Why I am probably not a longtermist

Denise_Melchin23 Sep 2021 17:24 UTC

230 points

47 comments8 min readEA link

Four Concerns Regarding Longtermism

Pat Andriola6 Jun 2022 5:42 UTC

82 points

15 comments7 min readEA link

Mistakes in the moral mathematics of existential risk (Part 2: Ignoring background risk) - Reflective altruism

Eevee🔹3 Jul 2023 6:34 UTC

84 points

7 comments6 min readEA link

(ineffectivealtruismblog.com)

Effective altruists are already institutionalists and are doing far more than unworkable longtermism—A response to “On the Differences between Ecomodernism and Effective Altruism”

jackva21 Feb 2023 18:08 UTC

78 points

3 comments12 min readEA link

My highly personal skepticism braindump on existential risk from artificial intelligence.

NunoSempere23 Jan 2023 20:08 UTC

435 points

116 comments14 min readEA link

(nunosempere.com)

“Effective Altruism, Longtermism, and the Problem of Arbitrary Power” by Gwilym David Blunt

WobblyPandaPanda12 Nov 2023 1:21 UTC

22 points

2 comments1 min readEA link

(www.thephilosopher1923.org)

The Base Rate of Longtermism Is Bad

ColdButtonIssues5 Sep 2022 13:29 UTC

220 points

27 comments7 min readEA link

Is the Far Future Irrelevant for Moral Decision-Making?

Tristan D1 Oct 2024 7:42 UTC

35 points

31 comments2 min readEA link

(www.sciencedirect.com)

A response to Michael Plant’s review of What We Owe The Future

JackM4 Oct 2023 23:40 UTC

61 points

14 comments10 min readEA link

Monetary and social incentives in longtermist careers

Vaidehi Agarwalla 🔸23 Sep 2023 21:03 UTC

140 points

5 comments6 min readEA link

A Critique of The Precipice: Chapter 6 - The Risk Landscape [Red Team Challenge]

Sarah Weiler26 Jun 2022 10:59 UTC

57 points

2 comments21 min readEA link

Enlightenment Values in a Vulnerable World

Maxwell Tabarrok18 Jul 2022 11:54 UTC

66 points

18 comments31 min readEA link

The Credibility of Apocalyptic Claims: A Critique of Techno-Futurism within Existential Risk

Ember16 Aug 2022 19:48 UTC

24 points

35 comments17 min readEA link

Thoughts on “A case against strong longtermism” (Masrani)

MichaelA3 May 2021 14:22 UTC

39 points

33 comments2 min readEA link

Response to recent criticisms of EA “longtermist” thinking

kbog6 Jan 2020 4:31 UTC

27 points

46 comments11 min readEA link

Common-sense cases where “hypothetical future people” matter

tlevin12 Aug 2022 14:05 UTC

107 points

21 comments4 min readEA link

The Epistemic Challenge to Longtermism (Tarsney, 2020)

MichaelA4 Apr 2021 3:09 UTC

79 points

27 comments2 min readEA link

(globalprioritiesinstitute.org)

Utilitarianism and the replaceability of desires and attachments

MichaelStJules27 Jul 2024 1:57 UTC

33 points

11 comments12 min readEA link

[Link post] Optimistic “Longtermism” Is Terrible For Animals

BrianK6 Sep 2022 22:38 UTC

47 points

6 comments1 min readEA link

(www.forbes.com)

21 criticisms of EA I’m thinking about

Peter Wildeford1 Sep 2022 19:28 UTC

209 points

26 comments9 min readEA link

Rethinking longtermism and global development

Eevee🔹2 Sep 2022 5:28 UTC

10 points

2 comments8 min readEA link

(sunyshore.substack.com)

Summarizing the comments on William MacAskill’s NYT opinion piece on longtermism

West21 Sep 2022 17:46 UTC

106 points

11 comments2 min readEA link

“Pronatalists” may look to co-opt effective altruism or longtermism

pseudonym17 Nov 2022 21:04 UTC

34 points

23 comments4 min readEA link

(www.businessinsider.com)

A “Solipsistic” Repugnant Conclusion

Ramiro21 Jul 2022 16:06 UTC

13 points

0 comments6 min readEA link

Longtermists should take climate change very seriously

Nir Eyal3 Oct 2022 18:33 UTC

29 points

10 comments8 min readEA link

EA is too focused on the Manhattan Project

trevor15 Sep 2022 2:00 UTC

17 points

0 comments1 min readEA link

Against longtermism: a care-centric approach?

Aron P2 Oct 2022 5:00 UTC

21 points

2 comments1 min readEA link

A longtermist critique of “The expected value of extinction risk reduction is positive”

Anthony DiGiovanni1 Jul 2021 21:01 UTC

129 points

10 comments32 min readEA link

Future people might not exist

Indra Gesink 🔸30 Nov 2022 19:17 UTC

18 points

0 comments4 min readEA link

[Question] Why doesn’t WWOTF mention the Bronze Age Collapse?

Eevee🔹19 Sep 2022 6:29 UTC

16 points

4 comments1 min readEA link

Winners of the EA Criticism and Red Teaming Contest

Lizka1 Oct 2022 1:50 UTC

226 points

41 comments19 min readEA link

[Linkpost] Dan Luu: Futurist prediction methods and accuracy

Linch15 Sep 2022 21:20 UTC

64 points

7 comments4 min readEA link

(danluu.com)

The Long Reflection as the Great Stagnation

Larks1 Sep 2022 20:55 UTC

43 points

2 comments8 min readEA link

Concerns/Thoughts over international aid, longtermism and philosophical notes on speaking with Larry Temkin.

Ben Yeoh27 Jul 2022 19:51 UTC

35 points

1 comment12 min readEA link

Formalising the “Washing Out Hypothesis”

dwebb25 Mar 2021 11:40 UTC

101 points

27 comments12 min readEA link

Reducing the nearterm risk of human extinction is not astronomically cost-effective?

Vasco Grilo🔸9 Jun 2024 8:02 UTC

20 points

37 comments8 min readEA link

Non-utilitarian effective altruism

keir bradwell29 Jan 2023 6:07 UTC

42 points

10 comments17 min readEA link

(keirbradwell.substack.com)

I No Longer Feel Comfortable in EA

disgruntled_ea5 Feb 2023 20:45 UTC

2 points

29 comments1 min readEA link

Proposal: Create A New Longtermism Organization

Brian Lui7 Feb 2023 5:59 UTC

25 points

37 comments6 min readEA link

Maybe longtermism isn’t for everyone

Eevee🔹10 Feb 2023 16:48 UTC

39 points

17 comments1 min readEA link

Mistakes in the moral mathematics of existential risk (Part 1: Introduction and cumulative risk) - Reflective altruism

Eevee🔹3 Jul 2023 6:33 UTC

74 points

6 comments6 min readEA link

(ineffectivealtruismblog.com)

[Question] Will the vast majority of technological progress happen in the longterm future?

Vasco Grilo🔸8 Jul 2023 8:40 UTC

8 points

0 comments2 min readEA link

Prior probability of this being the most important century

Vasco Grilo🔸15 Jul 2023 7:18 UTC

8 points

2 comments2 min readEA link

Effective Altruism and the strategic ambiguity of ‘doing good’

Jeroen De Ryck 🔹17 Jul 2023 19:24 UTC

80 points

10 comments2 min readEA link

(medialibrary.uantwerpen.be)

Blog update: Reflective altruism

David Thorstad14 May 2023 11:07 UTC

165 points

22 comments9 min readEA link

Existential risk pessimism and the time of perils

David Thorstad12 Aug 2022 14:42 UTC

173 points

67 comments20 min readEA link

Nuclear war is unlikely to cause human extinction

Jeffrey Ladish7 Nov 2020 5:39 UTC

61 points

27 comments11 min readEA link

Nuclear war tail risk has been exaggerated?

Vasco Grilo🔸25 Feb 2024 9:14 UTC

41 points

22 comments28 min readEA link

Supervolcanoes tail risk has been exaggerated?

Vasco Grilo🔸6 Mar 2024 8:38 UTC

45 points

9 comments8 min readEA link

(journals.ametsoc.org)

Can a conflict cause human extinction? Yet again, not on priors

Vasco Grilo🔸19 Jun 2024 16:59 UTC

19 points

2 comments11 min readEA link

A case against focusing on tail-end nuclear war risks

Sarah Weiler16 Nov 2022 6:08 UTC

31 points

15 comments10 min readEA link

Can a terrorist attack cause human extinction? Not on priors

Vasco Grilo🔸2 Dec 2023 8:20 UTC

43 points

9 comments15 min readEA link

Exaggerating the risks (Part 13: Ord on Biorisk)

Vasco Grilo🔸31 Dec 2023 8:45 UTC

57 points

18 comments13 min readEA link

(ineffectivealtruismblog.com)

[linkpost] “What Are Reasonable AI Fears?” by Robin Hanson, 2023-04-23

Arjun Panickssery14 Apr 2023 23:26 UTC

41 points

3 comments4 min readEA link

(quillette.com)

Variance of the annual conflict and epidemic/pandemic deaths as a fraction of the global population

Vasco Grilo🔸10 Sep 2024 17:02 UTC

16 points

0 comments2 min readEA link

Which World Gets Saved

trammell9 Nov 2018 18:08 UTC

151 points

27 comments3 min readEA link

Two tools for rethinking existential risk

Arepo5 Apr 2024 21:25 UTC

82 points

14 comments25 min readEA link

Imitation Learning is Probably Existentially Safe

Vasco Grilo🔸30 Apr 2024 17:06 UTC

19 points

7 comments3 min readEA link

(www.openphilanthropy.org)

International risk of food insecurity and mass mortality in a runaway global warming scenario

Vasco Grilo🔸2 Sep 2023 7:28 UTC

15 points

2 comments6 min readEA link

(www.sciencedirect.com)

Can a war cause human extinction? Once again, not on priors

Vasco Grilo🔸25 Jan 2024 7:56 UTC

67 points

29 comments18 min readEA link

[Question] What do you think the vision is behind our biggest critics?

aprilsun1 Aug 2023 18:49 UTC

29 points

6 comments1 min readEA link

Three errors in the moral calculations concerning existential risk.

jun1233 Aug 2023 11:47 UTC

−9 points

0 comments1 min readEA link

Against longtermism

Brian Lui11 Aug 2022 5:37 UTC

38 points

30 comments6 min readEA link

[Opzionale] Perché probabilmente non sono una lungoterminista

EA Italy17 Jan 2023 18:12 UTC

1 point

0 comments8 min readEA link

Sensitive assumptions in longtermist modeling

Owen Murphy18 Sep 2024 1:39 UTC

77 points

12 comments7 min readEA link

(ohmurphy.substack.com)

Optimism, AI risk, and EA blind spots

Justis28 Sep 2022 17:21 UTC

87 points

21 comments8 min readEA link

Carnegie Council MisUnderstands Longtermism

Jeff A30 Sep 2022 2:57 UTC

6 points

8 comments1 min readEA link

(www.carnegiecouncil.org)

#203 – Interfering with wild nature, accepting death, and the origin of complex civilisation (Peter Godfrey-Smith on The 80,000 Hours Podcast)

80000_Hours4 Oct 2024 13:00 UTC

14 points

0 comments16 min readEA link

Radical Longtermism and the Seduction of Endless Growth: A Critique of William MacAskill’s ‘What We Owe the Future’

Alexander Herwix 🔸14 Sep 2023 14:43 UTC

−13 points

15 comments1 min readEA link

(perspecteeva.substack.com)

A Sequence Against Strong Longtermism

vadmas22 Jul 2021 20:07 UTC

20 points

14 comments1 min readEA link

A Gentle Introduction to Risk Frameworks Beyond Forecasting

pending_survival11 Apr 2024 9:15 UTC

81 points

4 comments27 min readEA link

A Case Against Strong Longtermism

A. Wolff2 Sep 2022 16:40 UTC

9 points

4 comments39 min readEA link

The reasonableness of special concerns

jwt29 Aug 2022 0:10 UTC

3 points

0 comments3 min readEA link

[Linkpost] Eric Schwitzgebel: Against Longtermism

ag40006 Jan 2022 14:15 UTC

41 points

4 comments1 min readEA link

Phil Torres’ article: “The Dangerous Ideas of ‘Longtermism’ and ‘Existential Risk’”

Ben_Eisenpress6 Aug 2021 7:19 UTC

6 points

13 comments1 min readEA link

Remarks about Longtermism inspired by Torres’s ‘Against Longtermism’

carboniferous_umbraculum2 Feb 2022 16:20 UTC

43 points

0 comments24 min readEA link

On longtermism, Bayesianism, and the doomsday argument

iporphyry1 Sep 2022 0:27 UTC

30 points

5 comments13 min readEA link

Will longtermists self-efface

Noah Scales12 Aug 2022 2:32 UTC

−7 points

23 comments6 min readEA link

Should strong longtermists really want to minimize existential risk?

tobycrisford 🔸4 Dec 2022 16:56 UTC

38 points

9 comments4 min readEA link

EA is more than longtermism

frances_lorenz3 May 2022 15:18 UTC

160 points

99 comments5 min readEA link

Phil Torres on Against Longtermism

Group Organizer13 Jan 2022 6:04 UTC

1 point

5 comments1 min readEA link

Paper summary: Staking our future: deontic long-termism and the non-identity problem (Andreas Mogensen)

Global Priorities Institute7 Jun 2022 13:14 UTC

25 points

6 comments6 min readEA link

(globalprioritiesinstitute.org)

Nuclear Fine-Tuning: How Many Worlds Have Been Destroyed?

Ember17 Aug 2022 13:13 UTC

18 points

28 comments23 min readEA link

St. Petersburg Demon – a thought experiment that makes me doubt Longtermism

wuschel23 May 2022 11:49 UTC

48 points

39 comments2 min readEA link

Thread on LT/ut’s preference for billions of imminent deaths

Peter_Layman14 Sep 2022 15:44 UTC

−16 points

1 comment1 min readEA link

(twitter.com)

A proposed hierarchy of longtermist concepts

Arepo30 Oct 2022 16:26 UTC

38 points

13 comments4 min readEA link

Longtermist (especially x-risk) terminology has biasing assumptions

Arepo30 Oct 2022 16:26 UTC

70 points

13 comments7 min readEA link

A Critique of Longtermism by Popular YouTube Science Channel, Sabine Hossenfelder: “Elon Musk & The Longtermists: What Is Their Plan?”

Ram Aditya29 Oct 2022 17:31 UTC

61 points

21 comments2 min readEA link

An epistemic critique of longtermism

Nathan_Barnard10 Jul 2022 10:59 UTC

12 points

4 comments9 min readEA link

We can’t put numbers on everything and trying to weakens our collective epistemics

ConcernedEAs8 Mar 2023 15:09 UTC

9 points

0 comments11 min readEA link

Against Longtermism: I welcome our robot overlords, and you should too!

MattBall2 Jul 2022 2:05 UTC

5 points

6 comments6 min readEA link

Nuclear winter scepticism

Vasco Grilo🔸13 Aug 2023 10:55 UTC

110 points

42 comments10 min readEA link

(www.navalgazing.net)

A critique of strong longtermism

Pablo Rosado28 Aug 2022 19:33 UTC

15 points

11 comments14 min readEA link

Summary: Maximal Cluelessness (Andreas Mogensen)

Nicholas Kruus6 Feb 2024 14:49 UTC

39 points

17 comments4 min readEA link

The Case for Shorttermism—by Robert Wright

Miquel Banchs-Piqué (prev. mikbp)16 Aug 2022 20:00 UTC

24 points

0 comments1 min readEA link

(nonzero.substack.com)

Concepts of existential catastrophe

Vasco Grilo🔸15 Apr 2024 17:16 UTC

11 points

1 comment8 min readEA link

(globalprioritiesinstitute.org)

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Crit­i­cism of longter­mism and ex­is­ten­tial risk studies

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Criticism of longtermism and existential risk studies