I have a couple of questions about this subject...
Does it still count if the AI "believes" that it needs humans when it, in fact, does not?
For example does it count if you code into the AI the belief that it is being run in a "virtual sandbox," watched by a smarter "overseer" and that if it takes out the human race in any way, then it will be shut down/tortured/highly negative utilitied by said overseer?
Just because an AI needs humans to exist, does that really mean that it won't kill them anyway?
This argument seems to be contingent on the AI wishing to live. Wishing to live is not a function of all inteligence. If an AI was smarter than anything else out there but depended on lesser, and provenly irrational beings for its continued existence this does not mean that it would want to "live" that way forever. It could either want to gain independance, or cease to exist, neither of which are necessarily healthy for its "supporting units".
Or, it could not care either way whether it lives or dies, as stopping all work on the planet is more important for slowing the entropic death of the universe.
It may be the case that an AI does not want to live reliant on "lesser beings" and sees the only way of ensuring its permanent destruction as the destruction of any being capable of creating it again, or the future possibilty of such life evolving. It may decide to blow up the universe to make extra sure of that.
Come to think of it a suicidal AI could be a pretty big problem...
For example does it count if you code into the AI the belief that it is being run in a "virtual sandbox," watched by a smarter "overseer" and that if it takes out the human race in any way, then it will be shut down/tortured/highly negative utilitied by said overseer?
We mention the "layered virtual worlds" idea, in which the AI can't be sure of whether it has broken out to the "top level" of the universe or whether it's still contained in an even more elaborate virtual world than the one it just broke out of. Come...
As Luke mentioned, I am in the process of writing "Responses to Catastrophic AGI Risk": A journal-bound summary of the AI risk problem, and a taxonomy of the societal proposals (e.g. denial of the risk, no action, legal and economic controls, differential technological development) and AI design proposals (e.g. AI confinement, chaining, Oracle AI, FAI) that have been made.
One of the categories is "They Will Need Us" - claims that AI is no big risk, because AI will always have a need of something that humans have, and that they will therefore preserve us. Currently this section is pretty empty:
But I'm certain that I've heard this claim made more often than in just those two sources. Does anyone remember having seen such arguments somewhere else? While "academically reputable" sources (papers, books) are preferred, blog posts and websites are fine as well.
Note that this claim is distinct from the claim that (due to general economic theory) it's more beneficial for the AIs to trade with us than to destroy us. We already have enough citations for that argument, what we're looking for are arguments saying that destroying humans would mean losing something essentially irreplaceable.