Hi Jamie
For Longtermism see UNESCO’s declaration of the Responsibilities of Current Generations towards future Generations.
Also the Welsh Assembly in the UK has a working Future Generations Commissioner www.futuregenerations.wales
Best Regards
Trev Prew
Thanks Greg, I’m sixty years old and grew up when every one said the world was going to be destroyed in a thermonuclear war, then it was acid rain, then it was nano technology (covering the world in a layer of scum!), then it was the millennium bug, currently its climate change and it looks like people are starting to worry about AI. Even the Prime minister is at it, perhaps as a cover for his failed short term policies. Humans are fundamentally neurotic—perhaps it gives us an evolutionary edge, always being on the lookout for new threats, but if you step back and take an overview of humanity, maybe you will see what the real problems are.
However, my point is, take care of today (with an eye on the mid term), the current problems and the future will look after itself. Who can predict the future with any degree of certainty anyway, so why worry? Its correct that long term thinking is needed to tackle climate change, but not problems like Palestine / Israel or Putin’s and Xi Jinping’s ideology that threatens Europe and Asia or Trumps attack on democracy, all of which are trying to drag us back to repeat past failures. Long term thinking should not be used to avoid tackling short term problems.
From what I’ve read of science, biology, neurology, psychology, politics, economics, history, philosophy we are on the verge of a breakthrough in new thought and maybe because AI can pull vast pools of knowledge together and perhaps eliminate our biases and prejudices, bring about great change for the better. This is not something to be afraid of, but something to embrace, but of course caution is needed and a simple fail safe button should be built in if we don’t like the outputs.
Thanks for reading.
Regards and good luck with your endeavours. Never stop learning, but keep it real.
Thanks for for reply. The only threat to humanity comes from humanity. AI, like any other tool such as atomic weapons or dynamite will be used for good or bad by humans. AI is powerful and because its a new technology, it’s impact on the future debatable, but this has been the case ever since humans invented flint tools.
I say the fundamental problem is how to steer humanity away from improper use of technology, which can be achieved by first understanding human behaviors and motivations, then by the widespread dispersion of this knowledge and finally by exposing the futility of such behaviour in our globalised, interconnected and interdependent society.
If the end of humanity does happen, it will not be due to AI, pandemics or atomic weapons, it will because one group of humans, decided it wanted to get an advantage over another group of humans and ignored all other considerations. Understand why and we may be able to find a solution.
Hello
At a lecture I attended, a leading banker said “long term thinking should not be used as an excuse for short term failure”. At the time, he was defending short term profit making as against long term investment, but when applied to discussions of longtermist the point is similar. Our policies and actions can only be implemented in the present and must succeed in the short term as well as the long term. This means careful risk assessment/management but as the future can never be predicted with absolute certainty,the long term effects of policy become increasingly uncertain into the future. It should be remembered that policy can always be adapted at a future date as events/new information dictate. This may be a more efficient way of operating.
I wholeheartedly agree that Governments need more long term thinking rather than indulging voters demands that are driven on by a crisis loving media (please excuse my cynicism) . I assume the EA community is taking action and lobbying MP’s to legally adopt UNESCO’s declaration of Responsibilities of Current Generations towards Future Generations. But I would hate to think that longtermism became an excuse for inaction or delay, as we have many serious problems that need urgent action.
Regards
Trevor Prew
Sheffield UK
There has been plenty of discussion above relating to family planning, birth rates and global population, but no mention of death rates. Longer life spans means a higher population. So does this mean euthanasia and right to die policies should be considered as a means to reduce population levels too?
I agree that a lower global population would solve many environmental problems but is fraught with issues.
In low income countries with minimal welfare provisions, children are seen as an alternative to a pension. Sons and daughters will look after you when you are old, so having many will be added security. Therefore female education and contraception provision should go hand in hand with increase in wealth and welfare.
Lowering population will lower GDP which is a principal measure of Governments success or failure. Countries with falling populations currently solve this by immigration which defeats the goal of a lower population. If governments concentrated on alternative measures of success, such as happiness measures per person this may help.
Other people telling couples how many children to have is an infringement of basic freedoms and morally wrong. So a programme of contraception education within local communities based on freedom of choice is essential.
Who decides what is the “correct” global population level? I see the “correct” level of population as a balance between life style ie consumption level and number of people. If everyone in the world adopted a western high consumption level then a low population would be obvious, but if everyone lived sustainable simple life styles a higher level of global population would be unproblematic. Proposing lower population levels could be viewed as culturally biased, ie rich westerners wishing to protect their high consumption life styles at the expense of other equally valid cultures. Dangerous ground to be avoided.
China adopted a one child per family policy which has been abandoned, so this is not the way to go. It lead to a sex bias of more sons than daughters and much resentment and suffering at the state intervention required to enforce it.
So to summarise, make contraception and the knowledge to use it correctly freely available, but do no more. Let people decide what is best for their lives, after all they are the true experts in this field.
Action on climate change is in its infancy and forecasts cannot be relied as they cannot include unforeseen events. Given human nature ie people do what is the least inconvenient to them (ie act in their own self interest) rather than what is morally right, I’m expecting a backlash to CO2 reducing policies which I doubt the IPCC forecasts include. Will the majority of people pay for new green infrastructure and a more expensive hydrogen economy? People are already up in arms about the current energy cost rises. Will Governments stand up to the majority who want cheap energy and convenience, as they have had for the past few decades?
The only hope to counter this self interested behaviour that I can see, is to portray the fossil fuel industries as being as bad as the slave trade of the 19th 18th centuries. Both are/ were cheap sources of energy but both have or will cause great harm to humanity. (Predictions of 4 Billion people living in a tropical hot house by 2050 was reported in New Scientist a few weeks ago).
See “What else is there to say about climate change?” on trevorprew.blogspot.com
As for AI, can’t you just pull the plug out if it starts running amuck!
Hi JasperGeh
Thanks for you comments. I take your point that I do not make citations references etc. I’m not an academic, so I don’t have to follows rules and can write with complete freedom. It’s great therapy for me at least!
I guess EA is not the social group for me, so I wish you all well and I will continue with my solo actions of writing to Ambassadors, newspapers, Politicians, Religious leaders, MP’s and any one else who might listen and has power to make the world a better place. I put my faith in the chaos theory, that a small insignificant butterfly has a small non zero probability of creating a storm one day.
Keep up the good work, but apologies for wasting your valuable time.
Best Regards
Trevor Prew
Hello
Who I am isn’t very important, but like you, I endeavor to make the world a better place. To this end I write to who ever I think could make a difference and write essays on my blog. It all started when I stared into the darkness whilst standing in a railway truck that transported Jews to Auschwitz. After this harrowing experience, I thought “is this the way it is going to be? War and holocausts forever, as long as there are humans alive? Current events suggest yes, but I believe humanity can learn and avoid such a future. See my essay “A history of the world in a single object”.
Donating to charities is fine and will do a lot of good in the world, but I also feel it is like passing the buck, avoiding our direct responsibility to our fellow humans and other inhabitants of planet earth whether living or to live. I think that it is vitally important that we understand human nature, so that we can learn to change for a much more positive future. (I did get one of my essays published as the lead letter in the Economist Magazine March 5th − 11th 2022, if this is all sounding a bit wacky).
So I would be grateful if you could use some of your valuable time to read some of my work on my blog and consider my ideas.
Trevor Prew
Sheffield UK
Fears over AI are based on a fallacy. The fallacy is that whatever the output of an AI system is, humans will use it regardless. This is obviously not true, humans are not slaves to AI masters and can choose to use, ignore or question the outputs. Scientists are not solely responsible for how their discoveries are used, we all are. Scientists should be open and explain what they are doing and discovering but we should still boldly go, or is that go boldly, into the future.
The posting is concerned about deadly chemical weapons. Well, if you speak to a toxicologist I’m sure they will tell you that anything can kill you, it just depends on the dose. The world is already full of toxins.
Climate change is wrecking the planet, Putin is trying to start World War Three and the middle east is turning into a blood bath. Mean while some people hide from reality and worry about a perceived threat from the latest tools that humanity has invented.
Is their intelligent life on earth? I see little evidence to support that argument.
Hello EA community
I’m new to EA and I’m surprised by the fear expressed about AI. Have you heard of the ludities? Well I suppose fear of scientific progress is only natural, considering the popularity of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein since it was written in the early 19th century.
Firstly will AI systems defy the second law of thermodynamics, where entropy (disorder) increases with time? Will AI systems be perpetual calculating machines that never break? Surely not, they will be like every other computer that fails from time to time, especially when a cosmic ray smashes into a critical electron at a critical time.
Secondly programmes may be set up to evolve for improved performance (a process that will not be directly controlled by humans), but the performance will be judged against a human defined goal, so humans are always in control.
Thirdly, if you are worried that AI computers will become self aware, I would recommend the book The Evolution of the Sensitive soul by Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jabolonka for their views on consciousness. Will AI systems be able to perform unlimited associated learning and if they do will it be harmful or dangerous? Animals only attack for food or if threatened, anything else is a waste of energy. Why would AI systems be any different?
Fourthly, AI systems will need a power source, so humans can always pull the plug.
So my personal view, which will no doubt up set people, is that so called human “intelligence” (or lack of it) is a much bigger problem than AI, and it would be more effective altruism to focus on solutions to the current human caused problems, rather than imagined ones based on an emotional, irrational fear of future machines.
I look forward to your comments.
Yours faithfully
Trevor Prew
Sheffield UK
What is the most effective altruistic act that you and I can make? This if the question posed by this website, and after a few months of thought I have decided to do the following.
I will drastically reduce and then eliminate all fossil fuel and meat consumption from my life. I don’t want to do this, I have enjoyed a life of cheap energy based on fossil fuels, but I now know that I can no longer live this way. Because of the harm it does to those less well off, future others and all life on this planet, I must stop.
Socrates said that wisdom is knowledge and we now have the knowledge that climate change is “widespread, rapid and intensifying and the world must quickly and completely curtail greenhouse gas emissions to avert catastrophe” (Economist Magazine‘s stark summary of the IPCC’s most recent report). If you read the IPCC’s freely available 6th Assessment Report (or for something less heavy The Climate Book compiled by Greta Thunberg), or just watched the news, or the weather in your local area, you cannot fail to know this to be the effects of global warm are true and immensely damaging. We have to stop dumping green house gases into atmosphere or the planet will get hotter and hotter and hotter until our civilization collapses. So will you and the rest of humanity act wisely? Socrates thought that with knowledge you couldn‘t do anything but, however I‘m not so sure.
Whilst knowledge is wisdom, we now know it is not enough. Humans have the capacity for delusion, disbelief and selfishness, so that we can dismiss knowledge as untrue or “fake news” or think we are already doing enough or it is pointless an individual acting or its up to Governments to act. We can invent countless excuses for our own convenience. We can create a reality that suits ourselves to give us short term pleasure (and maybe pleasure that will last until we die). However, eventually the true reality comes crashing in and we are forced to acknowledge the unavoidable truth. But, by then it will be too late and the planet will be unable to recover.
When you look at the cosmic, geological and evolutionary events that have resulted in the advanced life forms on this planet, how can you not be amazed by the world? For all we know, we may be the most complex life form in the Universe—but we are currently on a path to destroy ourselves by swiftly and radically altering the planet. Do we not have a moral duty to prevent harm to others, future others and other life forms?
So, the most altruistic the most effective act you can do is to stop dumping your pollution on those least able to cope with the consequences, namely those in less wealthy countries, future others who have no voice and other life forms who have an equal right to live. You will be helping billions and billions, not to mention saving the future of our planet.
Also, at the next election, vote for the political party with the greenest agenda,
Dear Holden
Thanks very much for taking time to reply to my comments. I can agree with point 2 that human specified goals could be dangerous -it’s humans that should be closely monitored rather than the tools they use! Also doesn’t your point one contradict point 4. Entropy will increase so any AI system will break and ultimately turn itself off?
Overall, I’m not worried by AI, so I wish you all the success in your endeavours and will live in happy ignorance knowing you are worrying on my behalf. I would only point out that, in my experience, humans over worry and inflate risks. It gives us an evolutionary survival advantage, but causes a lot of stress, wasted effort and holds us back from great achievements.
So, just go for it, but keep your risk assessments real!
Best Regards
Trevor Prew
(no reply necessary but if interested, see my essay “fear” on trevorprew.blogspot.com)
My apologies to Plex. Please excuse my newbie error.