in retrospect maybe a memetic advantage i don't talk or think much about having is that i was AGI-pilled for long enough that i know what having a totalizing narrative about the most important thing feels like from the inside and i know what it feels like to step out of it
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can you provide a recipe for an anti-agi-pill
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i like MDMA
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in more seriousness what actually did it for me was a bunch of stuff over time. repeated exposure to brilliant warm lovely people outside the rationalist ecosystem (circlers etc) helped. noticing how fucked up a bunch of people inside were helped. LSD helped. crying helped. etc
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i haven’t used the c-word yet but ultimately it’s a mild variation on normal cult dynamics. it’s really easy in the bay area rat scene to make your entire social world rats and from there it’s easy to feel unconsciously like social acceptance depends on continuing to buy in
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one experience that sticks out in particular was going to a really lovely authentic relating event in austin, feeling happier than i had in months, like just dancing and singing for joy
and then noticing i was dreading going back to the bay
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you’re describing this as a social/emotional phenomenon
to be clear, did you at some point believe that AI safety was a serious concern and no longer believe that? or did your beliefs not shift as part of this process?
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i at some point believed it was worth building my entire life around and i no longer believe that. i still think it's a problem and am mostly in despair about it
I have not yet met someone who once believed AGI was an existential threat who no longer does
orthogonal to the truth of the statement it is certainly very sticky
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How do we know it's orthogonal if we don't know whether it's true?
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fwiw most good people in ai safety I know don’t build their whole life around it. They just think it’s a concern and should try to help
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I can't comment on whether this statement is true or not, but I can definitely say that it's not the impression one gets from lurking on LW for any amount of time
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yeah I went thru a sorta similar arc, & I still think it's a huge concern
I'm glad MIRI is doing their thing
I'm glad other researchers are
I'm investing my time elsewhere in meta stuff that will help eventually but I'm definitely making a bet nothing explodes in the meantime
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you also don’t need to help or justify whatever you’re doing as a roundabout long term way to help (if you don’t want to). Took me a long time to get this
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