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“Neuroscience of human social instincts: a sketch” by Steven Byrnes

Nov 23, 2024

Steven Byrnes, a neuroscience researcher focusing on AGI safety, dives deep into the neurological underpinnings of human social instincts. He discusses how our innate sensory heuristics shape social interactions and decision-making. The podcast reveals the tension between compassion and spite in social dynamics and how this affects relationships. Byrnes also explores how involuntary attention impacts our perception and emotional responses, offering insights into empathy and aggression, all crucial for understanding both human and artificial intelligence.

01:03:26

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Steve Byrnes

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Quick takeaways

The podcast explores the dual brain structure, emphasizing the interplay between the learning and steering subsystems in shaping human social instincts.

Innate sensory heuristics in the brain enable rapid recognition and response to social stimuli, facilitating essential social connections and emotional understanding.

The compassion-spite circuit illustrates how emotional responses to others, based on perceived feelings, influence moral judgments and interpersonal interactions.

Deep dives

Understanding Human Social Instincts

The structure of the brain is divided into two main subsystems: the learning subsystem and the steering subsystem. The learning subsystem, which includes the cortex and amygdala, is responsible for creating and processing information based on personal experiences. In contrast, the steering subsystem houses innate drives and functions akin to a reward system, guiding reactions to stimuli based on genetically encoded behaviors. A critical area of exploration is understanding how these systems work in conjunction to foster human social instincts, such as compassion, love, and justice.

Intro

2min

Understanding Human Social Instincts

5min

Exploring the Compassion-Spite Circuit and Social Instincts

3min

Sensory Heuristics and Social Instincts

9min

The Dynamics of Involuntary Attention

17min

Understanding Pleasure, Displeasure, and Social Dynamics

4min

Decoding Social Instincts in Animals and Humans

24min

(If you’re in a hurry, you can just read the “Background and summary” section, and skip the other 85%.)

0. Background and summary

0.1 Background: What's the problem and why should we care?

My primary neuroscience research goal for the past couple years has been to solve a certain problem, a problem which has had me stumped since the very beginning of when I became interested in neuroscience at all (as a lens into Artificial General Intelligence safety) back in 2019. In this post I offer a hypothesis for what the solution might generally look like, at least in the big picture. I don’t have all the details pinned down, but I feel like this post is major progress. (Unless it's all wrong! Like the last one was.[1] Very happy for feedback!)

What is this grand problem? As described in Intro to Brain-Like AGI Safety, I believe the following:

[...]

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Outline:

(00:13) 0. Background and summary

(00:18) 0.1 Background: What's the problem and why should we care?

(03:43) 0.2 Summary of the rest of the post

(08:10) 0.3 Confidence level

(08:52) 1. Ingredient 1: Innate sensory heuristics in the Steering Subsystem

(10:27) 1.1 Ingredient 1A: Innate sensory heuristics for conspecific detection in particular

(11:29) 1.2 Neuroscience details

(13:07) 2. Ingredient 2: Generalization via short-term predictors

(16:09) 2.1 Neuroscience details

(17:23) 3. Ingredient 3: Tailoring learned models via involuntary attention and learning rate

(17:43) 3.1 What does the orienting reflex do?

(20:30) 3.1.1 Side note: Transient attentional gaps are more common, and harder to notice, than you realize

(22:17) 3.2 Combining attention with time-variable learning rates

(25:25) 3.3 Neuroscience details

(26:33) 4. Ingredient 4: Reading out transient empathetic simulations

(30:18) 4.1 So, the “thinking of a conspecific” flag is also a “this is an empathetic simulation” flag?

(33:10) 4.2 Neuroscience details

(34:42) 5. Hypothesis: a “compassion / spite circuit”

(35:04) 5.1 The “Conspecific seems to be feeling (dis)pleasure” signal

(36:36) 5.2 The “friend (+) vs enemy (–)” parameter

(39:13) 5.2.1 Evolution and zoological context

(41:49) 5.2.2 Neuroscience details

(42:19) 5.3 Phasic physiological arousal

(43:41) 5.3.1 Neuroscience details

(45:22) 5.4 Generalization via short-term predictors

(45:53) 6. The “compassion / spite circuit” also causes a “drive to feel liked / admired”

(46:49) 6.1 Key idea: My “compassion / spite circuit” is disproportionately active and important while the conspecific is thinking about me-in-particular

(47:00) 6.1.1 Starting example: Innate sensory heuristics for receiving eye contact

(48:22) 6.1.2 Generalization: Innate sensory heuristics fire strongly upon being the target of an orienting reflex

(49:18) 6.1.3 Another example: Somebody deliberately getting my attention

(49:57) 6.2 If the same circuit drives both compassion and “drive to feel liked / admired”, why aren’t they more tightly correlated across the population?

(52:33) 6.3 Whose admiration do I crave?

(56:11) 7. Other examples of social instincts

(58:44) 7.1 “Drive to feel feared” (a.k.a. “drive to receive submission”)

(01:01:07) 8. Conclusion

The original text contained 14 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

The original text contained 11 images which were described by AI.

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First published:
November 22nd, 2024

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/kYvbHCDeMTCTE9TAj/neuroscience-of-human-social-instincts-a-sketch

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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