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Do you ever worry that we are building Superhuman Artificial Intelligences with the goal of maximizing the amount of attention paid to advertisements? I'm conce

Do you ever worry that we are building Superhuman Artificial Intelligences with the goal of maximizing the amount of attention paid to advertisements? I'm concerned that they might accidentally either turn the world into paperclips or turn journalists into maximally conflict-driven-story finders.

NateEag 6y ago
The AI can't do that to journalists, because journalists have already done that to themselves.
- paulie_a 6y ago
  While I don't know of I would call it journalism, computer generated articles are becoming increasingly prevelant
- ethbro 6y ago
  There have been good and bad journalists since the beginning of journalism.
  - marcus_holmes 6y ago
    This is not about good/bad journalism. A great journalist will turn in a fantastic story, get it approved and even on the front page, only to have it get few clicks because it can't compete for attention with the sensationalist crap. This is about how humans first discovered that, given an infinite amount of reading material, we choose to read things that give us an emotional reaction. Any emotional reaction.
- afarrell 6y ago
  Who pays journalists? Companies that depend on ad revenue. Individuals have agency. A set of persons responds to incentives.
paulie_a 6y ago
On the flip side we are training humanity to be less susceptible to advertising. Hence the increase in noise as humans naturally and unknowingly filter it out.
- thinkingemote 6y ago
  We really are not training humanity to resist advertising at all. If anything its quite the opposite and at the very least no change from before. We should try individually and we might get some success. We might try at a societal level but I have not see this occuring (apart from things like bans for things like cigarettes or products aimed at children). There's no fundamental human change occuring. Additionally the vast majority of HN users are dependent on advertising. Advertisments are core to the western life. It's deep in our psychology, and requires more than just an ad blocker.
  - neutronicus 6y ago
    Yeah, if anything, we're training people to aspire to be living advertisements, since the reward for success on Instagram is luxury brands subsidizing your lifestyle in-kind and perhaps even in money.
  - paulie_a 6y ago
    Is advertising in the 50s more or less successful than now? I do not know the answer but I am curious. Does the more in your face advertising actually make a difference or is the bar simply raised?
tenuousemphasis 6y ago
I don't know about superhuman AI, but that system already exists and it's called capitalism.
BenoitEssiambre 6y ago
Scott Alexander has a (Halloween) short story sort of about that: https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/

NateEag 6y ago

The AI can't do that to journalists, because journalists have already done that to themselves.

paulie_a 6y ago
While I don't know of I would call it journalism, computer generated articles are becoming increasingly prevelant
ethbro 6y ago
There have been good and bad journalists since the beginning of journalism.
- marcus_holmes 6y ago
  This is not about good/bad journalism. A great journalist will turn in a fantastic story, get it approved and even on the front page, only to have it get few clicks because it can't compete for attention with the sensationalist crap. This is about how humans first discovered that, given an infinite amount of reading material, we choose to read things that give us an emotional reaction. Any emotional reaction.
afarrell 6y ago
Who pays journalists? Companies that depend on ad revenue. Individuals have agency. A set of persons responds to incentives.

paulie_a 6y ago

On the flip side we are training humanity to be less susceptible to advertising. Hence the increase in noise as humans naturally and unknowingly filter it out.

thinkingemote 6y ago
We really are not training humanity to resist advertising at all. If anything its quite the opposite and at the very least no change from before. We should try individually and we might get some success. We might try at a societal level but I have not see this occuring (apart from things like bans for things like cigarettes or products aimed at children). There's no fundamental human change occuring. Additionally the vast majority of HN users are dependent on advertising. Advertisments are core to the western life. It's deep in our psychology, and requires more than just an ad blocker.
- neutronicus 6y ago
  Yeah, if anything, we're training people to aspire to be living advertisements, since the reward for success on Instagram is luxury brands subsidizing your lifestyle in-kind and perhaps even in money.
- paulie_a 6y ago
  Is advertising in the 50s more or less successful than now? I do not know the answer but I am curious. Does the more in your face advertising actually make a difference or is the bar simply raised?

tenuousemphasis 6y ago

I don't know about superhuman AI, but that system already exists and it's called capitalism.

BenoitEssiambre 6y ago

Scott Alexander has a (Halloween) short story sort of about that: https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/