I need the Writing Style Guide people to figure out how to put a smiley face inside parentheses
http://mdickens.me/2025/12/11/smiley_inside_parentheses/ I can’t figure out any good way to put a smiley emoticon inside parentheses. There are five choices,...
I did Inkhaven
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/30/inkhaven/ I published a post every day of November as part of the Inkhaven program, in which we are required to publish a post...
Wartime ethics is weird
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/28/wartime_ethics/ The ethical principles that most people hold—and hold most strongly—go completely out the window when it comes...
Alignment Bootstrapping Is Dangerous
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/27/alignment_bootstrapping_is_dangerous/ AI companies want to bootstrap weakly-superhuman AI to align superintelligent AI. I don’t...
Where I Am Donating in 2025
Dear email readers: This post will probably not fit in your email because it’s too long. You can read the whole thing online:...
We won't solve non-alignment problems by doing research
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/20/research_wont_solve_non-alignment_problems/ Introduction Even if we solve the AI alignment problem, we still face non-alignment...
Do Disruptive or Violent Protests Work?
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/19/do_disruptive_protests_work/ Previously, I reviewed the five strongest studies on protest outcomes and concluded that peaceful...
Knowing Whether AI Alignment Is a One-Shot Problem Is a One-Shot Problem
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/16/ai_meta_one_shot/ One day, I was at my grandma’s house reading the Sunday funny pages, when I suddenly felt myself getting...
What If Ghosts Were Real?
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/15/what_if_ghosts_were_real/ If we are correct about the laws of physics, then ghosts can’t exist. But some people are insistent...
Epistemic Spot Check: Expected Value of Donating to Alex Bores's Congressional Campaign
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/13/spot_check_alex_bores/ Political advocacy is an important lever for reducing existential risk. One way to make political change...
Upside Volatility Is Bad
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/09/upside_volatility_is_bad/ Investors often say that standard deviation is a bad way to measure investment risk because it...
Writing Your Representatives: A Worthwhile and Neglected Intervention
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/08/call_or_write_your_representatives/ Is it a good use of time to call or write your representatives to advocate for issues you...
Things I Learned from College
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/07/things_I_learned_from_college/ (that I still remember a decade later) Evolution on Earth Fact 1: When foxes are bred to be more...
How Can I Not Know Whether I'm Having a Good Experience?
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/05/how_can_I_not_know_whether_I'm_having_a_good_experience/ I’m playing Elden Ring. I’m fighting a difficult boss1, and I’m...
Do Small Protests Work?
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/04/do_small_protests_work/ TLDR: The available evidence is weak. It looks like small protests may be effective at garnering...
My Third Caffeine Self-Experiment
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/03/third_caffeine_self-experiment/ Last year I did a caffeine cycling self-experiment and I determined that I don’t get habituated...
Things I've Become More Confident About
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/02/things_ive_become_more_confident_about/ Last year, I wrote a list of things I’ve changed my mind on. But good truth-seeking...
Will Welfareans Get to Experience the Future?
http://mdickens.me/2025/11/01/will_welfareans_get_to_experience_the_future/ Epistemic status: This entire essay rests on two controversial premises (linear...
The Next-Gen LLM Might Pose an Existential Threat
http://mdickens.me/2025/10/15/next_gen_LLM_might_pose_existential_threat/ I’m pretty sure that the next generation of LLMs will be safe. But the risk is...
Mechanisms Rule Hypotheses Out, But Not In
http://mdickens.me/2025/10/08/mechanisms_rule_hypotheses_out_not_in/ If there is no plausible mechanism by which a scientific hypothesis could be true, then...