Alignment Problem Part 2 - Taking it Seriously

Can the AI "alignment problem" actually be defined, or is it fundamentally flawed from the start? In this episode of Philosophy, Programs, and Prompts, Casey Hart( @OntologyExplained ) and Carl Brown( @InternetOfBugs ) set aside bad-faith doomer rhetoric and corporate marketing moats to examine the core arguments behind AI alignment in good faith.Casey argues that grappling with alignment acts as a conceptual gateway into foundational questions of ethics, paternalism, and what constitutes the "good life". Meanwhile, Carl pushes back from an engineering and practical standpoint, arguing that true alignment with humanity—which is notoriously misaligned with itself—is a distraction from pressing real-world issues like environmental degradation, social media algorithms, legal accountability, and building practical systems we can control.Together, they dissect the mechanics of Coherent Extrapolated Volition (CEV), Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics, Nick Bostrom's orthogonality thesis, and the practical limits of guardrails, kill switches, and machine interpretability.---Links & Resources Mentioned:// Eliezer Yudkowsky – Coherent Extrapolated Volition (2004):https://intelligence.org/files/CEV.pdf// Nick Bostrom – Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (2014): Referenced for the Orthogonality Thesis (01:06:44) and the Paperclip Maximizer https://global.oup.com/academic/product/superintelligence-9780199678112?cc=us&lang=enhttps://rudyct.com/ai/Superintelligence%20Paths,%20Dangers,%20Strategies%20%28Nick%20Bostrom%292014.pdf---CHAPTERS:00:00 - Cold Open: Why Computer Science Ignores History00:28 - Welcome to Philosophy, Programs, and Prompts01:53 - The Thesis: Alignment as a Gateway Drug to Philosophy03:59 - Four Ways to Frame the Alignment Problem06:05 - Paternalism, Ethics, and Defining "The Good Life"09:50 - The Computer Science Habit of Working in a Vacuum15:06 - Coherent Extrapolated Volition & Paternalistic Genies20:20 - Eternal Recurrence and Avoiding an Algorithmic Rut25:30 - Defining Alignment: Goals, Intentions, and Needs31:40 - Can We Be Aligned with Non-Living Artifacts?36:00 - Internal Self-Misalignment and Humanity's Fractured Goals47:20 - A Taxonomy of Proposed Solutions: Moratoriums & Off Switches54:20 - Asimov's Three Laws: Control Constraints vs. True Alignment01:00:50 - Encoding Morality: Utilitarian Calculators & Perfect Parents01:05:14 - Eliminativism, Orthogonality, and Decision Theory Flaws01:09:30 - Machine Interpretability: What Science Can Actually Do01:13:00 - Marketing Benchmarks vs. Real-World Harm#AIAlignment #ArtificialIntelligence #PhilosophyOfTech #AISafety #TechPodcast #ComputerScience #PhilosophyProgramsAndPrompts