Dario Amodei: prediction

Transcript context

…But this seems like a fully general argument against the diffusion of AI technology. That’s the implication of this world. Let me just go on, because I think we will get diffusion eventually. The other concern I have is that governments will oppress their own people with AI. I’m worried about a world where you have a country in which there’s already a government that’s building a high-tech authoritarian state. To be clear, this is about the government. This is not about the people. We need to find a way for people everywhere to benefit. My worry here is about governments. My worry is if the world gets carved up into two pieces, one of those two pieces could be authoritarian or totalitarian in a way that’s very difficult to displace. Now, will governments eventually get powerful AI, and is there a risk of authoritarianism? Yes. Will governments eventually get powerful AI, and is there a risk of bad equilibria? Yes, I think both things. But the initial conditions matter. At some point, we’re going to need to set up the rules of the road. I’m not saying that one country, either the United States or a coalition of democracies—which I think would be a better setup, although it requires more international cooperation than we currently seem to want to make—should just say, “These are the rules of the road.” There’s going to be some negotiation. The world is going to have to grapple with this. What I would like is for the democratic nations of the world—those whose governments represent closer to pro-human values—are holding the stronger hand and have more leverage when the rules of the road are set. So I’m very concerned about that initial condition. I was re-listening to the interview from three years ago, and one of the ways it aged poorly is that I kept asking questions assuming there was going to be some key fulcrum moment two to three years from now. In fact, being that far out, it just seems like progress continues, AI improves, AI is more diffused, and people will use it for more things. It seems like you’re imagining a world in the future where the countries get together, and “Here’s the rules of the road, here’s the leverage we have, and here’s the leverage you have.” But on the current trajectory, everybody will have more AI. Some of that AI will be used by authoritarian countries. Some of that within the authoritarian countries will be used by private actors versus state actors. It’s not clear who will benefit more. It’s always unpredictable to tell in advance. It seems like the internet privileged authoritarian countries more than you would’ve expected. Maybe AI will be the opposite way around. I want to better understand what you’re imagining here.…

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