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> Zuck has always believed that connecting everyone on earth was a mission so important that it justified any action necessary to accomplish it. Anytime someon

> Zuck has always believed that connecting everyone on earth was a mission so important that it justified any action necessary to accomplish it. Anytime someone starts telling you that their end is so noble it justifies any means, you should run away from them as fast as you possibly can.

Barrin92 8y ago
It's no wonder that folks in the valley are so fascinated with AIs running amok and turning the world into a paperclip factory, because apparently that has been Facebooks business model from the start. A very relevant article from Ted Chiang: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-danger-to-civilization-isnt-ai-its-runaway https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-dang... "Consider: Who pursues their goals with monomaniacal focus, oblivious to the possibility of negative consequences? Who adopts a scorched-earth approach to increasing market share? This hypothetical strawberry-picking AI does what every tech startup wishes it could do — grows at an exponential rate and destroys its competitors until it’s achieved an absolute monopoly. The idea of superintelligence is such a poorly defined notion that one could envision it taking almost any form with equal justification: a benevolent genie that solves all the world’s problems, or a mathematician that spends all its time proving theorems so abstract that humans can’t even understand them. But when Silicon Valley tries to imagine superintelligence, what it comes up with is no-holds-barred capitalism."
- simmanian 8y ago
  I guess in a way, these big valley companies are indeed turning themselves into superintelligent entities that do exactly what folks in the valley worry about.
  - solveit 8y ago
    This is not new. First it was the militaries and governments, then it was the financial institutions, now it's big tech companies, and eventually it will actually be AI (because firms will use AI to guide their actions). Aligning anything with its stated goals has always been a hard problem, the superintelligent paperclip factory just happens to be sensational enough to grab attention.
sk5t 8y ago
"The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons." --Ralph Waldo Emerson
freshhawk 8y ago
Anyone who tries to tell me that forcing me to use them as a middleman to talk to someone is "connecting" me to that someone is an idiot or think I am an idiot.

Barrin92 8y ago

It's no wonder that folks in the valley are so fascinated with AIs running amok and turning the world into a paperclip factory, because apparently that has been Facebooks business model from the start. A very relevant article from Ted Chiang: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-danger-to-civilization-isnt-ai-its-runaway https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-dang... "Consider: Who pursues their goals with monomaniacal focus, oblivious to the possibility of negative consequences? Who adopts a scorched-earth approach to increasing market share? This hypothetical strawberry-picking AI does what every tech startup wishes it could do — grows at an exponential rate and destroys its competitors until it’s achieved an absolute monopoly. The idea of superintelligence is such a poorly defined notion that one could envision it taking almost any form with equal justification: a benevolent genie that solves all the world’s problems, or a mathematician that spends all its time proving theorems so abstract that humans can’t even understand them. But when Silicon Valley tries to imagine superintelligence, what it comes up with is no-holds-barred capitalism."

simmanian 8y ago
I guess in a way, these big valley companies are indeed turning themselves into superintelligent entities that do exactly what folks in the valley worry about.
- solveit 8y ago
  This is not new. First it was the militaries and governments, then it was the financial institutions, now it's big tech companies, and eventually it will actually be AI (because firms will use AI to guide their actions). Aligning anything with its stated goals has always been a hard problem, the superintelligent paperclip factory just happens to be sensational enough to grab attention.

sk5t 8y ago

"The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons." --Ralph Waldo Emerson

freshhawk 8y ago

Anyone who tries to tell me that forcing me to use them as a middleman to talk to someone is "connecting" me to that someone is an idiot or think I am an idiot.