I think that many of the projects intended to help with AI alignment don’t make progress on key difficulties and won’t significantly reduce the risk of catastrophic outcomes.

This is related to people gravitating to whatever research is most tractable and not being too picky about what problems it helps with, and related to a low level of concern with the long-term future in particular.

Overall, there are relatively few researchers who are effectively focused on the technical problems most relevant to existential risk from alignment failures.

— Paul Christiano (2022)

Christiano, P. (2022, June 19). Where I agree and disagree with Eliezer. AI Alignment Forum. https://www.alignmentforum.org/posts/CoZhXrhpQxpy9xw9y/where-i-agree-and-disagree-with-eliezer