Comment by pas

and somewhat ironically the answer is trivial. yes. just as if we were to start building nukes and irradiated the whole surface and most of the atmosphere too. could it happen? sure. it takes one powerful rouge state. how likely it is? unlikely.

now superitelligence is tens of orders of magnitude more complex than this simple rouge-geocidal-state case, but the math is the same. could it happen somehow? yes. how likely it is? well, that's the real question.

... and it seems Elizier thinks it's too likely. and in a sense he's right to act as the most doomy-gloomy person (because he thinks this directly helps decrease this likelihood). and it makes sense, by forcing the debate as much as possible it gives some chance to sufficient coordination between stakeholders to take this hazard somewhat seriously.