Vitalik publishes a new declaration on d/acc: Progress and future of decentralized defensive accelerationism.
Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin (also known as Vitalik) recently published an article titled (d/acc: One Year Later), reflecting on the progress of his proposal for 'decentralized and democratic differential defensive acceleration' (d/acc) made a year ago, and further elaborating on the ideas, challenges, and future development directions.
At the beginning of 2024, Vitalik published an article (My Technological Optimism) and has been cultivating this idea over the past year, allowing it to gradually mature. Recently, he has released new articles related to this topic, gaining attention and discussion from the community.
What is d/acc?
The core idea of d/acc is simply 'accelerate technological development, but prioritize the development of technologies that enhance defense, decentralization, and democratization', because this core concept has the opportunity to empower individuals and communities, reducing the risk of being controlled or oppressed by central authorities.
Vitalik believes this strategy can better address the risks posed by future technological developments, especially the threats posed by super artificial intelligence (AI).
The core and goal of d/acc: to create a safer and freer world.
Imagine in 2042, a new epidemic breaks out in human society, but this time, because advanced technologies such as early warning systems, rapid virus testing, and open-source personal assistant AI have been developed, the outbreak is quickly brought under control without causing significant harm.
And this scenario is actually the future that d/acc envisions: a society that uses technology to enhance defensive capabilities, thereby ensuring human freedom and safety.
Vitalik emphasizes that the core principles of d/acc can be applied in multiple fields, including biological defense, physical defense, cyber defense, and information defense.
In simple terms, the goal of d/acc is:
In an increasingly 'tribalized' world, it is essential to maintain principles and selectively develop technology.
Acknowledge that exponential technological progress will make the world very different, and humanity needs to enhance its ability to protect vulnerable groups.
Create more effective technological tools in defense and construction than 'destruction'.
How far has d/acc developed now? What are its possible applications?
Since the concept of d/acc was proposed, progress has been made in various fields. Vitalik himself has listed some specific achievements, such as verifiable open-source vaccines that can lower the risk of monopolies in medicine; increased attention to indoor air quality; the rise of prediction markets as information tools; and the application of zero-knowledge proof systems like ZK-SNARKs in government identification and social media, which can enhance privacy protection, among others.
All of these contribute to enhancing the defensive capabilities that d/acc pursues, creating a more resilient and secure society.
💡ZK-SNARKs: A cryptographic technology that allows one party to prove they know specific information without revealing any details, helping to protect privacy and enhance security.
By encouraging diverse technological development paths and promoting open-source technologies, d/acc has the potential to drive innovation and is expected to be applied in various fields such as the metaverse, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, and healthcare in the future.
Looking back at the examples mentioned at the beginning of the article, when an epidemic breaks out again, assuming that the concept of d/acc has become a reality, countries can quickly test for viruses through open-source air detectors and use social media analysis to create early warning systems, providing the public with timely protective advice.
In the field of medical technology, due to the open-source vaccine tools, medical facilities around the world can quickly produce vaccines to solve the 'vaccine shortage' issue.
In the future, everyone can use advanced technologies such as personal assistant AI to find safer activity venues through encrypted data, thus protecting personal privacy while also reducing the risk of virus infection.
From the examples above, it can be seen that under the concept of d/acc, society no longer needs so many centralized directives or dependencies from the government and businesses; relying on decentralized innovative technologies, society can respond flexibly and efficiently to various challenges.
What challenges does d/acc currently face?
However, this set of ideas is certainly not perfect; AI threats to security, urgent timelines, and regulatory issues are among the main criticisms received since the publication of last year's article.
Vitalik believes that if humanity truly has only a few years before facing super AI, then merely accelerating 'good technology' is not enough; we also need to slow down 'bad technology', which may require implementing some strong regulatory measures.
For example, the 'SB-1047 bill' proposed in California last year was too targeted at the current situation, while technology is developing rapidly, making the standards of the bill outdated. Additionally, the most likely actors to cause AI disasters are the military, and any safety regulations formulated by the government are highly likely to exempt the military.
However, Vitalik believes this does not mean we should abandon regulation. He proposed two possible strategies:
Accountability:
In simple terms, if someone's actions cause legal damage, they can be sued.
This is a very common and general approach, supported by liberal economists. He believes that placing responsibility on the end users is most aligned with incentive mechanisms, as this will influence how users utilize AI.
However, since users may lack sufficient resources to assume responsibility, it may also be considered to hold deployers and developers accountable.
Additionally, he proposed a novel perspective: that the owners or operators of devices taken over by AI should be held accountable, thereby motivating the entire world to strengthen infrastructure security.
Global 'pause' on industrial-grade hardware:
Vitalik believes that the world should establish an emergency response mechanism to reduce the available AI computing power globally by 90-99% through technological means in critical situations, and maintain this for 1-2 years, giving humanity more time to respond to technological risks.
For example, industrial-grade AI hardware can be equipped with trusted hardware chips, which need to obtain signatures from multiple international organizations every week to continue operating.
He believes this approach can minimize risks, and since this method is based on hardware, it has strong resilience to technological changes.
Regardless, Vitalik believes that a powerful new technological crisis (especially AI or biotechnology) is about to arrive, combined with reduced global cooperation, the next few decades are bound to be full of challenges.
However, humanity's greatest hope now is to accelerate development through more powerful tools, and decentralized technology may be the best solution. Through AI-assisted governance, verification technologies, and the popularization of open-source technologies, Vitalik believes that as long as people continue to work hard, humanity has the capability to meet challenges and create a brighter, freer, and safer future.
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