I think that these are genuinely hard questions to answer in a scientific way. My own speculation is that using AI to solve problems is a skill of its own, along with recognizing which problems they are currently not good for. Some use of LLMs teaches these skills, which is useful.

I think a potential failure mode for AI might be when people systematically choose to work on lower-impact problems that AI can be used to solve, rather than higher-impact problems that AI is less useful for but that can be solved in other ways. Of course, AI can also increase people's ambitions by unlocking the ability to pursue higher-impact goals they would not have been able to otherwise achieve. Whether or not AI increases or decreases human ambition on net seems like a key question.

In my world, I see limited use of AI except as a complement to traditional internet search, a coding assistant by competent programmers, a sort of Grammarly on steroids, an OK-at-best tutor that's cheap and always available on any topic, and a way to get meaningless paperwork done faster. These use cases all seem basically ambition-enhancing to me. That's the reason I asked John why he's worried about this version of AI. My experience is that once I gained some familiarity with the limitations of AI, it's been a straightforwaredly useful tool, with none of the serious downsides I have experienced from social media and smartphones.

The issues I've seen seem to have to do with using AI to deepfake political policy proposals, homework, blog posts, and job applications. These are genuine and serious problems, but mainly have to do with adding a tremendous amount of noise to collective discourse rather than the self-sabotage enabled by smartphones and social media. So I'm wondering if John's more concerned about those social issues or by some sort of self-sabotage capacity from AI that I'm not seeing. Using AI to do your homework is obviously self-sabotage, but given the context I'm assuming that's not what John's talking about.

Agreed. Perhaps a better test of a society's relative liberality is to examine its worst examples of infringements of liberal views -- its worst censorship, persecution of demographic groups, limits on property rights, and so on, defining these terms broadly.

I think that the tradeoff between allowing people to pursue their cultural and aesthetic agendas through legal means and preserving a basically liberal government and intercultural framework in which those agendas are pursued is an extremely difficult one to get right. It tends to produce a sense of paradox and hypocrisy. It's also very hard to figure out when we're facing a slippery slope into illiberalism or a non-preferred implemention of the tradeoffs inherent in liberalism.

In the context of a basically liberal society, like the USA where I live, I tend to perceive most of the flaws in liberalism as stemming from human nature rather than capture of power centers by committed illiberal ideologues. Conservatives and liberals in the USA both see themselves as basically sticking up for what we're here referring to as "liberal" values, and I think most members of both parties, even the far left and far right, see themselves as generally presenting contrasting versions of "liberalism." So I think we have a case here where most US citizens see their nation as less liberal than it really is, in contrast to the example you give of China, a nation where most Chinese citizens may see their nation as more liberal than it really is.

It sounds like what you are hoping for is to avoid illiberal backsliding by making everybody crystal-clear on what liberalism is and giving them a deep understanding of why they should support it.

Unfortunately, I don't think that's tractable. Fortunately, I don't think it's necessary. How successful have China and Myanmar been in convincing the world they being run on liberal principles?

My view is that most people are pretty clear on the concrete facts of life that matter for liberalism.

• Am I being persecuted for my beliefs?
• Is my life at risk due to my identity?
• Can I say what I want?
• Is my property secure, and am I free to transact?

When people debate politics, I contend they typically are debating over tradeoffs inherent in liberal ideas, or between values orthogonal to liberalism. Examples of the latter include dealing with externalities such as pollution, environmental destruction, or public aesthetics. Note that a liberal society can still care about things other than liberalism, and sometimes that will result in tradeoffs with liberalism-maximalism. Making a democratic choice for non-liberal maximalism is still a position compatible with liberalism.

Setting aside cheating, do you think LLMs are diminishing opportunities for thought, or redistributing them to other topics? And why?

Most of the current debates about liberalism are debates about how to trade off between competing liberal priorities. I would regard these debates about exceptions to free speech - whether any are tolerated, and which ones - as debates within a common liberal framework. Typically, proponents of each site, all of whom are taking one liberal view or another, cast their opponents as illiberal (in the theory sense, not the American “progressive-vibe” sense). Opponents reject this label because they genuinely don’t perceive themselves that way.

I think the whole debate would be better if we recognized that there are exist high-stakes tradeoffs between competing liberal priorities, and that it’s these competing visions of liberalism that are at the heart of contemporary political discourse in America.

The distinction I’m driving at is between making an in-depth intellectual argument about liberalism (which is what you and Gordon are focused on) and a winning emotional appeal (which is what I’m focused on).

My claim is that support for liberalism has been eroded by too few winning emotional appeals for it, and that they’re actually easy to make. It’s not necessary to address the ambiguities. Just share anecdotes that stir up positive feelings in the right direction.

Why do you think LLMs are moving people backwards? With phones, it was their attention-sucking nature. What is it with LLMs?

Controversial ideas need to be defended bravely, clearly, and often to keep them in the Overton Window. A persistent drip of timely examples and anecdotes combined with a simple interpretation is much more effective. Ideas like "free speech" are very easy to defend in a simple way. Just pointing out that "in Britain, they just put someone on trial for calling someone a Karen" is a fine way to argue for continuing to protect free speech, without needing to get into any abstractions.

Disagree. People are plenty smart enough to understand them. The case for them just doesn’t get made vigorously.

I find conversations more meaningful than many comparably-fun activities. What provides the meaning is my intuition about the opportunities the conversation can lead to and the update in how I’m perceived by my counterpart. As a secondary effect, conversations exercise and test my ability to think on my feet.

Flirtation can lead to sex, a coffee break chat with a collaborator can lead to a new project, a talk with anyone can lead to closer friendship. Flirtation suggests I’m more desirable than I thought, talk about projects that I’m regarded as more capable, talk with acquaintances that I’m charismatic.

These social updates and the mental exercise conversation provides are why I seek out conversation compared to many other more-fun activities. Also, I have to recognize that I probably value conversation for its own sake above and beyond these instrumental purposes. It just feels like it ought to be part of a good life aesthetic, like eating fresh fruits and vegetables.