Artificial Intelligence, Values, and Alignment
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Effective Altruism William Macaskill and Theron Pummer
1 Effective Altruism William MacAskill and Theron Pummer Climate change is on course to cause millions of deaths and cost the world economy trillions of dollars. Nearly a billion people live in extreme poverty, millions of them dying each year of easily preventable diseases. Just a small fraction of the thousands of nuclear weapons on hair‐trigger alert could easily bring about global catastrophe. New technologies like synthetic biology and artificial intelligence bring unprece dented risks. Meanwhile, year after year billions and billions of factory‐farmed ani mals live and die in misery. Given the number of severe problems facing the world today, and the resources required to solve them, we may feel at a loss as to where to even begin. The good news is that we can improve things with the right use of money, time, talent, and effort. These resources can bring about a great deal of improvement, or very little, depending on how they are allocated. The effective altruism movement consists of a growing global community of peo ple who use reason and evidence to assess how to do as much good as possible, and who take action on this basis. Launched in 2011, the movement now has thousands of members, as well as influence over billions of dollars. The movement has substan tially increased awareness of the fact that some altruistic activities are much more cost‐effective than others, in the sense that they do much more good than others per unit of resource expended. According to the nonprofit organization GiveWell, it costs around $3,500 to prevent someone from dying of malaria by distributing bed nets. -
Apocalypse Now? Initial Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic for the Governance of Existential and Global Catastrophic Risks
journal of international humanitarian legal studies 11 (2020) 295-310 brill.com/ihls Apocalypse Now? Initial Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic for the Governance of Existential and Global Catastrophic Risks Hin-Yan Liu, Kristian Lauta and Matthijs Maas Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] Abstract This paper explores the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic through the framework of exis- tential risks – a class of extreme risks that threaten the entire future of humanity. In doing so, we tease out three lessons: (1) possible reasons underlying the limits and shortfalls of international law, international institutions and other actors which Covid-19 has revealed, and what they reveal about the resilience or fragility of institu- tional frameworks in the face of existential risks; (2) using Covid-19 to test and refine our prior ‘Boring Apocalypses’ model for understanding the interplay of hazards, vul- nerabilities and exposures in facilitating a particular disaster, or magnifying its effects; and (3) to extrapolate some possible futures for existential risk scholarship and governance. Keywords Covid-19 – pandemics – existential risks – global catastrophic risks – boring apocalypses 1 Introduction: Our First ‘Brush’ with Existential Risk? All too suddenly, yesterday’s ‘impossibilities’ have turned into today’s ‘condi- tions’. The impossible has already happened, and quickly. The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, both directly and as manifested through the far-reaching global societal responses to it, signal a jarring departure away from even the © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2020 | doi:10.1163/18781527-01102004Downloaded from Brill.com09/27/2021 12:13:00AM via free access <UN> 296 Liu, Lauta and Maas recent past, and suggest that our futures will be profoundly different in its af- termath. -
Existential Risk and Existential Hope: Definitions
Future of Humanity Institute – Technical Report #2015-1 Existential Risk and Existential Hope: Definitions Owen Cotton-Barratt* & Toby Ord† We look at the strengths and weaknesses of two existing definitions of existential risk, and suggest a new definition based on expected value. This leads to a parallel concept: ‘existential hope’, the chance of something extremely good happening. An existential risk is a chance of a terrible event occurring, such as an asteroid striking the earth and wiping out intelligent life – we could call such events existential catastrophes. In order to understand what should be thought of as an existential risk, it is necessary to understand what should be thought of as an existential catastrophe. This is harder than it first seems to pin down. 1. The simple definition One fairly crisp approach is to draw the line at extinction: Definition (i): An existential catastrophe is an event which causes the end of existence of our descendants. This has the virtue that it is a natural division and is easy to understand. And we certainly want to include all extinction events. But perhaps it doesn’t cast a wide enough net. Example A: A totalitarian regime takes control of earth. It uses mass surveillance to prevent any rebellion, and there is no chance for escape. This regime persists for thousands of years, eventually collapsing when a supervolcano throws up enough ash that agriculture is prevented for decades, and no humans survive. In Example A, clearly the eruption was bad, but the worst of the damage was done earlier. After the totalitarian regime was locked in, it was only a matter of time until something or other finished things off. -
Evidence-Based Policy Cause Area Report
Evidence-Based Policy Cause Area Report AUTHOR: 11/18 MARINELLA CAPRIATI, DPHIL 1 — Founders Pledge Animal Welfare Executive Summary By supporting increased use of evidence in the governments of low- and middle-income countries, donors can dramatically increase their impact on the lives of people living in poverty. This report explores how focusing on evidence-based policy provides an opportunity for leverage, and presents the most promising organisation we identified in this area. A high-risk/high-return opportunity for leverage In the 2013 report ‘The State of the Poor’, the World Bank reported that, as of 2010, roughly 83% of people in extreme poverty lived in countries classified as ‘lower-middle income’ or below. By far the most resources spent on tackling poverty come from local governments. American think tank the Brookings Institution found that, in 2011, $2.3 trillion of the $2.8 trillion spent on financing development came from domestic government revenues in the countries affected. There are often large differences in the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of social programs— the amount of good done per dollar spent can vary significantly across programs. Employing evidence allows us to identify the most cost-effective social programs. This is useful information for donors choosing which charity to support, but also for governments choosing which programs to implement, and how. This suggests that employing philanthropic funding to improve the effectiveness of policymaking in low- and middle-income countries is likely to constitute an exceptional opportunity for leverage: by supporting the production and use of evidence in low- and middle-income countries, donors can potentially enable policy makers to implement more effective policies, thereby reaching many more people than direct interventions. -
Whether and Where to Give1 (Forthcoming in Philosophy and Public Affairs)
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by St Andrews Research Repository 1 Whether and Where to Give1 (Forthcoming in Philosophy and Public Affairs) Theron Pummer University of St Andrews 1. The Ethics of Giving and Effective Altruism The ethics of giving has traditionally focused on whether, and how much, to give to charities helping people in extreme poverty.2 In more recent years, the discussion has increasingly focused on where to give, spurred by an appreciation of the substantial differences in cost- effectiveness between charities. According to a commonly cited example, $40,000 can be used either to help 1 blind person by training a seeing-eye dog in the United States or to help 2,000 blind people by providing surgeries reversing the effects of trachoma in Africa.3 Effective altruists recommend that we give large sums to charity, but by far their more central message is that we give effectively, i.e., to whatever charities would do the most good per dollar donated.4 In this paper, I’ll assume that it’s not wrong not to give bigger, but will explore to what extent it may well nonetheless be wrong not to give better. The main claim I’ll argue for here is that in many cases it would be wrong of you to give a sum of money to charities that do less good than others you could have given to instead, even if 1 I am extremely grateful to Derek Parfit, Roger Crisp, Jeff McMahan, and Peter Singer for extremely helpful feedback and encouragement. -
Cognitive Biases Nn Discussing Cognitive Biases with Colleagues and Pupils
The RSA: an enlightenment organisation committed to finding innovative practical solutions to today’s social challenges. Through its ideas, research and 27,000-strong Fellowship it seeks to understand and enhance human capability so we can close the gap between today’s reality and people’s hopes for a better world. EVERYONE STARTS WITH AN ‘A’ Applying behavioural insight to narrow the socioeconomic attainment gap in education NATHALIE SPENCER, JONATHAN ROWSON, LOUISE BAMFIELD MARCH 2014 8 John Adam Street London WC2N 6EZ +44 (0) 20 7930 5115 Registered as a charity in England and Wales IN COOPERATION WITH THE no. 212424 VODAFONE FOUNDATION GERMANY Copyright © RSA 2014 www.thersa.org www.thersa.org For use in conjunction with Everyone Starts with an “A” 3 ways to use behavioural insight in the classroom By Spencer, Rowson, www.theRSA.org Bamfield (2014), available www.vodafone-stiftung.de A guide for teachers and school leaders at: www.thersa.org/startswitha www.lehrerdialog.net n Praising pupils for effort instead of intelligence to help instil the Whether you and your pupils believe that academic idea that effort is key and intelligence is not a fixed trait. For ability is an innate trait (a ‘fixed mindset’) or can be example, try “great, you kept practicing” instead of “great, you’re strengthened through effort and practice like a muscle really clever”. (a ‘growth mindset’) affects learning, resilience to n Becoming the lead learner. Educators can shape mindset setbacks, and performance. Mindset through modelling it for the pupils. The way that you (and parents) give feedback to Think about ability like a muscle Try: n Giving a “not yet” grade instead of a “fail” to set the expectation pupils can reinforce or attenuate a given mindset. -
Why Maximize Expected Choice-Worthiness?1 WILLIAM MACASKILL and TOBY ORD University of Oxford
NOUSˆ 00:00 (2018) 1–27 doi: 10.1111/nous.12264 Why Maximize Expected Choice-Worthiness?1 WILLIAM MACASKILL AND TOBY ORD University of Oxford This paper argues in favor of a particular account of decision-making under nor- mative uncertainty: that, when it is possible to do so, one should maximize expected choice-worthiness. Though this position has been often suggested in the literature and is often taken to be the ‘default’ view, it has so far received little in the way of positive argument in its favor. After dealing with some preliminaries and giving the basic motivation for taking normative uncertainty into account in our decision- making, we consider and provide new arguments against two rival accounts that have been offered—the accounts that we call ‘My Favorite Theory’ and ‘My Fa- vorite Option’. We then give a novel argument for comparativism—the view that, under normative uncertainty, one should take into account both probabilities of different theories and magnitudes of choice-worthiness. Finally, we further argue in favor of maximizing expected choice-worthiness and consider and respond to five objections. Introduction Normative uncertainty is a fact of life. Suppose that Michael has £20 to spend. With that money, he could eat out at a nice restaurant. Alternatively, he could eat at home and pay for four long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets that would protect eight children against malaria. Let’s suppose that Michael knows all the morally relevant empirical facts about what that £20 could do. Even so, it might be that he still doesn’t know whether he’s obligated to donate that money or whether it’s permissible for him to pay for the meal out, because he just doesn’t know how strong his moral obligations to distant strangers are. -
“Is Cryonics an Ethical Means of Life Extension?” Rebekah Cron University of Exeter 2014
1 “Is Cryonics an Ethical Means of Life Extension?” Rebekah Cron University of Exeter 2014 2 “We all know we must die. But that, say the immortalists, is no longer true… Science has progressed so far that we are morally bound to seek solutions, just as we would be morally bound to prevent a real tsunami if we knew how” - Bryan Appleyard 1 “The moral argument for cryonics is that it's wrong to discontinue care of an unconscious person when they can still be rescued. This is why people who fall unconscious are taken to hospital by ambulance, why they will be maintained for weeks in intensive care if necessary, and why they will still be cared for even if they don't fully awaken after that. It is a moral imperative to care for unconscious people as long as there remains reasonable hope for recovery.” - ALCOR 2 “How many cryonicists does it take to screw in a light bulb? …None – they just sit in the dark and wait for the technology to improve” 3 - Sterling Blake 1 Appleyard 2008. Page 22-23 2 Alcor.org: ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ 2014 3 Blake 1996. Page 72 3 Introduction Biologists have known for some time that certain organisms can survive for sustained time periods in what is essentially a death"like state. The North American Wood Frog, for example, shuts down its entire body system in winter; its heart stops beating and its whole body is frozen, until summer returns; at which point it thaws and ‘comes back to life’ 4. -
The Definition of Effective Altruism
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 19/08/19, SPi 1 The Definition of Effective Altruism William MacAskill There are many problems in the world today. Over 750 million people live on less than $1.90 per day (at purchasing power parity).1 Around 6 million children die each year of easily preventable causes such as malaria, diarrhea, or pneumonia.2 Climate change is set to wreak environmental havoc and cost the economy tril- lions of dollars.3 A third of women worldwide have suffered from sexual or other physical violence in their lives.4 More than 3,000 nuclear warheads are in high-alert ready-to-launch status around the globe.5 Bacteria are becoming antibiotic- resistant.6 Partisanship is increasing, and democracy may be in decline.7 Given that the world has so many problems, and that these problems are so severe, surely we have a responsibility to do something about them. But what? There are countless problems that we could be addressing, and many different ways of addressing each of those problems. Moreover, our resources are scarce, so as individuals and even as a globe we can’t solve all these problems at once. So we must make decisions about how to allocate the resources we have. But on what basis should we make such decisions? The effective altruism movement has pioneered one approach. Those in this movement try to figure out, of all the different uses of our resources, which uses will do the most good, impartially considered. This movement is gathering con- siderable steam. There are now thousands of people around the world who have chosen -
Lesswrong.Com Sequences
LessWrong.com Sequences Elizier Yudkowsky Generated by lesswrong_book.py on 2013-04-28. Pseudo-random version string: 8c37c10f-8178-4d00-8a06-16a9ed81a6be. Part I Map and Territory A collection of posts dealing with the fundamentals of rationality: the difference between the map and the territory, Bayes’s Theorem and the nature of evidence, why anyone should care about truth, and minds as reflective cognitive engines. 1. The Simple Truth↗ “I remember this paper I wrote on existentialism. My teacher gave it back with an F. She’d underlined true and truth wherever it appeared in the essay, probably about twenty times, with a question mark beside each. She wanted to know what I meant by truth.” — Danielle Egan (journalist) Author’s Foreword: This essay is meant to restore a naive view of truth. Someone says to you: “My miracle snake oil can rid you of lung cancer in just three weeks.” You reply: “Didn’t a clinical study show this claim to be untrue?” The one returns: “This notion of ‘truth’ is quite naive; what do you mean by ‘true’?” Many people, so questioned, don’t know how to answer in exquisitely rigorous detail. Nonetheless they would not be wise to abandon the concept of ‘truth’. There was a time when no one knew the equations of gravity in exquisitely rigorous detail, yet if you walked off a cliff, you would fall. Often I have seen – especially on Internet mailing lists – that amidst other conversation, someone says “X is true”, and then an argument breaks out over the use of the word ‘true’. -
The Moral Imperative Toward Cost-Effectiveness in Global Health Toby Ord March 2013
center for global development essay The Moral Imperative toward Cost-Effectiveness in Global Health Toby Ord March 2013 www.cgdev.org/content/publications/detail/1427016 abstract Getting good value for the money with scarce resources is a substantial moral issue for global health. This claim may be surprising to some, since conversations on the ethics of global health often focus on moral concerns about justice, fairness, and freedom. But outcomes and consequences are also of central moral importance in setting priorities. In this essay, Toby Ord explores the moral relevance of cost-effectiveness, a major tool for capturing the relationship between resources and outcomes, by illustrating what is lost in moral terms for global health when cost-effectiveness is ignored. For example, the least effective HIV/AIDS intervention produces less than 0.1 percent of the value of the most effective. In practical terms, this can mean hundreds, thousands, or millions of additional deaths due to a failure to prioritize. Ultimately, the author suggests that creating an active process of reviewing and analyzing global health interventions to deliver the bulk of global health funds to the very best. Toby Ord is the founder of Giving What We Can and a James Martin Fellow in the Programme on the Impacts of Future Technology, Oxford University. The Center for Global Development is an independent, nonprofit policy research organization that is dedicated to reducing global poverty and inequality and to making globalization work for the poor. CGD is grateful for contributions from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in support of this work. -
Risks of Space Colonization
Risks of space colonization Marko Kovic∗ July 2020 Abstract Space colonization is humankind's best bet for long-term survival. This makes the expected moral value of space colonization immense. However, colonizing space also creates risks | risks whose potential harm could easily overshadow all the benefits of humankind's long- term future. In this article, I present a preliminary overview of some major risks of space colonization: Prioritization risks, aberration risks, and conflict risks. Each of these risk types contains risks that can create enormous disvalue; in some cases orders of magnitude more disvalue than all the potential positive value humankind could have. From a (weakly) negative, suffering-focused utilitarian view, we there- fore have the obligation to mitigate space colonization-related risks and make space colonization as safe as possible. In order to do so, we need to start working on real-world space colonization governance. Given the near total lack of progress in the domain of space gover- nance in recent decades, however, it is uncertain whether meaningful space colonization governance can be established in the near future, and before it is too late. ∗[email protected] 1 1 Introduction: The value of colonizing space Space colonization, the establishment of permanent human habitats beyond Earth, has been the object of both popular speculation and scientific inquiry for decades. The idea of space colonization has an almost poetic quality: Space is the next great frontier, the next great leap for humankind, that we hope to eventually conquer through our force of will and our ingenuity. From a more prosaic point of view, space colonization is important because it represents a long-term survival strategy for humankind1.