Caledonian2 comments on LA-602 vs. RHIC Review - Less Wrong

34 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 19 June 2008 10:00AM

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Comment author: Caledonian2 19 June 2008 05:17:47PM 2 points [-]

The truth is, no one knows what might come out when we open the pandora box.

That's true of anything new. Someone speaking a sequence of nonsense syllables might accidentally cast a magic spell - but we don't concern ourselves with that possibility, because we have absolutely no way to anticipate or protect against it. 'Spells' are not part of our working model of the universe.

There are known dangers and unknown dangers, anticipatable dangers and unanticipatable dangers. If the peril is both unknown and unanticipatable, we have nothing to be concerned about - if it's known, we can react appropriately. The problem is the unknown, anticipatable risks.