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this is: Reducing long-term risks from malevolent actors, published by David_Althaus, Tobias_Baumann on the effective altruism forum.

Summary

Dictators who exhibited highly narcissistic, psychopathic, or sadistic traits were involved in some of the greatest catastrophes in human history. (More)

Malevolent individuals in positions of power could negatively affect humanity’s long-term trajectory by, for example, exacerbating international conflict or other broad risk factors. (More)

Malevolent humans with access to advanced technology—such as whole brain emulation or other forms of transformative AI—could cause serious existential risks and suffering risks. (More)

We therefore consider interventions to reduce the expected influence of malevolent humans on the long-term future.

The development of manipulation-proof measures of malevolence seems valuable, since they could be used to screen for malevolent humans in high-impact settings, such as heads of government or CEOs. (More)

We also explore possible future technologies that may offer unprecedented leverage to mitigate against malevolent traits. (More)

Selecting against psychopathic and sadistic tendencies in genetically enhanced, highly intelligent humans might be particularly important. However, risks of unintended negative consequences must be handled with extreme caution. (More)

We argue that further work on reducing malevolence would be valuable from many moral perspectives and constitutes a promising focus area for longtermist EAs. (More)

What do we mean by malevolence?

Before we make any claims about the causal effects of malevolence, we first need to explain what we mean by the term. To this end, consider some of the arguably most evil humans in history—Hitler, Mao, and Stalin—and the distinct personality traits they seem to have shared.[1]

Stalin repeatedly turned against former comrades and friends (Hershman & Lieb, 1994, ch. 15, ch. 18), gave detailed instructions on how to torture his victims, ordered their loved ones to watch (Glad, 2002, p. 13), and deliberately killed millions through various atrocities. Likewise, millions of people were tortured and murdered under Mao’s rule, often according to his detailed instructions (Dikötter, 2011; 2016; Chang & Halliday, ch. 8, ch. 23, 2007). He also took pleasure in watching acts of torture and imitating in what his victims went through (Chang & Halliday, ch. 48, 2007). Hitler was not only responsible for the death of millions, he also engaged in personal sadism. On his specific instructions, the plotters of the 1944 assassination attempt were hung by piano wires and their agonizing deaths were filmed (Glad, 2002). According to Albert Speer, “Hitler loved the film and had it shown over and over again” (Toland, 1976, p. 818). Hitler, Mao, and Stalin—and most other dictators—also poured enormous resources into the creation of personality cults, manifesting their colossal narcissism (Dikötter, 2019). (The section Malevolent traits of Hitler, Mao, Stalin, and other dictators in Appendix B provides more evidence.)

Many scientific constructs of human malevolence could be used to summarize the relevant psychological traits shared by Hitler, Mao, Stalin, and other malevolent individuals in positions of power. We focus on the Dark Tetrad traits (Paulhus, 2014) because they seem especially relevant and have been studied extensively by psychologists. The Dark Tetrad comprises the following four traits—the more well-known Dark Triad (Paulhus & Williams, 2002) refers to the first three traits:

Machiavellianism is characterized by manipulating and deceiving others to further one’s own interests, indifference to morality, and obsession with achieving power or wealth.

Narcissism involves an inflated sense of one’s importance and abilities, an excessive need for admiration, a lack of emp...