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1 and 2 have had simple, proof-of-concept answers for more than a decade now: > 1. Email sets of DNA strings to one or more online laboratories which oﬀer DNA

1 and 2 have had simple, proof-of-concept answers for more than a decade now: > 1. Email sets of DNA strings to one or more online laboratories which oﬀer DNA synthesis, peptide sequencing, and FedEx delivery. (Many labs currently oﬀer this service, and some boast of 72-hour turnaround times.) > 2. Find at least one human connected to the Internet who can be paid, blackmailed, or fooled by the right background story, into receiving FedExed vials and mixing them in a specified environment. (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/pxGYZs2zHJNHvWY5b/request-for-concrete-ai-takeover-mechanisms https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/pxGYZs2zHJNHvWY5b/request-fo...) Those routes haven't gotten any more complicated for an AI to use in the intervening time. And that's just one set of ideas. You can read the comments for dozens more creative ideas, and likely for responses to every objection you can think of. The key is that AI is getting better and better at problem solving, so anything a human can come up with in a few minutes is likely already within its reach. --- > How is this materially different from today? Because the should-be-uncontroversial assumption is that AI is going to keep getting better at every step of the process, and be able to do it faster and more at scale. Currently it might struggle, but with a thousand agents? It's already able to find novel math results and cybersecurity flaws. It would be incredibly naive to believe "social engineering" is somehow a unique and unsolvable problem for a sufficiently advanced AI.

LaffertyDev 7d ago
For #1, I would seek a laboratory capable of _actually_ creating a _live virus_. That link to lesswrong, while interesting, does not actually indicate how and broadly reads as incredibly speculative. While this is far out of my wheelhouse, I am not aware of a commercial venture doing actual organic creation or manipulation of material (I.e. capable of creating a modified strain of COVID). This broadly still seems in the nation-state level of lab. But, just to get this goalpost out of the way, even _if_ such a venture exists, then would it not hold a bunch of doomsday cultists would already try to do this? This is what I’m getting at by my third question. What changes? Why don’t we see modified anthrax attacks in Palestine or Ukraine _today_? I take no contention with the social engineering argument. I fully accept that LLMs, today and for a while yet, are capable of social engineering their way into anything. I likewise take no contention with the sheer amount of effort LLMs could wield in pursuit of this.
- DirkH 6d ago
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LaffertyDev 7d ago

For #1, I would seek a laboratory capable of _actually_ creating a _live virus_. That link to lesswrong, while interesting, does not actually indicate how and broadly reads as incredibly speculative. While this is far out of my wheelhouse, I am not aware of a commercial venture doing actual organic creation or manipulation of material (I.e. capable of creating a modified strain of COVID). This broadly still seems in the nation-state level of lab. But, just to get this goalpost out of the way, even _if_ such a venture exists, then would it not hold a bunch of doomsday cultists would already try to do this? This is what I’m getting at by my third question. What changes? Why don’t we see modified anthrax attacks in Palestine or Ukraine _today_? I take no contention with the social engineering argument. I fully accept that LLMs, today and for a while yet, are capable of social engineering their way into anything. I likewise take no contention with the sheer amount of effort LLMs could wield in pursuit of this.

DirkH 6d ago
[flagged]