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2026-04-22

Summary of my current views on morality of various plans to fix ASI risk

Disclaimer

• Quick Note
• Contains politically sensitive info

My views on morality of various plans to fix ASI risk have changed atleast a little, in past few months. Here are my current views of 2026-04. I am relatively more at peace with my current views, than I was a few months back.

Main

• Morality of leaking info - I have a much longer "looking for cofounder" doc that goes into a lot of detail on this. I am working full-time on this and hence I think the details matter a lot.
• Morality of persuasion - Yes, I still want mass panic to happen, mass movement to happen, and fear of death or fear of job loss (or job loss) or relationship loss or similar is likely what will drive the masses. There are also practical downsides like risking civil war or dictatorship, and I am not sure how far I'd be willing to go to risk all that. Mostly though, I am not working on public persuasion anymore so I consider it no longer my responsibility to figure out how to be either moral or competent at it. Those who are attempting to persuade the public can figure it out.
• Morality of assassination attempts - I have no moral issue with trying to mass murder everyone working at the AI companies. I just don't think this an effective plan, given how difficult this is. I still want to encourage people to work on actually effective plans, and assassination attempts are not an effective plan. I am not personally trying to build a private militia, so again, I absolve responsibility to figure out how to be either moral or competent at it. If someone else is actually building a militia to do this, how to be moral or competent is now their problem. There is propaganda value to making an asassination attempt, but I am also not sure if the value of this is positive or negative, and again, I don't see it as my responsbility to figure out the answer to that question.
• Morality of public shaming - I am not the type of person who enjoys shaming others. I am generally someone who does not seek much to be liked by others, and similarly I don't like threatening people with "nobody will like you if you do XYZ". I would rather tell AI company employees "history will not be kind to you for doing XYZ" than tell them "shame on you for doing XYZ." I am also not very competent at public persuasion. My guess is that whoever is effective at persuasion will in fact have to shame the people at the AI companies, and get the public to shame them too. I have no moral issue with this if it turns out effective, this person should just figure out what is effective.
• Morality of inciting a mob to destroy TSMC - I haven't yet made up my mind on this. If it is effective, I don't have a moral issue with it, but I still need to make up my mind on whether practical consequences are good or bad. Also, I am not working on this, atleast as of today, so again, this is not my problem.

I think the overarching themes here are the following:

1. I care a lot about practical downsides of attempting various plans, but I don't care much about some innate deontological or virtue-ethical constraint.
2. Mostly, I just now consider a lot of things Not My Problem anymore, because I don't work on them.
   • I am only responsible for the work I actually do. Other people are responsible for the work they do.
   • If other people are accepting my advice on things, that is still their responsibility, and my advice usually comes with a bunch of disclaimers anyway.
3. A general lesson I have learned is to "practice what I preach", atleast in my own life.
   • Unless you are extremely competent at lying, people can tell if you're lying. I am not that good a liar, so I find it much easier to be quite transparent and honest instead. This means I should generally prefer asking others to do or say or feel things, only if I am also willing to do those things myself.
   • Example 1 - I am fine with using fear of death to scare the living daylights out of people, when it comes to persuading them about ASI risk. A major reason I am fine with this is because fear of death is genuinely an important part of what drives my actions too.
   • Example 2 - I generally don't prefer asking others to risk their lives doing assassinations or filling up the prisons or similar, if I am not willing to become an assassin myself.
   • (Maybe if you're an extremely competent liar, this lesson doesn't apply to you, and maybe the anti-ASI politicians will in fact be extremely competent liars, it is plausible. As usual, if you are an anti-ASI politician and an extremely good liar, then figuring out morality of persuasion is your problem not mine.)

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