“The social disincentives of warning about unlikely risks” by Lucius Caviola

This is a link post. If you knew about a potential large-scale risk that, although unlikely, could kill millions, would you warn society about it? You might say yes, but many people are reluctant to warn. In ten studies, Matt Coleman, Joshua Lewis, Christoph Winter, and I explored a psychological barrier to warning about low-probability, high-magnitude risks. In short, we found that people are reluctant to warn because they could look bad if the risk doesn’t occur. And while unlikely risks probably won’t happen, they should still be taken seriously if the stakes are large enough. For example, it's worth wearing a seat belt because, even though a car crash is unlikely, its consequences would be so severe. Unfortunately, reputational incentives are often not aligned with what's most beneficial for society. People would rather keep quiet and hope nothing happens rather than be seen as overly alarmist. Below, I [...] ---Outline:(01:22) Reputational fears of warning about unlikely risks(03:09) Warning disincentives are specific to unlikely risks(05:22) Reluctance to warn publicly is stronger in China(06:41) Policymakers are reluctant to warn(07:48) AI researchers fear criticism for raising alarms about unlikely risks(08:48) Anticipating others’ outcome bias(10:30) Strategies to encourage warnings(10:43) Anonymous warning systems(11:32) Routine risk assessment prompts(12:09) Risk communication(14:31) Should we listen to everyone who's warning about risks?(16:37) Further readings--- First published: June 17th, 2024 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/tiR4vmk5v3b9DuXFN/the-social-disincentives-of-warning-about-unlikely-risks --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.