10 ms·

Do we need to worry about artificial stupidity?

dahartigan 7y ago
The world has plenty of organic stupidity, we don't need more.
gillesjacobs 7y ago
The article generalizes and remains superficial in what it asserts. "AI that fails" currently will improve in the future and is currently being mitigated in use. Then there's the toothless "dumbed down" section: "Some artificial intelligence machines and programs are deliberately ‘dumbed-down’. This marks an entirely different take on the term artificial stupidity. By putting spelling errors in typed messages, not adhering to strict grammar and so on, AI seems less intelligent. These (fully intentional) errors are coded into the system with the goal of creating AI that appears human." The writer than asserts this is actually a good thing because it provides more human-likeness in customer interaction for instance. Attributing "incapability" to AI because it has the technology has no moral compass is also a platitude. Technology can always be used for bad. Fact remains, the current AI paradigm provides tremendous economic value and is merely an extension of the economic striving for automation. Harping on AI has become a bit of a trend and the author calls for cynicism but ends up with a pretty toothless analysis.
mtrazzi 7y ago
For a literature review of Artificial Stupidity: https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.03644 https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.03644
dr_j_ 7y ago
Artificial intelligence is certainly no match for natural stupidity..
- arethuza 7y ago
  And real weapons grade stupidity, at least in my experience, tends to be wielded by people who are actually very intelligent in general, but having a bad day or an attack of hubris....
arethuza 7y ago
I suspect something like the "artificial inanity" described in Anathem so that the reputation of authors becomes a vital part of the infrastructure of their network.
Inu 7y ago
One shouldn't underestimate the intelligence of stupidity. It can have its own utility, strength and creativity within certain parameters.
- julienreszka 7y ago
  What do you mean? I don't understand
  - jobigoud 7y ago
    Not the parent but sometimes ignoring the rational choice leads to interesting discoveries or results. For creative endeavors it's also good to not overthink things and let the flow take over.
  - pixl97 7y ago
    If you're a caveman it would be stupid to play with fire. You dont have any medical care to treat burns and it's dangerous, but because we did we started cooking, then melting metals. So what is stupid at one point becomes knowledge at another point.
  - pvaldes 7y ago
    Stupid people tend to die and gave example, or make bombastic plans that later explode in their face, so we, the rest of stupid people can learn something about the experience. Don't gobble this berries nor those shiny mushroms, don't pet this nice crocodile, don't jump over this small canyon with a too short pole... the list is endless.
- beobab 7y ago
  Possibly irrelevant to this discussion (you decide): the level of stupidity in any human undertaking is almost always a) higher than you'd think, and b) pretty constant across all cross-sections of humanity. Source Carlo M. Cipolla, Professor of Economics at UC Berkeley: https://advanced.jhu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/The-Basic-Laws-of-Human-Stupidity.pdf https://advanced.jhu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/The-Basi... Despite widespread attempts by humans to eradicate it, it exists everywhere; ignoring race/class/education/gender/orientation/profession or any other sub-division you can think of. You'll find roughly the same amount of stupidity in a gaggle of university professors as you will in a humdrum of railway attendants (I made up those collective terms, in case it wasn't obvious).
qwsxyh 7y ago
I get my dose of natural stupidity on this website every day. I wouldn't need an artificial source.
- SirLJ 7y ago
  LOL
pjc50 7y ago
There's a lot to be said for this line of argument. The stupidity of the Youtube recommendation engine has wrecked Brazilian politics, for example: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/11/world/americas/youtube-brazil.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/11/world/americas/youtube-br... (The deliberate construction of an AI that pays people to produce lies to damage other people's health and welfare sounds like a farfetched science fiction plot. Accidentally building one, and then trying to deny responsibility for it, is a far more plausible thing for humans to do to ourselves. Just as Schneier talked about the "Exxon Valdez of privacy", what we have now is the tetraethyl lead of video entertainment.)
- mrhappyunhappy 7y ago
  YouTube recommendations feel like a direct impediment to democracy. When your recommendations consist of the same crap all the time, it may seem as though that stuff carries more weight than it really does. I wonder to what degree YouTube is responsible for the current political climate. The same with Twitter really. When you only follow and see posts from people you choose, how are you supposed to give important issues a fair shake and debate viewpoints that different from yours.
  - matz1 7y ago
    Democracy work just fine. It might not what you want but what if the current youtube recommendation system is what I want ? In democracy people like me should still get equal power to decide. There are no right or wrong outcome in democracy.
    - ben_w 7y ago
      No system of decision-making can survive a high level of misinformation. In the case of democracy that means you might be happy and placated, but you won’t have any control no matter how often you vote.
      - matz1 7y ago
        >that means you might be happy and placated Maybe some people do fine with that, even though to some other people perspective they call it illusion. I don't really care if my happiness is perceived as "illusion" by some other people as long as I my self consider it happy. as long as these people still allowed to vote, its fine to me. They may vote for "stupid" decision but democracy should still allow for that.
al_form2000 7y ago
'There is no doubt that AI may one day become much more intelligent than humans' Really?
- skilled 7y ago
  "no doubt" and "may" are two words that contradict one another. Clearly whoever wrote that has no idea what they are talking about.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - AndunD 7y ago
    Definitely on the other hand. The writer, if anyone, could consider the future of stronger AI without the artificial stupidity. Then he, too, would stumble upon the great joys of folding multiple sources of falsity into a single tablet, a simulacrum. I vouch for that uncertainty. We must agree to disagree to all have a look in the mirror, when we can't discern between AI and that. For any number (> 0, to be perfectly rational) of times, because it is a duty and a necessity. However, I would not be so sure of myself today if it weren't for my wife; she keeps the existential dread out. I don't actually have a wife, but I do have a brain. One makes ends meet. It's that simple. --- The age of artisanal stupidity, beginning the day with a goblet of poison :')
  - delinka 7y ago
    I disagree. They've constructed a sentence that will always be true by using the weasel word "may" and the emphatic "no doubt." I have no doubt that one day someone may win big at poker in a casino. Someone may; or they may not - of this I have no doubt.
    - xamuel 7y ago
      Technically the sentence could be falsified if we ever managed to formally prove that AI can never become more intelligent than humans.
    - 7y ago
polytronic 7y ago
Hahaha, I would say we should be more worried about natural stupidity
magwa101 7y ago
Yes we do, it's called humans. This continual bashing of AI is so funny. We never measure the baseline of human activity which is chock full of stupidity, illogic and unreasonableness. Of course, AI is human directed, but it will likely be many times more predictable.
jddj 7y ago
I used Google Translate yesterday to translate a french phrase to english and got something like: "It's better to be alone than to be in bad comapny". I looked around for a Duolingo-style "report bad translation", "rate" or "give feedback" action but couldn't find one anywhere on that screen. Artificial stupidity seems like a natural step on the way to artificial intelligence, but we would likely benefit from building in some training wheels.
- rapunkill 7y ago
  If you're in a browser the "send feedback" is at the bottom right in italic. If you're using the application it's hamburger button, "help & feedback" then "Feedback" will be located at the top right.
xamuel 7y ago
A lot of what we call AI these days (especially neural network stuff) should really be called "artificial knee-jerk reactions". A neural network trained to detect traffic lights is 'intelligent' only insofar as your leg is 'intelligent' when it involuntarily kicks in response to a tap on the knee. Of course, automating a knee-jerk reaction in response to traffic lights can still be extremely useful (say, for self-driving cars). But there's no contemplation involved, no thinking, no deliberation---no intelligence.
- kaolti 7y ago
  Agree. I would argue context makes all the difference in real intelligence and we can never define context because it's multi level, slightly different for everyone and constantly changing. On top of all that forcing a certain context across the board can have countless unintended consequences.
einpoklum 7y ago
Ugh, human stupidity is more than enough for me to worry about right now... global warming will flood my city... US-vs-Russia jingoism will get us all killed in a nuclear war... No more please (covers eyes and ears)!
KatarinaGrumy 7y ago
I think we don't need to worry about it no. Sooner or later they will learn. And will be smarter than us
MisterTea 7y ago
I can't blame Youtube, or any social media here at all. The enemy here is ignorance which is the root enabler for spreading this garbage. The only way to fix that is via education. Good luck. A well educated populace that thinks for itself is less profitable because you can't sell them a line of bullshit. And you wonder why education budgets are under attack. Another issue is how we humans emotionally relate education with self worth in society. Ignorant people don't like to be called ignorant. Educated people telling them they need to be smarter is insulting. So there is a tendency to distrust educated people because the ignorant persons perception is that educated people think they are bad or broken and need to be fixed. If they don't feel bad or broken then there must be something more to this, why are we being manipulated... (conspiracy can then take over) So perhaps we should rethink how to approach the problem and realize that ignorant impressionable people are a given. Instead of trying to fight propaganda with education we should disguise education as easy to digest propaganda. Don't fight fiction with facts because you're always going to lose. Just start your own propaganda machine and hope you can out smart the stupid. Sure it's manipulation but how much longer can educated people stay righteous while the world is being burned down around them by the ignorant?
- jerf 7y ago
  "Instead of trying to fight propaganda with education we should disguise education as easy to digest propaganda." How is this different from what we are already doing? I do not just mean that as mindless snark. There's a selection effect, where children can only handle even more radically simplified versions of reality than even our feeble adult minds can handle, so by necessity, it's already been processed down to that level because nothing else would stick even a little. A common example is "The civil war was caused by slavery", which gets mocked, but it's not like there's any explanation you can fit into a middle-school textbook that isn't just as simplified and loaded with the biases of the simplifier. (Which themselves are the result of the bias-loaded simplifications that they were themselves fed....)
jeroenjanssens 7y ago
I recommend this related talk by Vincent Warmerdam: "How to Constrain Artificial Stupidity" at PyData London 2019: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8MEFI7ZJlA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8MEFI7ZJlA

The world has plenty of organic stupidity, we don't need more.

The article generalizes and remains superficial in what it asserts. "AI that fails" currently will improve in the future and is currently being mitigated in use. Then there's the toothless "dumbed down" section: "Some artificial intelligence machines and programs are deliberately ‘dumbed-down’. This marks an entirely different take on the term artificial stupidity. By putting spelling errors in typed messages, not adhering to strict grammar and so on, AI seems less intelligent. These (fully intentional) errors are coded into the system with the goal of creating AI that appears human." The writer than asserts this is actually a good thing because it provides more human-likeness in customer interaction for instance. Attributing "incapability" to AI because it has the technology has no moral compass is also a platitude. Technology can always be used for bad. Fact remains, the current AI paradigm provides tremendous economic value and is merely an extension of the economic striving for automation. Harping on AI has become a bit of a trend and the author calls for cynicism but ends up with a pretty toothless analysis.

mtrazzi 7y ago

For a literature review of Artificial Stupidity: https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.03644 https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.03644

dr_j_ 7y ago

Artificial intelligence is certainly no match for natural stupidity..

arethuza 7y ago
And real weapons grade stupidity, at least in my experience, tends to be wielded by people who are actually very intelligent in general, but having a bad day or an attack of hubris....

arethuza 7y ago

I suspect something like the "artificial inanity" described in Anathem so that the reputation of authors becomes a vital part of the infrastructure of their network.

Inu 7y ago

One shouldn't underestimate the intelligence of stupidity. It can have its own utility, strength and creativity within certain parameters.

julienreszka 7y ago
What do you mean? I don't understand
- jobigoud 7y ago
  Not the parent but sometimes ignoring the rational choice leads to interesting discoveries or results. For creative endeavors it's also good to not overthink things and let the flow take over.
- pixl97 7y ago
  If you're a caveman it would be stupid to play with fire. You dont have any medical care to treat burns and it's dangerous, but because we did we started cooking, then melting metals. So what is stupid at one point becomes knowledge at another point.
- pvaldes 7y ago
  Stupid people tend to die and gave example, or make bombastic plans that later explode in their face, so we, the rest of stupid people can learn something about the experience. Don't gobble this berries nor those shiny mushroms, don't pet this nice crocodile, don't jump over this small canyon with a too short pole... the list is endless.
beobab 7y ago
Possibly irrelevant to this discussion (you decide): the level of stupidity in any human undertaking is almost always a) higher than you'd think, and b) pretty constant across all cross-sections of humanity. Source Carlo M. Cipolla, Professor of Economics at UC Berkeley: https://advanced.jhu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/The-Basic-Laws-of-Human-Stupidity.pdf https://advanced.jhu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/The-Basi... Despite widespread attempts by humans to eradicate it, it exists everywhere; ignoring race/class/education/gender/orientation/profession or any other sub-division you can think of. You'll find roughly the same amount of stupidity in a gaggle of university professors as you will in a humdrum of railway attendants (I made up those collective terms, in case it wasn't obvious).

qwsxyh 7y ago

I get my dose of natural stupidity on this website every day. I wouldn't need an artificial source.

SirLJ 7y ago
LOL

pjc50 7y ago

There's a lot to be said for this line of argument. The stupidity of the Youtube recommendation engine has wrecked Brazilian politics, for example: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/11/world/americas/youtube-brazil.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/11/world/americas/youtube-br... (The deliberate construction of an AI that pays people to produce lies to damage other people's health and welfare sounds like a farfetched science fiction plot. Accidentally building one, and then trying to deny responsibility for it, is a far more plausible thing for humans to do to ourselves. Just as Schneier talked about the "Exxon Valdez of privacy", what we have now is the tetraethyl lead of video entertainment.)

mrhappyunhappy 7y ago
YouTube recommendations feel like a direct impediment to democracy. When your recommendations consist of the same crap all the time, it may seem as though that stuff carries more weight than it really does. I wonder to what degree YouTube is responsible for the current political climate. The same with Twitter really. When you only follow and see posts from people you choose, how are you supposed to give important issues a fair shake and debate viewpoints that different from yours.
- matz1 7y ago
  Democracy work just fine. It might not what you want but what if the current youtube recommendation system is what I want ? In democracy people like me should still get equal power to decide. There are no right or wrong outcome in democracy.
  - ben_w 7y ago
    No system of decision-making can survive a high level of misinformation. In the case of democracy that means you might be happy and placated, but you won’t have any control no matter how often you vote.
    - matz1 7y ago
      >that means you might be happy and placated Maybe some people do fine with that, even though to some other people perspective they call it illusion. I don't really care if my happiness is perceived as "illusion" by some other people as long as I my self consider it happy. as long as these people still allowed to vote, its fine to me. They may vote for "stupid" decision but democracy should still allow for that.

al_form2000 7y ago

'There is no doubt that AI may one day become much more intelligent than humans' Really?

skilled 7y ago
"no doubt" and "may" are two words that contradict one another. Clearly whoever wrote that has no idea what they are talking about.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- AndunD 7y ago
  Definitely on the other hand. The writer, if anyone, could consider the future of stronger AI without the artificial stupidity. Then he, too, would stumble upon the great joys of folding multiple sources of falsity into a single tablet, a simulacrum. I vouch for that uncertainty. We must agree to disagree to all have a look in the mirror, when we can't discern between AI and that. For any number (> 0, to be perfectly rational) of times, because it is a duty and a necessity. However, I would not be so sure of myself today if it weren't for my wife; she keeps the existential dread out. I don't actually have a wife, but I do have a brain. One makes ends meet. It's that simple. --- The age of artisanal stupidity, beginning the day with a goblet of poison :')
- delinka 7y ago
  I disagree. They've constructed a sentence that will always be true by using the weasel word "may" and the emphatic "no doubt." I have no doubt that one day someone may win big at poker in a casino. Someone may; or they may not - of this I have no doubt.
  - xamuel 7y ago
    Technically the sentence could be falsified if we ever managed to formally prove that AI can never become more intelligent than humans.
  - 7y ago

polytronic 7y ago

Hahaha, I would say we should be more worried about natural stupidity

magwa101 7y ago

Yes we do, it's called humans. This continual bashing of AI is so funny. We never measure the baseline of human activity which is chock full of stupidity, illogic and unreasonableness. Of course, AI is human directed, but it will likely be many times more predictable.

jddj 7y ago

I used Google Translate yesterday to translate a french phrase to english and got something like: "It's better to be alone than to be in bad comapny". I looked around for a Duolingo-style "report bad translation", "rate" or "give feedback" action but couldn't find one anywhere on that screen. Artificial stupidity seems like a natural step on the way to artificial intelligence, but we would likely benefit from building in some training wheels.

rapunkill 7y ago
If you're in a browser the "send feedback" is at the bottom right in italic. If you're using the application it's hamburger button, "help & feedback" then "Feedback" will be located at the top right.

xamuel 7y ago

A lot of what we call AI these days (especially neural network stuff) should really be called "artificial knee-jerk reactions". A neural network trained to detect traffic lights is 'intelligent' only insofar as your leg is 'intelligent' when it involuntarily kicks in response to a tap on the knee. Of course, automating a knee-jerk reaction in response to traffic lights can still be extremely useful (say, for self-driving cars). But there's no contemplation involved, no thinking, no deliberation---no intelligence.

kaolti 7y ago
Agree. I would argue context makes all the difference in real intelligence and we can never define context because it's multi level, slightly different for everyone and constantly changing. On top of all that forcing a certain context across the board can have countless unintended consequences.

einpoklum 7y ago

Ugh, human stupidity is more than enough for me to worry about right now... global warming will flood my city... US-vs-Russia jingoism will get us all killed in a nuclear war... No more please (covers eyes and ears)!

KatarinaGrumy 7y ago

I think we don't need to worry about it no. Sooner or later they will learn. And will be smarter than us

MisterTea 7y ago

I can't blame Youtube, or any social media here at all. The enemy here is ignorance which is the root enabler for spreading this garbage. The only way to fix that is via education. Good luck. A well educated populace that thinks for itself is less profitable because you can't sell them a line of bullshit. And you wonder why education budgets are under attack. Another issue is how we humans emotionally relate education with self worth in society. Ignorant people don't like to be called ignorant. Educated people telling them they need to be smarter is insulting. So there is a tendency to distrust educated people because the ignorant persons perception is that educated people think they are bad or broken and need to be fixed. If they don't feel bad or broken then there must be something more to this, why are we being manipulated... (conspiracy can then take over) So perhaps we should rethink how to approach the problem and realize that ignorant impressionable people are a given. Instead of trying to fight propaganda with education we should disguise education as easy to digest propaganda. Don't fight fiction with facts because you're always going to lose. Just start your own propaganda machine and hope you can out smart the stupid. Sure it's manipulation but how much longer can educated people stay righteous while the world is being burned down around them by the ignorant?

jerf 7y ago
"Instead of trying to fight propaganda with education we should disguise education as easy to digest propaganda." How is this different from what we are already doing? I do not just mean that as mindless snark. There's a selection effect, where children can only handle even more radically simplified versions of reality than even our feeble adult minds can handle, so by necessity, it's already been processed down to that level because nothing else would stick even a little. A common example is "The civil war was caused by slavery", which gets mocked, but it's not like there's any explanation you can fit into a middle-school textbook that isn't just as simplified and loaded with the biases of the simplifier. (Which themselves are the result of the bias-loaded simplifications that they were themselves fed....)

jeroenjanssens 7y ago

I recommend this related talk by Vincent Warmerdam: "How to Constrain Artificial Stupidity" at PyData London 2019: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8MEFI7ZJlA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8MEFI7ZJlA