[bayarearefugee]

What constitutes a good ending is of course also a matter of perspective.

AI wiping out humanity is certainly not ending well from our perspective, but more universally who is to say. I would argue that it is not a given that we are a net positive for the universe.

[esafak]

I take the preservation of humanity, along with other life, as a matter of faith.

[MichaelZuo]

But then wouldn’t accelerationists also say their views are a matter of faith too?

[esafak]

What view is that, to be precise? It is naive to assume that acceleration is always going to be in one's favor. It's like saying change is a good thing, so let's do it fast. If you go fast enough, you can go back to the stone age. Is this position anything more than a rebranding of revolutionism? I don't like gambling with people's lives, so I prefer to go slow enough to enable a deliberative political process.

[MichaelZuo]

Why does this matter?

Two opposing factions can negate each other to leave a nil influence, and this seems likely to be the case when its resting on a foundation of ‘faith’.

[esafak]

That's like saying all beliefs are on equal footing, because people have beliefs. You should ask, what is the rationale for your belief? How many people have this accelerationist belief? Any more than the flat earth posse?

I don't think there is much of a real-life debate here. I bet the overwhelming majority of humans (say, 95%) would prefer humanity to continue to exist. Are you really taking the other side of this bet?

If you want to speak of universalizing beyond humanity, what is your case? It makes no categorical sense to reckon our toll on the universe. The universe was fine before we arrived and will remain unaffected if we disappeared. It has no preference. I don't understand your argument honestly, because you have not stated it.

[checkyoursudo]

That is an interesting question: do people generally care about the survival of the species?

I am not actually sure I wouldn't take the bet against you there. Given what I perceive about how little people care about wars that they think do not affect them, poverty, hunger, climate change, corruption, sustainability, etc ... I don't know.

I believe 95% of people would say they care about humanity's survival, sure, but the proof would be in action. How many people would actually do something about it? How many people would even merely inconvenience themselves if it meant the survival of someone other than themselves? I am not that confident about how many people that would be.

I do not usually think of myself as a pessimistic or nihilistic person, but this has me wondering even now whether I care about the long-term survival of the species. Like, really long term. Do I care if humans are around 10,000 years from now? 500? That is an interesting question. I will have to think about it.

[MichaelZuo]

So then… why do any of your opinions matter above and beyond someone else’s?

It’s convenient to assume an equal footing, because it saves the effort of having to justify why it’s even worth pondering.

Your free to not assume it, but if you also can’t provide the justification… then the comment is literally just another random string of words among a sea of noise online.

It seems like an insurmountable road block for anyone below the extreme outliers to be honest.

[achierius]

Come on man, you don't actually believe this. If you did you'd be a psychopath, and you certainly seem to care about people's lives when it comes to things like climate change. Just because you don't think AI doom is as likely, doesn't mean you should go and pretend that in that one case you all of a sudden have a nihilistic view of human life -- rhetoric matters.

[bayarearefugee]

I am not saying it would be clearly good if AI wiped out humanity, I'm just also not saying it would be clearly bad from a universal perspective.

There's no way to know until it all plays out and either way I won't be here when it all plays out.

But IMO to assume our continued existence is universally a positive (or of any universal consequence at all) is a hefty dose of narcissism.

[achierius]

There is no such thing as "universally a positive" unless you assume one. Not just in the sense of "there is no one true universal moral value function", but in the sense that "universal moral value function" is essentially gibberish -- as is "bad from a universal perspective". Humanity being wiped out would not be bad from a universal perspective because nothing is bad from a universal perspective. When we talk about good and bad we always implicitly couch that in "from a(/one or more) human perspective(s), ...".