AI Researchers on AI Risk

Yeah, I think insofar as Elon Musk expresses concerns about various supposed existential threats to humanity, the relationship of those to any of the things his companies actual work on is so distant that, if there is a relationship at all, its that the expressions of concerns are a rhetorical/marketing trick directed at people who think things through shallowly, if at all.

Alternatively, the expressions of concerns are unrelated to his business activities, except that both are born out of his interest in and thoughts about technology, and people are drawing spurious connections between them (I don't follow Musk closely enough to have a strong opinion on which is the case, particularly, I don't know if he's ever connected the concerns he expresses to his companies' activities.)

I think the Mars colonization is about other x-risks, e.g. asteroids, nuclear war, pathogens...

I think this bit is about other existential threats than AI. Nuclear war, engineered plagues, dumb gray goo, asteroids... A backup planet won't save us from super-AI but it does have its uses.

>AI is practically the only major x-risk that doesn't make only the Earth uninhabitable. Out-of-control replicating nanotech, engineered pathogens, extreme radioactivity, etc. The distinguishing factor of strong AI as an x-risk is that it will come and get you on Mars, which is the reason why Elon Musk is worried.

(Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/36proz/how_to_nai...)