I don't think self-driving cars are a major risk for catastrophe.
But I also am not sure we can say, in general, that ML is safe to the point that we can rule out catastrophe. Probably not-- but there's a lot of things we can't exclude. What if it completely poisons our discourse and ability to govern? What if it breaks labor markets and leads to profound unrest? What if it just plain screws up resource allocation and leads to famine? etc.
Ordinary mechanization and industrialization was pretty bad in a whole lot of ways (and the verdict is still out whether we will thread the needle and be OK or whether it will lead to catastrophe). ML and automation could arguably be a fair bit worse.
For the most part, ML doesn't control high-risk things with a human in the loop. The worst cases for ML so far have been stock market crashes from algo trading.
Its entirely possible that an update to self-driving car's algorithms cause a day of chaos as the self-driving cars lose control and crash. Worst case scenario.
I agree that the secondary effects of the ML systems are going to be far worse than the primary. We can only see how it goes.
mlyle|2 years ago
But I also am not sure we can say, in general, that ML is safe to the point that we can rule out catastrophe. Probably not-- but there's a lot of things we can't exclude. What if it completely poisons our discourse and ability to govern? What if it breaks labor markets and leads to profound unrest? What if it just plain screws up resource allocation and leads to famine? etc.
Ordinary mechanization and industrialization was pretty bad in a whole lot of ways (and the verdict is still out whether we will thread the needle and be OK or whether it will lead to catastrophe). ML and automation could arguably be a fair bit worse.
yxre|2 years ago
Its entirely possible that an update to self-driving car's algorithms cause a day of chaos as the self-driving cars lose control and crash. Worst case scenario.
I agree that the secondary effects of the ML systems are going to be far worse than the primary. We can only see how it goes.