From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Fri Mar 07 2003 - 00:11:32 MST
Lee Corbin wrote:
>
> In retrospect, it seems incredible that we could not
> see that this was very likely going to be the result.
> But the pressing question is still, what *can* be
> done in cases of famine? Are we to just turn our
> backs? (Unless you invade, what other option is there?)
While all of this fun discussion is going on, I'd like to say a few words
about simplicity. Sometimes the correct answer is simple, obvious, and
straightforward. So straightforward, in fact, that it is lost amid the
noise of people debating all the notions that *almost* work - since only
such notions, on the borderline, neither obviously right nor massively
wrong, generate the interesting debates that fill up these mailing lists.
In that situation, it is necessary to - even if it becomes boring - go on
repeating, every now and then, that two plus two equals four. There's
really very little you can add to that.
As far as leveraged altruism goes, nothing is within the same league of
the Singularity, for either efficiency or efficacy, by N orders of
magnitude. I really don't see why rational discussion would tend to
linger anywhere else.
-- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
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