Worldviews

Overview

People working on AI safety hold diverse worldviews that lead to different risk assessments and priorities. Understanding these worldviews helps explain disagreements and enables more productive dialogue.

Major Worldviews

Doomer

Believes AI existential risk is very high (often >50% p(doom)):

• Alignment is fundamentally hard
• Current approaches are inadequate
• We may not get many chances to get it right
• Often associated with: MIRI, Eliezer Yudkowsky, some AI safety researchers

Long Timelines

Believes transformative AI is further away (20+ years):

• More time to solve alignment
• Current risks are more speculative
• Near-term concerns deserve more attention
• Associated with: Some ML researchers, AI ethics community

Governance Focused

Prioritizes policy and institutional solutions:

• Technical alignment is necessary but insufficient
• Racing dynamics are the key problem
• International coordination is critical
• Associated with: GovAI, policy researchers, some EA organizations

Optimistic

Believes alignment is likely to succeed:

• Current research is making real progress
• Markets and institutions create safety incentives
• Past technology fears were often overblown
• Associated with: Some lab researchers, techno-optimists

How Worldviews Affect Priorities

Worldview	Technical Research	Governance	Timelines	Key Intervention
Doomer	Critical but may be hopeless	Valuable	Short	Pause/slow down
Long Timelines	Important, time available	Moderate priority	Long	Gradual progress
Governance Focused	Necessary	Highest priority	Medium	Coordination
Optimistic	On track	Light touch	Medium	Continue current

Using Worldview Analysis

Explicitly identifying worldview assumptions helps:

• Understand why experts disagree
• Identify which cruxes would change conclusions
• Design robustly valuable interventions
• Have more productive conversations