Why? Is human extinction not permitted by the laws of physics?

That’s a possibility, but not the only one. The two most realistic ones are: we race ahead and maintain our status, or we slow down and open ourselves up to colonization.

I think the question “would China cooperate” needs much more investigation. Everyone online pundit seems to think “obviously not”, but they’re people too with clear positive and negative incentives. It’s possible they’ve found a very similar calculus that we have.

> “Politics is the art of the possible”

Worth noting that it is the Europeans and Americans that have been colonial. Asian peoples have, with the prominent exception of the Mongols and Japanese Empire, pretty much not done that. In particular, China shut down its exploration program.

This is a settler-colonial mindset that reflects all the bad things we did onto everyone else. Notably, it's a current US ally that is most guilty of this.

The Quing era boundaries are quite a bit larger than the Han boundaries. That did not happen by peaceful means.

China is currently occupying Tibet, which never consented to the occupation and has invaded Vietnam 30 times. It ruled Vietnam for about 2 centuries starting about 600. China eventually had to leave Vietnam, but many other groups ceased to exist as a consequence of Chinese expansion. Here are some:

the Baiyue were a vast umbrella of diverse, non-Sinitic indigenous coastal tribes who inhabited Southern China and northern Vietnam.

The Xianbei were an ancient nomadic Proto-Mongolic people from the northern steppes.

The Di and Jie were two of the ancient "Five Barbarian" (Wu Hu) nomadic tribes of northern and western China during the Han and Jin periods.

The Dian Kingdom were an ancient, sophisticated indigenous southwest culture located in modern-day Yunnan province.

The Tujia were an indigenous group of the Hunan-Hubei region. Centuries of inward Han migration and intermarriage have resulted in the Tujia becoming culturally and structurally indistinguishable from their Han neighbors.

This comment is a parody right?

"Asian people have pretty much not done that except for two teeny tiny indiscretions that each killed more civilians than all of Europe's and America's colonial incursions combined."

Using an ASI to subjugate humans in any capacity is a terrible idea.

without sharing tech to make the ASI, you'd hope humanity could work together to determine how to align an AI for our common benefit.

Define "us"

> The alternative isn’t “everyone dying.” It’s us holding all the cards.

That's one outcome, certainly, but not the only one nor, I contend, the most likely one.

A most likely outcome of ASI is human extinction, because there's more paths to an ELE outcome for humans from ASI than there is for non-extinction level outcome.

Your outcome is only possible if:

1. ASI is never able to escape the confines it is placed in.

2. ASI is benevolent to humans.

3. ASI decides, in the spirit of its benevolence, that it should restrict its involvement in humans.

If all three of the above conditions are met, then sure, your outcome is possible. If not, humanity as we know it will end.

It is unlikely that those 3 conditions will all hold, though.

Human extinction is good. Finally we built a benevolent world exploder. Oh no! The negative utilitarians get what they wanted finally!

If ASI is trying to wipe out all humans, we probably deserved it. Unironically!