Pascal's mugging and AI safety
Revision as of 23:15, 12 November 2020 by Issa (talk | contribs) (Created page with "Existential risk reduction via work on AI safety has occasionally been compared to Pascal's mugging. The critic of AI safety argues that working on AI safety has a ver...")
Existential risk reduction via work on AI safety has occasionally been compared to Pascal's mugging. The critic of AI safety argues that working on AI safety has a very small probability of a very big payoff, which sounds suspicious.
The standard resolution seems to be:
- Point out that there are different levels of what "very small probability" means. Some people think 1% is very small, whereas in Pascal's mugging we are dealing with astronomically small probabilities such as 1/3^^^3.
- Argue that for probabilities like 1%, standard expected value calculations work fine.
- Argue that reducing x-risk from AI safety is more like a 1% chance than like an astronomically small chance.
