On "LLMs as Tools for Alignment":

Wanted to respond to one specific paragraph from this. Kids ask "why?" over and over until their parents go insane. The parents who cling to sanity the longest make the smartest kids.

LLMs tirelessly answer "why?" just for you. Is that curiosity still inside the average adult?

Ways LLMs improve coordination:

1. Helping people define problems (many of which we all share)
2. Pointing out stable solutions involving coordination when they exist and are described by literature
3. Suggesting coordination mechanisms

GPT-5 can do all three of these to a useful degree today, even if no further progress was made. It's not a PhD level thinker, but it can connect you to PhD level ideas. Sycophancy is a problem, as is distraction. Either could kill the concept. Maybe we get the Wall-E world. But I think people want to know "why?".

What LLMs don't do:

1. Alignment (although disagreements may converge to cruxes faster, enabling better understanding [or more direct conflict?])
2. Quorum sensing^[1] - the ability to detect when enough actors are willing to cooperate to make cooperation effective. People often avoid being the first to move, unless they know they have support.

I have been thinking about this a lot, and would appreciate links to further reading. OP^[2], you should look into Pol.is if you haven't already. It's on my reading list. Also, see Nepal ^[3] for some tech-enabled coordination on a large scale.

1. ^{^}

   For things like collective bargaining, voting behaviors, and civic coordination.

2. ^{^}

   As an aside, parts of this read like they were written by an LLM, and I'd expect more engagement if you added more of your voice throughout.

3. ^{^}

   I do not necessarily expect Nepal to go well.

I'm not sure how things can change, other than economic pressure by consumers or the government on welfare.

1. PE rollups of companion vet clinics are a contributing factor, as with human medical clinics. Consolidation combined with metrics-based optimization leads to harsh local incentives.

2. Vets in poultry and cattle operations don't necessarily care more about animal welfare than the owners or the consumers. Large animal / poultry vets have been desensitized to harm for many years, understand the economics, and understand their role in that system. I believe all of them care deeply about welfare, but the machine is optimizing for cost. There are selection effects in career choice too - if they share your ideals they probably won't end up in those roles. Companion vets have more room for empathy, even if they are still constrained by economics.

Vets are the HR of the production animal world - there to help unless your needs conflict with the org's.