I’m not sure I agree with all the implications in the closing of today’s Stratechery update, but like all good essays it is forcing me to really think about my own view:
… it’s worth noting that the very idea of a national or — worse! — global regulatory regime on intelligence is so deeply off-putting that I’d rather roll the dice and bet on humans figuring it out. Surviving isn’t everything; living freely counts for an awful lot as well.
@manton Can’t read the article - paywalled - but the quote makes me think of the “false dilemma” fallacy: “A false dilemma, also referred to as false dichotomy or false binary, is an informal fallacy based on a premise that erroneously limits what options are available.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma
Also note Hirschman’s “Jeopardy thesis” in /The Rhetoric of Reaction/. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rhetoric_of_Reaction#Reactionary_theses (1/2)
Humans tend to think in terms of binaries that are hierarchical in the sense that one side *must* be sharply good and the other sharply bad. No messy middle for us. It’s a (sharply!) bad habit.
https://blog.oddly-influenced.dev/2025/11/20/in-which-i-take-on.html (2/2)
@manton
@manton I can’t listen to this, but calling a global attempt to save all humans off-putting is… well… off-putting. What a ridiculous message in my perspective. It’s an unrealistic scenario and probably 100% guided by the wrong intentions by the involved companies. But handing the survival of human mankind freely into the hands of mentally unstable megalomaniacs, without discussion? Actual human beings should have a word in that.
@hutaffe I wish the blog post was public, because the part I quoted isn’t exactly representative of the whole thing. I actually think Ben might agree with your point! Also, there’s a conflict between people who give a (for example) 10% chance of humanity being destroyed and people who think it’s closer to 0%.