by David Wohlever Sánchez.

The Urgency of Mitigating Existential Risks

Within Effective Altruism circles, many people share a concern for the future of humanity. Mitigation of so-called “existential risks” is a huge priority for some of our more risk-seeking individuals.

An existential risk, put simply, is some class of possible event that presents a risk of extinction to humanity.

Nick Bostrom, Oxford philosopher and existential risk extraordinaire, defines it this way: “One where an adverse outcome would either annihilate Earth-originating intelligent life or permanently and drastically curtail its potential.”

Some main classes of existential risk include: catastrophic climate change, large asteroid impact, unfriendly artificial superintelligence, the emergence of malicious nanotechnology, nuclear war, malicious biotech, or some other undiscovered future risk.

When considering the threats posed by so-called “x-risks”, there are at least three factors to keep in mind.

First, bear in mind that if humanity continues for the foreseeable future, then the number of potential people in the future will be significantly higher than the number who exist today or have existed in the past. Additionally, the expected disutility of extinction-level events is massive, meaning that even a small mitigation of those probabilities results in a huge positive. Per one interpretation of the evidence, “even if we use the most conservative of these estimates… we find that the expected loss of an existential catastrophe is greater than the value of 10^16 human lives. This implies that the expected value of reducing existential risk by a mere one millionth of one percentage point is at least a hundred times the value of a million human lives.” If this holds even remotely true, then surely we should keep listening.

Second, consider that some experts believe that the probability of extinction-level events is somewhat high. In a report released by Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute, a survey of experts found the likelihood of extinction by the year 2100 to be a whopping 19%. While this number should be taken with a grain of salt, it is unsettling that people in the know are so pessimistic about our odds.

Third, bear in mind that there are very, very few people dedicated to mitigating these existential risks. Some limited efforts exist, but they are low-staffed and underfunded. As Nick Bostrom has noted, even “a million dollars could currently make a vast difference to the amount of research done on existential risks; the same amount spent on furthering world peace would be like a drop in the ocean.” If you’re looking for a cause with a funding gap, this might be just the ticket.

Risks posed in the past

Looking throughout history, we can find plenty of examples of near-nuclear war; the Future of Life Institute compiled a nice list of the most notable.

What this might show us is that our planet has almost faced near-extinction level events in the past. One reason we are all still here is because people worked to craft systems that would avoid careless mistakes or oversights. In other words, we built systems that attempted to mitigate these risks. If these systems had not been in place, and lazy fail-safes failed to prevent disaster, then what would have happened? Perhaps not outright extinction, but disaster indeed.

During the Cold War, the notion of “mutually assured destruction” was not some abstract idea; it was a working possibility, one that humanity had to take seriously. So today, in a world with ever-advancing technology and geopolitical uncertainty, we lack a compelling reason not to take these sorts of risks seriously.

Christians cared about stopping nuclear destruction, a form of x-risk. So unless there are relevant differences between nuclear war and emerging risks such as unfriendly AI, then Christians might have a reason to care about these risks as well.

The Bible and existential risk

I would now like to preface my argument by noting that the purpose of this post is to begin a discussion, not an attempt on some “final word” for the overlap of Christianity and existential risk. These arguments are preliminary, and surely valid critiques might follow. I am not drawing from previous Christian literature on the topic, because it basically does not exist as far as I could find. So, I am simply starting a conversation, one that Christians need to have as they further explore EA ideas.

That being said, I could see why many Christians might be skeptical of dedicated efforts to mitigating these existential risks. If you hold the assumption that God is in complete control of worldly affairs, then what is the point of working to combat something that God might prevent anyway?

I would push back against this argument by noting that this reasoning of “inevitability” or absolute control might also spur us to cease efforts that decrease global poverty, or work to alleviate suffering around the world. If God is in absolute control, then why should we need to donate time and money for these causes?

As we have argued in previous blogs, this is certainly not the case. There is a clear message throughout the Bible that we have strong reason to support and accelerate these efforts.

Let us, for instance, assume that climate change is real and can be generally attributed to human behavior. As Christians, we see ourselves as stewards of the amazing world around us. Accordingly, combating the risks to the planet posed by both unextreme and extreme climate change is well within a Christian worldview.

The debate about more “extreme” forms of x-risk might be more complicated. For instance, I recognize that a Christian might have doubts about the ability of an artificial superintelligence to achieve consciousness. However, this does not necessarily mean that a rogue AI couldn’t be dangerous.

A Christian might also doubt the arguments about future humans, citing the eventual second coming. I will leave these more challenging theological questions to the theologians and following discussion, but I recognize these concerns.

Some closing thoughts

The need to mitigate existential risk stands or falls with free will – if it does not exist, then there is little or no case to be made, but if it does, even to an extent, then we have every reason to at least listen to the experts.

So, perhaps my thesis is that, insofar as a Christian believes humans have free will, a Christian will likely have reason to support causes that mitigate the risks imposed by disaster scenarios.

This is not meant to take a stand on cause prioritization. It might be more worthwhile still to donate to groups that fight global health problems or empower people economically. It is, however, to say that, excluding opportunity cost, donating time or money to mitigating these threats is, depending on the organization or project, likely net positive.

In my view, whether or not to donate to these causes is an open question, but if the whole of humanity is at stake, it’s at least a conversation worth having.