[tfirst]

If carbon taxes are already a lethal policy for an political campaign, it's absurd to think that fears of ASI will create any real movement around pausing AI.

If there is any movement to pause AI development, it will come from the general public's dislike of these companies. Not from the AI safety angle.

[arjie]

If that is true and one cares about a moratorium on progress in the US then it seems like the number one way is to meet people where they are: so water use misinformation, degrowth, power supply constraints. That does place all the people who push for these things in a different light. They may well be attempting to do what the AI safety labs are ostensibly trying to do.

As an AI safetyist, one’s closest ally (in a distributed coordinated way) is the populist misinformer. Fascinating.

[tfirst]

If there's going to be any pause, I'm sure it will come from a populist movement. I just can't imagine misplaced worries about AI water use will translate into the kinds of policy the authors want to see.

[arjie]

Yeah it’s like shoving the top of a double pendulum. You will get some movement in one direction, but where it will precisely land is hard to predict. The water-use argument is already earning refinement by differentiating “AI datacenters” from “normal datacenters” in an effort to control the movement.

I imagine any populism movement will require rampant fearmongering to get a result. Considering the rough present alignments, presumably blue tribe focused propaganda will involve climate and inequality focused fear and red tribe focused propaganda will involve job loss. Grey tribe positioning is the P(doom) meme where everyone is rewarded for a high-P(doom) estimate.

[Alpha3031]

It's possible the general public wouldn't care enough one way or the other such that elected representatives could just do it without any change to their electoral fortunes.

[karahime]

You should consider why the best ally to your position is misinformation.

[ajyoon]

This is not the gotcha you think it is. Misinformation plays to all manner of political issues and sides.

[karahime]

I don't think it's a gotcha at all, they openly said it and were pondering how that might help them. Misinformation plays more to sides that are wrong about more things, and I don't consider misinformation my ally in anything.