The statement we will be debating for the forum-choice debate week will be based on: "By default, the world where AI goes well for humans will also go well for other sentient beings".

The debate week will be held during the week of March 23 — 29.

This post is primarily to finalise the topic we will be discussing, and to ask for input from the Forum on the exact phrasing. However, I’m sure a bunch of readers who were following the vote for the forum-choice debate week will be wondering — why did the third-place entry win? I’ll address that first.

Why the third place entry won

In the voting post, in a footnote, I wrote: “Again, generic caveat here: there are legal and practical reasons that CEA might want to veto a topic. I personally think this is very unlikely, but we do reserve the right to veto if necessary. In the case of a veto, we'd move to the second highest karma topic.”

Unfortunately, what I thought was unlikely has indeed happened[1]. Extra unfortunately, we have vetoed the first two topics. As with most internal wranglings, there isn’t much that it's rational for me to [...]

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Outline:

(00:43) Why the third place entry won

(01:54) Refining the statement

(02:16) Ambiguities:

(02:52) A few refined versions

(02:57) On the margin, it is better for animals to work on the transition to AGI going well, than directly working on AI for animal welfare

(04:24) Without extra animal-focused work, even aligned superintelligence would be bad for non-human animals

(04:57) AGI which doesnt cause human extinction or disempowerment will value animal welfare

(05:15) Leave your feedback below

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.