AI Doomerism as a Secular Religion
This is a lazy, bad-faith discussion of AI doom. It asserts that the belief in existential threat from AI is exactly equal to traditional religion, then it makes dubious claims to &quot;prove&quot; that assertion. And to top it off, the article boldly claims<p>&gt; I’m trying to steelman the case the best I can<p>That&#x27;s not believable - the author has cherry-picked examples that they <i>think</i> serve their purpose (and, in my opinion, they really don&#x27;t), and either ignores or is ignorant of actual &quot;doomerist&quot; reasoning.<p>For example:<p>&gt; AI doomerism as a religion ... Yudkowsky outed himself as being somewhat religious albeit in a non-traditional way<p>The actual quote:<p>&gt; the religion that I actually picked up was from the science fiction books instead, as it were. I’m using religion very metaphorically here, more like ethos<p>The author then continues to make parallels to traditional&#x2F;actual religion, doubling down for another few hundred words without much critical thinking.<p>It is a misreading (intentional or not, I am unsure) of Yudkowksy&#x27;s quote to form a basis of &quot;doomerism [and&#x2F;or science] as a religion.&quot; He is clearly saying he inherited a worldview, which religion often provides to people, and that he does not feel his beliefs are genuinely religious in nature.