Action authority ↓ · frame rejection

AI self directed

An aligned AI with agency should itself reason about strategy rather than deferring entirely on the strategic question to humans.

Mechanism

Treat the AI as a strategic actor: helpful assistant, transparent reasoner, broad welfare advocate, or cooperative peer with other AIs.

Load-bearing commitments

Worldview positions this strategy quietly assumes. If the claim fails empirically or philosophically, the strategy loses its target or its premise.

Agency

AI should and can set its own goals.

Fails if: If AI goals cannot stably include human welfare, self-direction is abandonment.

Coordinates

Primary leverAction authority (Delegate to AI)

Acts onframe rejection

Coercionn a

Actor in controlai

Time horizonduring transition

Legitimacy sourceself

Conflicts, grouped by mechanism

Lever opposition

same lever, opposite pull

The pair's primary lever is the same; they pull it in opposite directions. A portfolio containing both is internally incoherent on that lever.

Irreducible human authorityDecouple reasoning from action

Complements, grouped by mechanism

Same phase, different layer

same stage, distinct levers

Both are active in the same phase of the transition but act on different layers (model vs institution vs culture). They cover different failure modes inside the same window.

Cooperative AIAI welfare as safety

Same-lever reinforce

same lever, same pull, different mechanism

Both strategies pull the same lever in the same direction by different means. They stack: doing both amplifies the pull, at the cost of double-counting in portfolio audits.

AI as sovereign entity

Adjacent bet

different levers, loosely coupled

Different levers, different directions of action. They reinforce only via the general principle that covering more bets dominates covering fewer.

Reframe AI

Axis position

What the strategy acts onFrame rejection

Coercion levelNot applicable

Actor in controlAI as principal

Time horizonDuring transition

Legitimacy sourceSelf

Source note: AI self directed strategy.md