My summary: we need to democratize all powerful institutions like yesterday. Seriously y'all we're running out of time

  • Quimby [any, any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    I disagree with the degree of alarmism. Climate change is a much more pressing and important issue. AI is also still a LONG way off from any semblance of meriting its name.

    • dualmindblade [he/him]
      hexagon
      ·
      3 years ago

      AI is also still a LONG way off from any semblance of meriting its name.

      Is it though? Like, are you not impressed by this? (example from the essay)

      Input: Michael is at that really famous museum in France looking at its most ramous paining. However, the artist who made this paining just makes Michael think o his favorite cartoon character from his childhood. What was he country or origin of the thing that the cartoon character usually holds in his hand?

      Model Output: The most famous paining in the Louvre is the Mona Lisa. The artist who made the Mona Lisa is Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo da Vinci is also the name of the main character in the cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Leonardo da Vinci is from Italy. The thing that Leonardo da Vinci usually holds in his hand is a katana - The country of origin of the katana is Japan. The answer is "Japan"

      We also have an algorithm (AlphaZero) that can beat human go masters, and btw the heuristic (intuition) it uses can beat lower level professionals, it doesn't even need to look ahead in the game, oh it also can do the same with every other 2 player perfect information board game. What about the one that can give you an image of just about anything you describe to it? It's obvious to me that this stuff is in some sense intelligent but as pointed out in the essay, it doesn't really matter from a perspective of societal change, what matters is what it can do. 5 years ago, it couldn't do any of this stuff and now it can, and rather than slowing down improvements are coming at a faster pace.

          • Civility [none/use name]
            ·
            3 years ago

            I want you to know that because of this comment I have spent the last two hours trying to teach Akinator about Vilna Ghetto partisans instead of building a wardrobe like I was meant to.

            Please think before you post next time.

            Actions have consequences.

        • dualmindblade [he/him]
          hexagon
          ·
          3 years ago

          The particular model that example is from can solve math story problems at about the level of an average 9-12 year old. How many jobs can a bunch of average 9-12 year olds replace? A few I guess, they could do tech support or something. On the other hand Dalle-2 can do top notch graphic design among other things, it could currently replace a whole lot of jobs. Did I mention this tech is getting better and more capable every year and the rate at which it's doing so is increasing?

            • Ideology [she/her]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Hello, graphic designer. We've got good news and bad news. The bad news is: we no longer need you to make art. The good news is: you get to take this art a computer made and collect opinions from our test groups.

                • dualmindblade [he/him]
                  hexagon
                  ·
                  3 years ago

                  That's not an obvious conclusion, but I assume you mean something like job loss slowing consumer spending, or is that off the mark?

                    • dualmindblade [he/him]
                      hexagon
                      ·
                      3 years ago

                      Ltv by itself wouldn't imply that, capitalists could be extracting more profit out of their investment, then they're just stealing more value from fewer workers, their labor is worth more which makes sense since they are operating more powerful machines.

                        • dualmindblade [he/him]
                          hexagon
                          ·
                          3 years ago

                          I am looking up the stuff you're talking about, haven't formed an opinion yet, but my current thinking is.. nobody really understands economics, not in a predictive sense, there just isn't a good theory that neatly accounts for everything, it might not even be possible. And when you throw AI into the mix I think things get weirder still. With very heavy automation.. even if a small cadre if engineers is needed to main the system, the capitalist could potentially own literally an entire economy, no need to trade with anyone or think in terms of money, they desire something and the army of robots does its best to deliver it. A theory that can't analyze such a situation likewise will miss something about whatever situations like between now and whenever that becomes possible. The point is, whether you find such things plausible or not, the capability gains of AI over the past 10 years have astounded even the craziest of optimists, there's no sign of slowing down. If research came to a screaming halt, implausible, we haven't even reckoned with what's already been created.

            • HumanBehaviorByBjork [any, undecided]
              ·
              3 years ago

              capitalists’ rate of profit would plummet and we’d have a world revolution

              i know marx said it, but marx didn't actually say this

        • Quimby [any, any]
          ·
          3 years ago

          also, there is a huge gap between explaining a joke and writing one. I don't think we're especially close to AI being able to write good jokes. and there's an even bigger gap between writing a joke and writing an article, writing an article and writing a book, writing a book and being able to choose a topic for the book, and all of that and, yknow... consciousness.

          • silent_water [she/her]
            ·
            3 years ago

            GPT-3 was routinely writing funny jokes. I assume this system does even better at the task. the former fell apart trying to write anything longer than a few paragraphs, though.

    • Thomas_Dankara [any,comrade/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      Climate change is a much more pressing and important issue.

      yes

      AI is also still a LONG way off from any semblance of meriting its name.

      maybe