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That reminds me of the “paper clip maximizer” thought experiment about rogue AI fulfilling a particular goal, without being held to any consideration of human welfare

I thought it was a very novel idea at first, until I realized that this describes all manners of human groups, notably corporations and lobbying groups, they will turn the world into a stove, subvert democracy, (try to) disrupt the economic and social fiber of society, anything to eg maximize shareholder value



And corporations are ultimately just sock-puppets for humanity. People forget that and like to other them while simultaneously turning them into the scapegoats. See every idiot with the list of companies responsible for global warming that amounts to 'every oil company' and ignore that it was the customers were the ones burning their products.

It is to be expected really. Humans themselves hold little consideration to human welfare when fulfilling their goals. It is something ingrained by nature for survival and in no way limited to humans. Every drop of water you drink, every bite you eat, are ones which cannot go to the thirsty and the hungry. With few exceptions, only our children would even give us pause to forgo such things for the sake of others.

Also bit of a pet peeve of mine: society isn't a delicate bolt of laced silk. It isn't a fabric, much less one that is damaged by any little change that you don't like. It isn't even stable which makes the charges of anything as 'ruining' society especially bizarre when nobody can point to where it would go before the blamed change. So hold off on poisoning Socrates.

Even if we hold the current state as worthy of preservation we would ultimately fail to for reasons related to the central paradox of tradition. Why your forebearers first did something was not done because of obedience to tradition, so by trying to preserve it set in stone, you have already failed.


I mean any 'moral' reasoning behind ruining society is probably wrong.

This said society can be 'ruined' by everybody in that society dying either by outside influence or their own stupidity. So while I discount the moral ruination, the "oh god, oh god, we're all dying ones I'd like to avoid"




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