The question was

> How many people are allowed to die to prevent AGI?

He didn’t say “not everyone dying is preferable to everyone dying”. The question was about acceptable consequences from preemptively stopping AGI under his assumption that AGI will lead to the extinction all humans.

Those are only the same thing under the assumptions that 1) AGI is inevitable without intervention and 2) AGI will lead to the extinction of humanity.

If he believes he is being misunderstood, his “apology” doesn’t actually deny either of the assumptions I identified, and he is widely known to believe them.

In fact, his stated reason for correcting his earlier tweet, that using nuclear weapons is taboo, is an extremely weak excuse. Given the opportunity to save humanity from AGI if that is what you believe, it would be comical to draw the line at first use of nukes.

No, I think Eliezer is trying to come to grips with the logical conclusion of his strident rhetoric.