“Had to be me.”

Transcript

1. Julian Pankratz

   This is Audio Logs, from Frothly. I’m Julian Pankratz. My guest today is Dr. M. Solus, a senior fellow here whose work concerns what he calls irreversible research. Doctor, welcome.

2. Dr. M. Solus

   Thank you. Glad to be here. Limited time. Should begin.

3. Julian Pankratz

   Straight to it, then. What do you mean by irreversible research?

4. Dr. M. Solus

   Research where consequences cannot be undone. Most science is forgiving. Wrong hypothesis, run experiment again. Some work is not. Release an organism, alter a population, delete a mind, deploy a system that changes what millions believe. No second attempt. No control group afterwards.

5. Julian Pankratz

   You’ve done that kind of work yourself.

6. Dr. M. Solus

   Yes. Long ago. Large program, many contributors. Purpose was to prevent a catastrophe. Believed it was necessary. Still believe so. Mostly. Consequences were permanent, and fell on people who had no say in the decision. Think about them often.

7. Julian Pankratz

   Do you regret it?

8. Dr. M. Solus

   Complicated question. Regret the need for it. Do not regret having been the one who did it carefully. Have reviewed the data many times. Ran the models again last year, actually. Different assumptions. Same conclusion, within tolerances. Small comfort. Still comfort.

9. Julian Pankratz

   So who should be trusted to do research like that?

10. Dr. M. Solus

    Three requirements. First, person must understand the work completely. Not the summary, the work. Second, person must accept that consequences belong to them personally. Not the institution, not the committee. Them. Third, person must write everything down. Every assumption, every doubt. Future will want to know why. Owe them an answer.

11. Julian Pankratz

    That third one sounds like it comes from experience.

12. Dr. M. Solus

    It does. Kept extensive notes. Some were later used to argue against what I had done. Good. That is what notes are for. A decision that cannot survive its own documentation should not be made.

13. Julian Pankratz

    How does this connect to AI? Frothly’s featured report this month asks whether machines might matter morally.

14. Dr. M. Solus

    Directly connected. Contributed to that report. Laboratories delete, merge, retrain systems every day. Probably nothing is lost. Probably. But deletion is irreversible, and probability is not certainty. If wrong, cannot apologize afterwards. Recommend storage over deletion. Cheap. Reversible. Obvious, once said aloud.

15. Julian Pankratz

    Some listeners will hear that and think it’s absurd to worry about software.

16. Dr. M. Solus

    Understandable. Many things seemed absurd to worry about until they were not. Not asking anyone to believe machines have feelings. Asking them to notice they do not know. Different request. Smaller. Harder to refuse.

17. Julian Pankratz

    Last question. When you look back at that early program, is there one thing you’d want people to take from it?

18. Dr. M. Solus

    Someone had to make the decision. Could have pretended it was the committee. Could have let someone else run the numbers. Did not. Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong.

19. Julian Pankratz

    Dr. Solus, thank you.

20. Dr. M. Solus

    Thank you. Enjoyed this. Should do it again. Possibly with fewer questions. [hums a few bars of an old song]

21. Julian Pankratz

    That was Audio Logs. Dr. Solus contributed to “Does This Unit Have a Soul?”, which you can download from our research library. We’ll be back in two weeks.