LoveAndPeaceAlways
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I'm wondering what Nick Bostrom's p(doom) currently is, given the subject of this book. He said 9 years ago in his lecture on his book Superintelligence "less than 50% risk of doom". In this interview 4 months ago he said that it's good there has been more focus on risks in recent times, but there's still slightly less focus on the risks than what is optimal, but he wants to focus on the upsides because he fears we might "overshoot" and not build AGI at all which would be tragic in his opinion. So it seems he thinks the risk is less than it used to be because of this public awareness of the risks.
I'd like to underline that I'm agnostic, and I don't know what the true nature of our reality is, though lately I've been more open to anti-physicalist views of the universe.
For one, if there's a continuation of consciousness after death then AGI killing lots of people might not be as bad as when there is no continuation of consciousness after death. I would still consider it very bad, but mostly because I like this world and the living beings in it and would not like them to end, but it wouldn't be the end of consciousnesses like some doomy AGI safety people imply.
Another thing is that the relationship between consciousness and the physical universe might be more complex than physicalists say - like some of the early figures of quantum physics thought - and there might unknown to current science factors at play that could have an effect on the outcome. I don't have more to say about this because I'm uncertain what the relationship between consciousness and the physical universe might be in such a view.
And lastly, if there's God or gods or something similar, such beings would have agency and could have an effect on what the outcome might be. For example, there are Christian eschatological views that say that the Christian prophecies about the New Earth and other such things must come true in some way, so the future cannot end in a total extinction of all human life.
You may be aware of this already, but I think there is a clear difference between saving an existing person who would otherwise have died - and in the process reducing suffering by also preventing non-fatal illnesses - and starting a pregnancy because before starting a pregnancy the person doesn't exist yet.
There are a couple of debate ideas I have, but I would most like to see a debate on whether ontological physicalism is the best view of the universe there is.
I would like to see someone like the theoretical physicist Sean Carroll represent physicalism, and someone like the professor Edward F. Kelly from the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia represent anti-physicalism. The researchers at the Division of Perceptual Studies study near-death experiences, claimed past-life memories in children and other parapsychological phenomena, and Edward F. Kelly has written three long books on why he thinks physicalism is false, relying largely on case studies that he says don't fit well with the physicalistic worldview. Based on my understanding, the mainstream scientific community treats the research by the Division of Perceptual Studies as fringe science.
I'm personally agnostic, but I have thought about making an efforpost on steelmanning anti-physicalism based on Edward F. Kelly's works for LessWrong, but I have doubted whether there would be any kind of interest for it because the people at LessWrong seem to be very certain of physicalism and think lowly of other positions. If you think there would be interest for it, you can say so. Physicalism has very good arguments for it, and the anti-physicalist position relies on non-verifiable case studies being accurate.
For example, Norman Borlaug is often called "the father of the Green Revolution", and is credited with saving a billion people worldwide from starving to death. Stanislav Petrov and Vasily Arkhipov prevented a probable nuclear war from happening.