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Joe Carlsmith Audio

18 Episodes
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Contra some meta-ethical views, you can't forever aim to approximate the self you would become in idealized conditions. You have to actively create yourself, often in the here and now. Originally published in 2021. Text version here: https://joecarlsmith.com/2021/06/21/on-the-limits-of-idealized-values
How worried about AI risk will we feel in the future, when we can see advanced machine intelligence up close? We should worry accordingly now. Text version here: https://joecarlsmith.com/2023/05/08/predictable-updating-about-ai-risk
A shorter version of my report on existential risk from power-seeking AI. Forthcoming in an essay collection from Oxford University Press. Text version here: https://jc.gatspress.com/pdf/existential_risk_and_powerseeking_ai.pdf
Is everything holy? Can reality, in itself, be worthy of reverence? Text version here: https://joecarlsmith.com/2021/04/19/problems-of-evil
On looking out of your own eyes. Text version at joecarlsmith.com.
Who needs a system if you're free? Text version at https://joecarlsmith.com/2023/02/16/why-should-ethical-anti-realists-do-ethics
Audio version of my report on existential risk from power-seeking AI. Text here: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2206.13353.pdf. Narration by Type III audio.
Nearby is the country they call life. Text version at: https://joecarlsmith.com/2022/12/23/on-sincerity.
Can the epistemology of consciousness save moral realism and redeem experience machines? No.
If your find a button that gives you a hundred dollars if a certain controversial meta-ethical view is true, but you and your family get burned alive if that view is false, should you press the button? No.Text version here. Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
Infinities puncture the dream of a simple, bullet-biting utilitarianism. But they're everyone's problem. Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
Life in the future could be profoundly good. I think this is an extremely important fact, and one that often goes under-estimated.Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
Making happy people is good. Just ask the golden rule. Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
I find imagining future people looking back on present-day longtermism (the view that positively influencing the long-term future should be a key moral priority) a helpful intuition pump, especially re: a certain kind of “holy sh**” reaction to existential risk, and to the possible size and quality of the future at stake.Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
Sometimes, you can “control” events you have no causal interaction with (for example, if you're a deterministic software twin).Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
If you kill something, look it in the eyes as you do.Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
How can "non-attachment" be compatible with care? We need to distinguish between caring and clinging.Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.
You can't keep any of it. The only thing to do is to give it away on purpose.Text version here.Edited for Joe Carlsmith by TYPE III AUDIO.