Here’s Why People Will Never Care About AI Risk
It is an irrational fear but people are afraid of stupider things
I think a big problem w getting the public to care about AI risk is that it’s just a huge emotional ask — for someone to really consider that there’s a solid chance that the whole world’s about to end. People will instinctively resist it tooth-and-nail.
People instinctively resist the idea that the world could be about to end. I agree with that. For three reasons: First, we don’t want to die, and the brain, if anything, is an apt defense-mechanism-creating machine. Denial is universal. Second, we can’t — literally — imagine a “no-world” reality where our beloved Earth doesn’t exist. Third, we are very bad at imagining unprecedented events and unprecedented change.
AI risk is a huge cognitive ask we can’t afford
All that applies even better to threats other than AI. A meteorite, an alien invasion, a deadly pandemic, the sun swallowing our collective home in a spectacle of fire, energy rays, and indifference. But there’s a different reason that makes AI-driven existential risk harder to imagine than any of those.
