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And what's that got to do with the price of fish and chips?
Even if we concede arguendo your Views on sexual morality, "_______'s thoughts on AI risk are invalid because _______ engages in immoral sexual practises" is literally an ad hominem argument.
How about "X's thoughts on AI risk should be downgraded because they put [a certain set of sexual practices] above all reproach and thus [apocalyptic AI risk] rank less important to them than [continuing a certain set of sexual practices]."
Also depending on the exact nature of those sexual practices, it can be a pretty good argument for keeping them as far away from the levers of power as humanly possible. I think AI poses severe but not existential risks. Either way letting the EA/rat group set AI morality will be net-negative for the majority of humanity.
“…unlike the rest of humanity, who can definitely be trusted to rank apocalyptic AI risk ahead of their own sexual practices?”
Unless you can show a nexus between the practices and the handling of risk, ad hominem arguments are symmetric. Disqualify everyone who thinks more about pussy than x-risk and you’ll be left only with the scheming eunuchs.
The eunuchs are the ones disproportionately involved in creating the AI in the first place.
The selection effect is actually really noteworthy here because all modern eunuchs are self-made. (They don't actually call themselves eunuchs these days unless maybe you're on the WPATH mailing list- but they are very womanly men all the same. Perhaps the way certain scientific types act to give birth to some massive project is uterus-envy?)
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Sounds like a win. When have the scheming eunuchs ever led us wrong?
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That risks running into the Heckler's Veto: "I will ignore your warnings of potential catastrophe unless you forswear any lifestyle choices of which I disapprove; therefore, if you do not change your lifestyle to fit my demands, you rank prevention of catastrophe as less important than your lifestyle choices." Giving in to such a demand will then invite every wowser within 20,000 kilometres to make similar demands regarding whatever bee they happen to have in their bonnets, and once you've paid the Dane-Geld, you'll never be rid of the Dane.
It would be, if they were engaging in the sort of things described in the more lurid claims circulating among the Blue Tribe regarding Epstein's clients. When the practises in question entirely involve mutually consenting adults, whose standards for consent are probably a fair bit less flexible than the median, the argument starts to look a lot flimsier.
Funny, this is exactly how I feel about global warming 'enthusiasts'.
Of course, the difference between this and that is that said 'enthusiasts' have an obviously massive amount to gain politically from most human activity being banned like they want; the 'ban AI' faction isn't quite there yet (and dependent on who it takes down first- maybe they're on the side of weird sex, maybe they're not) so it's not clear if the origins of the group will be a liability.
The usual playbook here is "change the rules, accuse of rape ex post facto", so the truth's not going to matter anyway. Of course, the weird sex people (or at least, their allies) are the same ones pushing in the #fightFor25 direction more generally, so maybe they don't have to worry about that for the foreseeable future.
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The problem here is that some of your interlocutors might be actual Christians, who would really rather die (along with everyone else) than abide unapologetic sexual impropriety.
Aren't Christians supposed to get the world to chug along until at least the Second Coming before letting it explode?
-C.S. Lewis, On Living in an Atomic Age (1948)
There's an upper limit on how concerned Christians are supposed to be about physical survival.
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I think the degree of focus on the Second Coming differs quite a bit between the various branches; it's well-known because a certain common type of modern US Evangelical is obsessed with it, but more of our Christian posters seem to be various forms of traditionalists who as far as I can tell don't put a lot of emphasis on it.
(To @SubstantialFrivolity, I imagine they might see it as something that goes beyond mere "dealing with people", like "enabling".)
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Yes and no. Yes, we are stewards of the world and owe it to God to treat his gift with respect. But no, that is not an absolute goal - this world is not our home, and if there is a conflict between our spiritual obligations and our material ones, the spiritual ones take precedence.
Note that I'm not saying Christians have an obligation to avoid dealing with people who do weird sex stuff. Just saying if someone did conclude that, even the fact that it might blow up the world as a consequence would not override the spiritual obligation.
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