So, in other words: which of your core beliefs do you think has the highest likelihood of being wrong? And by wrong, I don’t necessarily mean the exact opposite - just that the truth is significantly different from what you currently believe it to be.
That we can build a sane, rational society.
One could argue by historical standards that we’re closer than not already. How sane would you say sane is?
I thought that Western style Democratic republics were leading the world toward purely secular forms of government, but yet another group of sociopaths has managed to take power. They have distracted the science-illiterate majority into petty conflicts based on different versions of magical thinking.
So, “sane” would mean that we don’t elevate the least sane among us (sociopaths) into positions of power. “Rational” would mean that public policy decisions are mostly made based on evidence, rather than fundamentally irrational belief systems.
I fear that we are barely-sentient primates doomed to repeat the same awful mistakes, when simple, obvious solutions are within our grasp.
Yes, that’s fair. I worry about similar things - we had 5000 years of all dictatorships in the historical record, with randomly varying types and levels of intolerance and brutality, and then real progress for 200. How do we know it’s here to stay?
I haven’t given up hope yet, because we’re so far ahead of where we were. Even with the US down the forces of enlightenment lead the world. There’s also the question of how much longer humans are going to be solely in charge, anyway. Do we really expect no AGI for another 100 years, or that we wouldn’t use it to make the big decisions as well?
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