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Harlan Stewart works in communications for the Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI). In this episode, Harlan and I give our honest opinions on Dario Amodei's new essay "The Adolescence of Technology". Timestamps 0:00:00 — Cold Open 0:00:47 — How Harlan Stewart Got Into AI Safety 0:02:30 — What’s Your P(Doom)?™ 0:04:09 — The “Doomer” Label 0:06:13 — Overall Reaction to Dario’s Essay: The Missing Mood 0:09:15 — The Rosy Take on Dario’s Essay 0:10:42 — Character Assassination & Low Blows 0:13:39 — Dario Amodei is Shifting the Overton Window in The Wrong Direction 0:15:04 — Object-Level vs. Meta-Level Criticisms 0:17:07 — The “Inevitability” Strawman Used by Dario 0:19:03 — Dario Refers to Doom as a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy 0:22:38 — Dismissing Critics as “Too Theoretical” 0:43:18 — The Problem with Psychoanalyzing AI 0:56:12 — “Intellidynamics” & Reflective Stability 1:07:12 — Why Is Dario Dismissing an AI Pause? 1:11:45 — Final Takeaways Links Harlan’s X — https://x.com/HumanHarlan “The Adolescence of Technology” by Dario Amodei — https://www.darioamodei.com/essay/the-adolescence-of-technology Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Check out the new Doom Debates studio in this Q&A with special guest Producer Ori! Liron gets into a heated discussion about whether doomers must validate short-term risks, like data center water usage, in order to build a successful political coalition. Originally streamed on Saturday, January 24. Timestamps 00:00:00 — Cold Open 00:00:26 — Introduction and Studio Tour 00:08:17 — Q&A: Alignment, Accelerationism, and Short-Term Risks 00:18:15 — Dario Amodei, Davos, and AI Pause 00:27:42 — Producer Ori Joins: Locations and Vibes 00:35:31 — Legislative Strategy vs. Social Movements (The Tobacco Playbook) 00:45:01 — Ethics of Investing in or Working for AI Labs 00:54:23 — Defining Superintelligence and Human Limitations 01:02:58 — Technical Risks: Self-Replication and Cyber Warfare 01:19:08 — Live Debate with Zane: Short-Term vs. Long-Term Strategy 01:53:15 — Marketing Doom Debates and Guest Outreach 01:56:45 — Live Call with Jonas: Scenarios for Survival 02:05:52 — Conclusion and Mission Statement Links Liron’s X Post about Destiny — https://x.com/liron/status/2015144778652905671?s=20 Why Laws, Treaties, and Regulations Won’t Save Us from AI | For Humanity Ep. 77 — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUX00c5x2UM Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Audrey Tang was the youngest minister in Taiwanese history. Now she's working to align AI with democratic principles as Taiwan's Cyber Ambassador. In this debate, I probe her P(doom) and stress-test her vision for safe AI development. Timestamps 00:00:00 — Episode Preview 00:01:43 — Introducing Audrey Tang, Cyber Ambassador of Taiwan 00:07:20 — Being Taiwan’s First Digital Minister 00:17:19 — What's Your P(Doom)? ™ 00:21:10 — Comparing AI Risk to Nuclear Risk 00:22:53 — The Statement on AI Extinction Risk 00:27:29 — Doomerism as a Hyperstition 00:30:51 — Audrey Explains Her Vision of "Plurality" 00:37:17 — Audrey Explains Her Principles of Civic Ethics, The "6-Pack of Care" 00:45:58 — AGI Timelines: "It's Already Here" 00:54:41 — The Apple Analogy 01:03:09 — What If AI FOOMs? 01:11:19 — What AI Can vs What AI Will Do 01:15:20 — Lessons from COVID-19 01:19:59 — Is Society Ready? Audrey Reflects on a Personal Experience with Mortality 01:23:50 — AI Alignment Cannot Be Top-Down 01:34:04 — AI-as-Mother vs AI-as-Gardener 01:37:26 — China and the Geopolitics of AI Chip Manufacturing in Taiwan 01:40:47 — Red Lines, International Treaties, and the Off Button 01:48:26 — Debate Wrap-Up Links Plurality: The Future of Collaborative Technology and Democracy by Glen Weyl and Audrey Tang — https://www.amazon.com/Plurality-Future-Collaborative-Technology-Democracy/dp/B0D98RPKCK Audrey’s X — https://x.com/audreyt Audrey’s Wikipedia — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audrey_Tang Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

I joined Steve Bannon’s War Room Battleground to talk about AI doom. Hosted by Joe Allen, we cover AGI timelines, raising kids with a high p(doom), and why improving our survival odds requires a global wake-up call. 00:00:00 — Episode Preview 00:01:17 — Joe Allen opens the show and introduces Liron Shapira 00:04:06 — Liron: What’s Your P(Doom)? 00:05:37 — How Would an AI Take Over? 00:07:20 — The Timeline to AGI 00:08:17 — Benchmarks & AI Passing the Turing Test 00:14:43 — Liron Is Typically a Techno-Optimist 00:18:00 — Raising a Family with a High P(Doom) 00:23:48 — Mobilizing a Grassroots AI Survival Campaign 00:26:45 — Final Message: A Wake-Up Call 00:29:23 — Joe Allen’s Closing Message to the War Room Posse Links: Joe’s Substack — https://substack.com/@joebot Joe’s Twitter — https://x.com/JOEBOTxyz Bannon’s War Room Twitter — https://x.com/Bannons_WarRoom WarRoom Battleground EP 922: AI Doom Debates with Liron Shapira on Rumble — https://rumble.com/v742oo4-warroom-battleground-ep-922-ai-doom-debates-with-liron-shapira.html Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Economist Noah Smith is the author of Noahpinion, one of the most popular Substacks in the world. Far from worrying about human extinction from superintelligent AI, Noah is optimistic AI will create a world where humans still have plentiful, high-paying jobs! In this debate, I stress-test his rosy outlook. Let’s see if Noah can instill us with more confidence about humanity’s rapidly approaching AI future. Timestamps 00:00:00 - Episode Preview 00:01:41 - Introducing Noah Smith 00:03:19 - What’s Your P(Doom)™ 00:04:40 - Good vs. Bad Transhumanist Outcomes 00:15:17 - Catastrophe vs. Total Extinction 00:17:15 - Mechanisms of Doom 00:27:16 - The AI Persuasion Risk 00:36:20 - Instrumental Convergence vs. Peace 00:53:08 - The “One AI” Breakout Scenario 01:01:18 - The “Stoner AI” Theory 01:08:49 - Importance of Reflective Stability 01:14:50 - Orthogonality & The Waymo Argument 01:21:18 - Comparative Advantage & Jobs 01:27:43 - Wealth Distribution & Robot Lords 01:34:34 - Supply Curves & Resource Constraints 01:43:38 - Policy of Reserving Human Resources 01:48:28 - Closing: The Case for Optimism Links Noah’s Substack — https://noahpinion.blog “Plentiful, high-paying jobs in the age of AI” — https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/plentiful-high-paying-jobs-in-the “My thoughts on AI safety” — https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/my-thoughts-on-ai-safety Noah’s Twitter — https://x.com/noahpinion --- Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

In September of 2023, when OpenAI’s GPT-4 was still a fresh innovation and people were just beginning to wrap their heads around large language models, I was invited to debate Beff Jezos, Bayeslord, and other prominent “effective accelerationists” a.k.a. “e/acc” folks on an X Space. E/acc’s think building artificial superintelligence is unlikely to disempower humanity and doom the future, because that’d be an illegal exception to the rule that accelerating new technology is always the highest-expected-value for humanity. As you know, I disagree — I think doom is extremely likely and imminent possibility. This debate took place 9 months before I started Doom Debates, and was one of the experiences that made me realize debating AI doom was my calling. It’s also the only time Beff Jezos has ever not been too chicken to debate me. Timestamps 00:00:00 — Liron’s New Intro 00:04:15 — Debate Starts Here: Litigating FOOM 00:06:18 — Defining the Recursive Feedback Loop 00:15:05 — The Two-Part Doomer Thesis 00:26:00 — When Does a Tool Become an Agent? 00:44:02 — The Argument for Convergent Architecture 00:46:20 — Mathematical Objections: Ergodicity and Eigenvalues 01:03:46 — Bayeslord Enters: Why Speed Doesn’t Matter 01:12:40 — Beff Jezos Enters: Physical Priors vs. Internet Data 01:13:49 — The 5% Probability of Doom by GPT-5 01:20:09 — Chaos Theory and Prediction Limits 01:27:56 — Algorithms vs. Hardware Constraints 01:35:20 — Galactic Resources vs. Human Extermination 01:54:13 — The Intelligence Bootstrapping Script Scenario 02:02:13 — The 10-Megabyte AI Virus Debate 02:11:54 — The Nuclear Analogy: Noise Canceling vs. Rubble 02:37:39 — Controlling Intelligence: The Roman Empire Analogy 02:44:53 — Real-World Latency and API Rate Limits 03:03:11 — The Difficulty of the Off Button 03:24:47 — Why Liron is “e/acc at Heart” Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

AGI timelines, offense/defense balance, evolution vs engineering, how to lower P(Doom), Eliezer Yudkowksy, and much more! Timestamps: 00:00 Trailer 03:10 Is My P(Doom) Lowering? 11:29 First Caller: AI Offense vs Defense Balance 16:50 Superintelligence Skepticism 25:05 Agency and AI Goals 29:06 Communicating AI Risk 36:35 Attack vs Defense Equilibrium 38:22 Can We Solve Outer Alignment? 54:47 What is Your P(Pocket Nukes)? 1:00:05 The “Shoggoth” Metaphor Is Outdated 1:06:23 Should I Reframe the P(Doom) Question? 1:12:22 How YOU Can Make a Difference 1:24:43 Can AGI Beat Biology? 1:39:22 Agency and Convergent Goals 1:59:56 Viewer Poll: What Content Should I Make? 2:26:15 AI Warning Shots 2:32:12 More Listener Questions: Debate Tactics, Getting a PhD, Specificity 2:53:53 Closing Thoughts Links: Support PauseAI — https://pauseai.info/ Support PauseAI US — https://www.pauseai-us.org/ Support LessWrong / Lightcone Infrastructure — LessWrong is fundraising! Support MIRI — MIRI’s 2025 Fundraiser About the show: Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Devin Elliot is a former pro snowboarder turned software engineer who has logged thousands of hours building AI systems. His P(Doom) is a flat ⚫. He argues that worrying about an AI takeover is as irrational as fearing your car will sprout wings and fly away. We spar over the hard limits of current models: Devin insists LLMs are hitting a wall, relying entirely on external software “wrappers” to feign intelligence. I push back, arguing that raw models are already demonstrating native reasoning and algorithmic capabilities. Devin also argues for decentralization by claiming that nuclear proliferation is safer than centralized control. We end on a massive timeline split: I see superintelligence in a decade, while he believes we’re a thousand years away from being able to “grow” computers that are truly intelligence. Timestamps 00:00:00 Episode Preview 00:01:03 Intro: Snowboarder to Coder 00:03:30 "I Do Not Have a P(Doom)" 00:06:47 Nuclear Proliferation & Centralized Control 00:10:11 The "Spotify Quality" House Analogy 00:17:15 Ideal Geopolitics: Decentralized Power 00:25:22 Why AI Can't "Fly Away" 00:28:20 The Long Addition Test: Native or Tool? 00:38:26 Is Non-Determinism a Feature or a Bug? 00:52:01 The Impossibility of Mind Uploading 00:57:46 "Growing" Computers from Cells 01:02:52 Timelines: 10 Years vs. 1,000 Years 01:11:40 "Plastic Bag Ghosts" & Builder Intuition 01:13:17 Summary of the Debate 01:15:30 Closing Thoughts Links Devin’s Twitter — https://x.com/devinjelliot --- Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Dr. Michael Timothy Bennett, Ph.D, is an award-winning young researcher who has developed a new formal framework for understanding intelligence. He has a TINY P(Doom) because he claims superintelligence will be resource-constrained and tend toward cooperation. In this lively debate, I stress-test Michael’s framework and debate whether its theorized constraints will actually hold back superintelligent AI. Timestamps * 00:00 Trailer * 01:41 Introducing Michael Timothy Bennett * 04:33 What’s Your P(Doom)?™ * 10:51 Michael’s Thesis on Intelligence: “Abstraction Layers”, “Adaptation”, “Resource Efficiency” * 25:36 Debate: Is Einstein Smarter Than a Rock? * 39:07 “Embodiment”: Michael’s Unconventional Computation Theory vs Standard Computation * 48:28 “W-Maxing”: Michael’s Intelligence Framework vs. a Goal-Oriented Framework * 59:47 Debating AI Doom * 1:09:49 Debating Instrumental Convergence * 1:24:00 Where Do You Get Off The Doom Train™ — Identifying The Cruxes of Disagreement * 1:44:13 Debating AGI Timelines * 1:49:10 Final Recap Links Michael’s website — https://michaeltimothybennett.com Michael’s Twitter — https://x.com/MiTiBennett Michael’s latest paper, “How To Build Conscious Machines” — https://osf.io/preprints/thesiscommons/wehmg_v1?view_only Doom Debates' Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

My guest today achieved something EXTREMELY rare and impressive: Coming onto my show with an AI optimist position, then admitting he hadn’t thought of my counterarguments before, and updating his beliefs in realtime! Also, he won the 2013 Nobel Prize in computational biology. I’m thrilled that Prof. Levitt understands the value of raising awareness about imminent extinction risk from superintelligent AI, and the value of debate as a tool to uncover the truth — the dual missions of Doom Debates! Timestamps 0:00 — Trailer 1:18 — Introducing Michael Levitt 4:20 — The Evolution of Computing and AI 12:42 — Measuring Intelligence: Humans vs. AI 23:11 — The AI Doom Argument: Steering the Future 25:01 — Optimism, Pessimism, and Other Existential Risks 34:15 — What’s Your P(Doom)™ 36:16 — Warning Shots and Global Regulation 55:28 — Comparing AI Risk to Pandemics and Nuclear War 1:01:49 — Wrap-Up 1:06:11 — Outro + New AI safety resource Show Notes Michael Levitt’s Twitter — https://x.com/MLevitt_NP2013 -- Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Michael Ellsberg, son of the legendary Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg, joins me to discuss the chilling parallels between his father’s nuclear war warnings and today’s race to AGI. We discuss Michael’s 99% probability of doom, his personal experience being “obsoleted” by AI, and the urgent moral duty for insiders to blow the whistle on AI’s outsize risks. Timestamps 0:00 Intro 1:29 Introducing Michael Ellsberg, His Father Daniel Ellsberg, and The Pentagon Papers 5:49 Vietnam War Parallels to AI: Lies and Escalation 25:23 The Doomsday Machine & Nuclear Insanity 48:49 Mutually Assured Destruction vs. Superintelligence Risk 55:10 Evolutionary Dynamics: Replicators and the End of the “Dream Time” 1:10:17 What’s Your P(doom)?™ 1:14:49 Debating P(Doom) Disagreements 1:26:18 AI Unemployment Doom 1:39:14 Doom Psychology: How to Cope with Existential Risk 1:50:56 The “Joyless Singularity”: Aligned AI Might Still Freeze Humanity 2:09:00 A Call to Action for AI Insiders Show Notes: Michael Ellsberg’s website — https://www.ellsberg.com/ Michael’s Twitter — https://x.com/MichaelEllsberg Daniel Ellsberg’s website — https://www.ellsberg.net/ The upcoming book, “Truth and Consequence” — https://geni.us/truthandconsequence Michael’s AI-related substack “Mammalian Wetware” — https://mammalianwetware.substack.com/ Daniel’s debate with Bill Kristol in the run-up to the Iraq war — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyvsDR3xnAg -- Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Today's Debate: Should we ban the development of artificial superintelligence until scientists agree it is safe and controllable? Arguing FOR banning superintelligence until there’s a scientific consensus that it’ll be done safely and controllably and with strong public buy-in: Max Tegmark. He is an MIT professor, bestselling author, and co-founder of the Future of Life Institute whose research has focused on artificial intelligence for the past 8 years. Arguing AGAINST banning superintelligent AI development: Dean Ball. He is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation who served as a Senior Policy Advisor at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under President Trump, where he helped craft America’s AI Action Plan. Two of the leading voices on AI policy engaged in high-quality, high-stakes debate for the benefit of the public! This is why I got into the podcast game — because I believe debate is an essential tool for humanity to reckon with the creation of superhuman thinking machines. Timestamps 0:00 - Episode Preview 1:41 - Introducing The Debate 3:38 - Max Tegmark’s Opening Statement 5:20 - Dean Ball’s Opening Statement 9:01 - Designing an “FDA for AI” and Safety Standards 21:10 - Liability, Tail Risk, and Biosecurity 29:11 - Incremental Regulation, Timelines, and AI Capabilities 54:01 - Max’s Nightmare Scenario 57:36 - The Risks of Recursive Self‑Improvement 1:08:24 - What’s Your P(Doom)?™ 1:13:42 - National Security, China, and the AI Race 1:32:35 - Closing Statements 1:44:00 - Post‑Debate Recap and Call to Action Show Notes Statement on Superintelligence released by Max’s organization, the Future of Life Institute — https://superintelligence-statement.org/ Dean’s reaction to the Statement on Superintelligence — https://x.com/deanwball/status/1980975802570174831 America’s AI Action Plan — https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/07/white-house-unveils-americas-ai-action-plan/ “A Definition of AGI” by Dan Hendrycks, Max Tegmark, et. al. —https://www.agidefinition.ai/ Max Tegmark’s Twitter — https://x.com/tegmark Dean Ball’s Twitter — https://x.com/deanwball Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Max Harms and Jeremy Gillen are current and former MIRI researchers who both see superintelligent AI as an imminent extinction threat. But they disagree on whether it’s worthwhile to try to aim for obedient, “corrigible” AI as a singular target for current alignment efforts. Max thinks corrigibility is the most plausible path to build ASI without losing control and dying, while Jeremy is skeptical that this research path will yield better superintelligent AI behavior on a sufficiently early try. By listening to this debate, you’ll find out if AI corrigibility is a relatively promising effort that might prevent imminent human extinction, or an over-optimistic pipe dream. Timestamps 0:00 — Episode Preview 1:18 — Debate Kickoff 3:22 — What is Corrigibility? 9:57 — Why Corrigibility Matters 11:41 — What’s Your P(Doom)™ 16:10 — Max’s Case for Corrigibility 19:28 — Jeremy’s Case Against Corrigibility 21:57 — Max’s Mainline AI Scenario 28:51 — 4 Strategies: Alignment, Control, Corrigibility, Don’t Build It 37:00 — Corrigibility vs HHH (”Helpful, Harmless, Honest”) 44:43 — Asimov’s 3 Laws of Robotics 52:05 — Is Corrigibility a Coherent Concept? 1:03:32 — Corrigibility vs Shutdown-ability 1:09:59 — CAST: Corrigibility as Singular Target, Near Misses, Iterations 1:20:18 — Debating if Max is Over-Optimistic 1:34:06 — Debating if Corrigibility is the Best Target 1:38:57 — Would Max Work for Anthropic? 1:41:26 — Max’s Modest Hopes 1:58:00 — Max’s New Book: Red Heart 2:16:08 — Outro Show Notes Max’s book Red Heart — https://www.amazon.com/Red-Heart-Max-Harms/dp/108822119X Learn more about CAST: Corrigibility as Singular Target — https://www.lesswrong.com/s/KfCjeconYRdFbMxsy/p/NQK8KHSrZRF5erTba Max’s Twitter — https://x.com/raelifin Jeremy’s Twitter — https://x.com/jeremygillen1 --- Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Holly Elmore leads protests against frontier AI labs, and that work has strained some of her closest relationships in the AI-safety community.She says AI safety insiders care more about their reputation in tech circles than actually lowering AI x-risk. This is our full conversation from my “If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies” unofficial launch party livestream on Sept 16, 2025. Timestamps 0:00 Intro 1:06 Holly’s Background and The Current Activities of PauseAI US 4:41 The Circular Firing Squad Problem of AI Safety 7:23 Why the AI Safety Community Resists Public Advocacy 11:37 Breaking with Former Allies at AI Labs 13:00 LessWrong’s reaction to Eliezer’s public turn Show Notes PauseAI US — https://pauseai-us.org International PauseAI — https://pauseai.info Holly’s Twitter — https://x.com/ilex_ulmus Holly’s Substack: https://substack.com/@hollyelmore Holly’s post covering how AI isn’t another “technology”: https://hollyelmore.substack.com/p/the-technology-bucket-error Related Episodes Holly and I dive into the rationalist community’s failure to rally behind a cause: https://lironshapira.substack.com/p/lesswrong-circular-firing-squad The full IABED livestream: https://lironshapira.substack.com/p/if-anyone-builds-it-everyone-dies-party Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe

Sparks fly in the finale of my series with ex-MIRI researcher Tsvi Benson-Tilsen as we debate his AGI timelines.Tsvi is a champion of using germline engineering to create smarter humans who can solve AI alignment. I support the approach, even though I’m skeptical it’ll gain much traction before AGI arrives. Timestamps 0:00 Debate Preview0:57 Tsvi’s AGI Timeline Prediction 3:03 The Least Impressive Task AI Cannot Do In 2 years6:13 Proposed Task: Solve Cantor’s Theorem From Scratch 8:20 AI Has Limitations Related to Sample Complexity 11:41 We Need Clear Goalposts for Better AGI Predictions 13:19 Counterargument: LLMs May Not Be a Path to AGI16:01 Is Tsvi Setting a High Bar for Progress Towards AGI? 19:17 AI Models Are Missing A Spark of Creativity28:17 Liron’s “Black Box” AGI Test 32:09 Are We Going to Enter an AI Winter? 35:09 Who Is Being Overconfident? 42:11 If AI Makes Progress on Benchmarks, Would Tsvi Shorten His Timeline? 50:34 Recap & Tsvi’s Research Show Notes Learn more about Tsvi’s organization, the Berkeley Genomics Project — https://berkeleygenomics.org Doom Debates’ Mission is to raise mainstream awareness of imminent extinction from AGI and build the social infrastructure for high-quality debate. Support the mission by subscribing to my Substack at DoomDebates.com and to youtube.com/@DoomDebates, or to really take things to the next level: Donate 🙏 Get full access to Doom Debates at lironshapira.substack.com/subscribe