Agree / disagree?
Don't really understand the question. Our expectations about what happens are not affected by whether we discount or not. The probability I assign to the event "FOOMing AI within 40 years" is the same regardless of what discount rate I use. Same goes for the probability I assign to the proposition that "The first superhuman AI will tile the universe with paperclips." Or the proposition that "The first superhuman AI will tile the universe with happy humans."
What discounting or not discounting changes is how I feel about those possibilities. If I use a low discount rate, the future means a lot to me, and I should most rationally sell all I own and contribute it to the SIAI, pretty much however little I think of SIAI effectiveness. If I use a higher discount rate, then it is possible that I care more about what happens in the next 40 years than I do about anything that happens after 2050. I don't see uFAI all that far out as such a horrible disaster. And I don't see FAI as incredibly awesome either, if it doesn't appear quickly. I would be much more impressed to see a cure for malaria next year.
Our expectations about what happens are not affected by whether we discount or not.
Of course. What I was trying to get at was whether a few decades is too far away for you, or whether those ideas are not what you mean - and are talking about some other "insanity" to do with events further out in the future.
A few decades is not that far out - for many people.
Having all known life on Earth concentrated on a single planet is an existential risk. So we should try to spread out, right? As soon as possible?
Yet, if we had advanced civilizations on two planets, that would be two places for unfriendly AI to originate. If, as many people here believe, a single failed trial ruins the universe, you want to have as few places trying it as possible. So you don't want any space colonization until after AI is developed.
If we apply that logic to countries, you would want as few industrialized nations as possible until AAI (After AI). So instead of trying to help Africa, India, China, and the Middle East develop, you should be trying to suppress them. In fact, if you really believed the calculations I commonly see used in these circles about the probability of unfriendly AI and its consequences, you should be trying to exterminate human life outside of your developed country of choice. Failing to would be immoral.
And if you apply it within the USA, you need to pick one of MIT and Stanford and Carnegie Mellon, and burn the other two to the ground.
Of course, doing this will slow the development of AI. But that's a good thing, if UFAI is most likely and has zero utility.
In fact, if slowing development is good, probably the best thing of all is just to destroy civilization and stop development completely.
Do you agree with any of this? Is there a point where you think it goes too far? If so, say where it goes too far and explain why.
I see two main flaws in the reasoning.
ADDED: A number of the comments so far imply that the first AI built will necessarily FOOM immediately. FOOM is an appealing argument. I've argued in favor of it myself. But it is not a theorem. I don't care who you are; you do not know enough about AI and its future development to bet the future of the universe on your intuition that non-FOOMing AI is impossible. You may even think FOOM is the default case; that does not make it the only case to consider. In this case, even a 1% chance of a non-foom AI, multiplied by astronomical differences in utility, could justify terrible present disutility.