Against GDP as a metric for AI timelines and takeoff speeds

Or: Why AI Takeover Might Happen Before GDP Accelerates, and Other Thoughts On What Matters for Timelines and Takeoff Speeds I think world GDP (and economic growth more generally) is overrated as a metric for AI timelines and takeoff speeds. Here are some uses of GDP that I disagree with, or at least think should be accompanied by cautionary notes: Timelines: Ajeya Cotra thinks of transformative AI as “software which causes a tenfold acceleration in the rate of growth of the world economy (assuming that it is used everywhere that it would be economically profitable to use it).” I don’t mean to single her out in particular; this seems like the standard definition now. Takeoff Speeds: Paul Christiano argues for […]

Read more

Incentivizing forecasting via social media

Summary Most people will probably never participate on existing forecasting platforms which limits their effects on mainstream institutions and public discourse. Changes to the user interface and recommendation algorithms of social media platforms might incentivize forecasting and lead to its more widespread adoption. Broadly, we envision i) automatically suggesting questions of likely interest to the user—e.g., questions related to the user’s current post or trending topics—and ii) rewarding users with higher than average forecasting accuracy with increased visibility. In a best case scenario, such forecasting-incentivizing features might have various positive consequences such as increasing society’s shared sense of reality and the quality of public discourse, while reducing polarization and the spread of misinformation. Facebook’s Forecast could be seen as one […]

Read more

Commitment ability in multipolar AI scenarios

Abstract The ability to make credible commitments is a key factor in many bargaining situations ranging from trade to international conflict. This post builds a taxonomy of the commitment mechanisms that transformative AI (TAI) systems could use in future multipolar scenarios, describes various issues they have in practice, and draws some tentative conclusions about the landscape of commitments we might expect in the future. Introduction A better understanding of the commitments that future AI systems can make is helpful for predicting and influencing the dynamics of multipolar scenarios. The option to credibly bind oneself to certain actions or strategies fundamentally changes the game theory behind bargaining, cooperation, and conflict. Credible commitments can work to stabilize positive-sum agreements, and to increase […]

Read more

Persuasion Tools: AI takeover without takeoff or agency?

[epistemic status: speculation] I'm envisioning that in the future there will also be systems where you can input any conclusion that you want to argue (including moral conclusions) and the target audience, and the system will give you the most convincing arguments for it. At that point people won't be able to participate in any online (or offline for that matter) discussions without risking their object-level values being hijacked. --Wei Dai What if most people already live in that world? A world in which taking arguments at face value is not a capacity-enhancing tool, but a security vulnerability? Without trusted filters, would they not dismiss highfalutin arguments out of hand, and focus on whether the person making the argument seems […]

Read more

How Roodman's GWP model translates to TAI timelines

How does David Roodman’s world GDP model translate to TAI timelines? Now, before I go any further, let me be the first to say that I don’t think we should use this model to predict TAI. This model takes a very broad outside view and is thus inferior to models like Ajeya Cotra’s which make use of more relevant information. (However, it is still useful for rebutting claims that TAI is unprecedented, inconsistent with historical trends, low-prior, etc.) Nevertheless, out of curiosity I thought I’d calculate what the model implies for TAI timelines. Here is the projection made by Roodman’s model. The red line is real historic GWP data; the splay of grey shades that continues it is the splay […]

Read more

The date of AI Takeover is not the day the AI takes over

Instead, it’s the point of no return—the day we AI risk reducers lose the ability to significantly reduce AI risk. This might happen years before classic milestones like “World GWP doubles in four years” and “Superhuman AGI is deployed." The rest of this post explains, justifies, and expands on this obvious but underappreciated idea. (Toby Ord appreciates it; see quote below). I found myself explaining it repeatedly, so I wrote this post as a reference. AI timelines often come up in career planning conversations. Insofar as AI timelines are short, career plans which take a long time to pay off are a bad idea, because by the time you reap the benefits of the plans it may already be too […]

Read more

Reducing long-term risks from malevolent actors

Summary Dictators who exhibited highly narcissistic, psychopathic, or sadistic traits were involved in some of the greatest catastrophes in human history.  Malevolent individuals in positions of power could negatively affect humanity’s long-term trajectory by, for example, exacerbating international conflict or other broad risk factors. Malevolent humans with access to advanced technology—such as whole brain emulation or other forms of transformative AI—could cause serious existential risks and suffering risks. We therefore consider interventions to reduce the expected influence of malevolent humans on the long-term future. The development of manipulation-proof measures of malevolence seems valuable, since they could be used to screen for malevolent humans in high-impact settings, such as heads of government or CEOs. We also explore possible future technologies that […]

Read more
All blog posts