9 ms·

Aicracy – Governed by Algorithms

117 points by hemmert 4y ago

29athrowaway 4y ago
Large populations are needed for productivity and for territorial defense. Once large populations stop being needed for those things, rulers around the world will collude and get rid of most people.
hemmert 4y ago
We tried to create everyday objects from a fictional world in which we somehow chose to be governed by algorithms. The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way.
- phoe-krk 4y ago
  If you're the author(s), this possibly could be Show HN.
  - hemmert 4y ago
    Yes, I am – I'm a professor of Industrial Design, this was my class in which the students designed the objects. Should I rename it to Show HN?
- glass3 4y ago
  >The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way. Like the texts on the homepage, there are two ways to interpret this sentence. I don't want to imply an insult but why haven't you continued until you came up with something new? >Quickly, your brain will learn to stay focused, enabling you to be meaningfully productive without the urge to distract yourself. Why would there be a need for focused work in a world where an ai is available? If the government is just a mindless algorithm, where would be the difference to the current situation with an unaware code of law? We turn people into computers, who need stimuli to be happy, or punishment to stay focus. Once we have ai to do the computing, there is no need to train people into rigid structures. Thus the entire mood of a dystopia shouldn't be there. There will only be one in-group because nobody else is needed. However, the possible implications of that future are far more sinister.
- nonrandomstring 4y ago
  > The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way. That's a natural side effect of the kind of systems you are exploring. They kill creativity and innovation, which is an enemy of cybernetic control. If your students seem stuck at a pedestrian level of imagination the system is working - to protect itself from being anticipated. On the other hand, the fact you're still allowed to do this at least shows it considers you have some value yet to extract.
- zieben 4y ago
  This is usually the case with dystopian fiction; the stories that really resonate are the ones that express our subconscious dread at where our society’s self-appointed “leaders” are taking us. The same is true if conspiracy theories. QAnon is absurd dangerous nonsense, but upper-class human trafficking rings do exist (see: Epstein). The Great Reset is likewise absurd (the people who attend the WEF are dangerous, malevolent, and powerful, but the WEF itself has no real power) but the anxiety about it reflects our awareness of how the upper classes see us.
kitd 4y ago
I have sometimes wondered whether a sufficiently advanced AI could measure a proposed piece of legislation against a constitution/bill of rights/"mission statement", and provide a score to show how likely it is to conform and further the social mission. Step 2 would be to allow the sufficiently advanced AI to propose the legislation.
- psiops 4y ago
  A "sufficiently advanced" AI could do that, by definition.
mfabbri77 4y ago
A true AI-cracy should ignore the citizens' vote (it's not a democracy) and make autonomous decisions trying to maximize their well-being. The dopamine-releasing device would skew the measurement of an individual's well-being, so it shouldn't be used.
maest 4y ago
> This will help you to conveniently find the products that match your taste, your wallet, and your societal value. To increase your societal value, just be yourself and actively contribute as much as you can. Your efforts will not remain unrewarded. This is supposed to be dystopian etc, but don't we already have this mechanism in place in our current world? It's called money.
- hemmert 4y ago
  It was more aimed at personalized pricing in insurances e.g., but money is indeed all that, too.
- noduerme 4y ago
  I think that exaggerates the purpose of the world's economy - which for almost everyone, everywhere, all of the time is about sustaining themselves and their kids, not buying products for social value (what the neighbors just got is a very old idea, but the Instagram version of showing it off is very new, and most people just want to live well without trying to impress people with bling). There's also something contained in this assumption about the purpose of money itself that winkingly implies that what all working class boobs aspire to are fancy watches.
  - thfuran 4y ago
    A lot of people place a lot more value on status than you seem to realize.
    - noduerme 4y ago
      I feel like all my friends say this but none of them really care about status either, they just think other people do. Maybe apart from a handful of psychopaths with outsized social media followings, no one really does. Then again, I live in Portland where a lot of people fight for intellectual status but no one would be caught dead showing any sign of material wealth or privilege... but I also feel like people in the red parts of the metro/state are mostly not concerned with status or much beyond living middle class lives either.
ckastner 4y ago
I expected this to be dystopian but nevertheless was extremely relieved to to see it explicitly labeled as such towards the end. Remember that only 18 months or so ago, during the crypto hype, the legal aspect of this was actively touted as some utopic feature of blockchains.
- freemanon 4y ago
  What's the point if the conclusion has already been made by the authors? Such "discussion" with a presumed bias becomes merely a statement or an echo chamber.
  - clericbob 4y ago
    You know you can disagree with a conclusion, right?
    - freemanon 4y ago
      Neutrality is a prerequisite for discussions. This project is not a discussion.
      - _gfwu 4y ago
        > Neutrality is a prerequisite for discussions I have a hard time understanding how a person who has ever talked to another person in their life could have that viewpoint.
        freemanon 4y ago
        Your hyperbole doesn't mean anything
      - newswasboring 4y ago
        I don't think I have ever had a discussion which started from a neutral point of view. The process of discussion was neutral in the sense that all sides were considered equally, but everyone enters the discussion with something in their mind. Which is fair, right? Everyone has looked and thought about the problem, so of course they have an opinion.
gampleman 4y ago
I get this was a design/art project and not necessarily meant to be sophisticated political philosophy, nonetheless there are a few distinctions here that would be useful: To be ruled by AI I think requires the AI to be in some sense conscious, to have some notion of I and be able to form its own values and goals. Otherwise the ruler is whoever imposes/creates the AI, just in a once removed sort of way. On the other hand to be ruled by algorithms: we already are. That's basically what the "rule of law" means - it's the (actually fairly desirable) right to be ruled and governed by a set of (in principle) knowable algorithms, which creates a fairer society than one ruled directly by human dictat. What's being depicted (and criticised) in the film I think are mostly two things: 1. Some notion of social credit, where desirable actions are being rewarded with some arbitrary tokens and undesirable actions are being punished by these tokens being taken away. In some way this is already the case with capitalism (where desirable actions are work/investment and tokens are money), so I think some notion where what is societally desirable being more broadly evaluated isn't necessarily that terrible. 2. Persistent surveillance. This makes the above notions of social credit a bit more challenging since in some ways it makes participation in the social ranking system less voluntary (although how voluntary is work/making money in our own system is pretty debatable). Also it's creepy and dangerous in a number of other ways. Neither of these things really require AI or algorithms to be bad, but AI tech really helps with the scalability of these solutions and therefore their applicability to real world societies. But it doesn't really seem like you are critiquing things for which AI would actually be bad as such (such as bias in training, value of compassion over justice, etc)
- bbor 4y ago
  Great points, I think they used “AI” to be a bit provocative on purpose. IMO this is really more about taking the concepts of pure utilitarianism to their extreme, as enshrined by systems and technologies that rule our lives. This fits the term “artificial intelligence” very well I think, but in a very different way than how it’s used today (I.e. conscious AGI agents or stats-based ML models)
- hemmert 4y ago
  Thanks for these points!
ly3xqhl8g9 4y ago
Algocracy [1] sounds somewhat better, but as any barbarism, Medieval Latin algorismus, a mangled transliteration of the Arabic al-Khwarizmi + kratos, Ancient Greek word for power, is just as wrong. The issue however is that society does not have a technology problem, it has a metaphysics problem: under, over, and for what should there be a we. Hence why all the futures we imagine through technology can barely go beyond a boring distopia. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_by_algorithm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_by_algorithm
- hemmert 4y ago
  I think we're losing that 'we' in many instances, even if it feels like being 'more connected', it's less 'together' often.
  - prox 4y ago
    Going back to etymology: the word relationship comes from “act of telling or relating in words.” You can’t have a “we” if you don’t directly connect in a meaningful way your experiences.
- nonrandomstring 4y ago
  > The issue however is that society does not have a technology problem, it has a metaphysics problem: Wrote the same thing yesterday in this Techrights piece [1] I think there's a genuine danger in writing "dystopian warnings" like this. Plenty of people are now actually at the stage where they cannot see the joke. Christopher Hitchens wrote on North Korea's Kim Jong-Un (and later Cory Doctorow said something similar), that Orwell's warning had simply been taken as a blueprint. For the same reason psychotherapists refuse to treat psychopaths - it arms them with better ways to be manipulative. The problem with satirical tech-critique is that for a lot of people our "Dystopia" is their "Utopia", and our frightening visions just gives them ideas. [1] https://techrights.org/2023/01/28/unmasking-ai/ https://techrights.org/2023/01/28/unmasking-ai/
  - m-watson 4y ago
fastball 4y ago
Although I like where this satire is coming from, I find the actual execution to feel a little bit too strawmannish.
- barager 4y ago
  If they hadn't explained the project, it would've worked better as satire. Had they steelmanned it, the explanation would've had something to add.
  - hemmert 4y ago
    I actually added that explanation at the very end. I was afraid that people wouldn't get it as satire. ;-)
notahacker 4y ago
I quite fancy a Productivity Chair. When I work, I get a normal chair, but if I want to procrastinate I get all the benefits of a standing desk!
LMYahooTFY 4y ago
Does attempting to offload decision making to an "AI/Algo/ML tool/whatever" not simply suffer from the same problem models/scientific studies/corporations/governments/whatever suffer from already? Externalities?
- loa_in_ 4y ago
  We simplify or straight up forgo adding some laws to the lawbooks because they're about something hard to measure, too mentally taxing to determine, too much paperwork when executing it, all while we want them and they would be beneficial. In short the benefit is offloading the mental work as computers do.
SO_NOT_THE_GUY 4y ago
Thunderhead is here
college_physics 4y ago
It is conceivable that the rushed and breathless attempt to remove the human from the loop (more precisely, to have a small minority of humans exert unprecedented control over others via digital channels) will lead to the exact opposite: deepening our appreciation for humanity, an era of a new, digitally inspired, humanism if you wish. This backlash plays out simultaneously both in the "AI" domain (the algorithmic classification, influencing or reproduction of human behavior) and the "crypto" domain (the algorithmic facilitation and management of "value" and credit accounting between humans) Dystopia or Utopia? Odds are still on the former but its not a done deal yet.
freemanon 4y ago
I've actually discussed the same idea with friends. My western friends find the idea very repulsive, where for me with my mixed east-west background find it worthy of exploration. IMO the west's ideals reflects their history of loosely-confederated tribes, e.g. the Germanic and Frankish tribes. Centralised governments are the exception (the Roman empire, lasting only a few hundred years). Compare this with the east with China being the center of eastern civilisation for more than 2000 years. Education, order and standardisation enabled society to progress beyond wars and civil wars into commerce and creativity.
- michaelscott 4y ago
  Western cultures, as originating from the Greeks, prioritise the individual in society and usually attempt to improve through the conflict and collaboration of such individuals. Eastern cultures, as originating from Confucianism, prioritise the group and attempt to improve through harmony of social structure and contribution to the greater good. I wouldn't say one is better than the other, but they're very alien in comparison to each other and this makes preference extremely subjective. Both approaches have significant drawbacks in addition to all their successes, so it's natural that an Easterner would entertain this satirical idea (seeing the positives) while it'd be abhorrent to a Westerner (seeing only the negatives)
  - freemanon 4y ago
    Sums up my thoughts! Haven't met many people who can appreciate or at least listen to both point of views, unfortunately.
  - ETH_start 4y ago
    The individualized approach is more congruent with reality, as people experience the world as individuals. Collectivism is based on a conceptual error, in personifying society, instead of recognizing it as an abstract notion. The advancement of human civilization was driven by the recognition of individual rights and the emphasis on the individual. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-politically-incorrect-guide-to-ending-poverty/308134/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-pol...
kissgyorgy 4y ago
This would be a perfect episode for Black Mirror. Hopefully won't become real.
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  It already exists: Nosedive, S3E1 [0]. See also: Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow [1] and Community's App Developments and Condiments, S5E8 [2]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive_(Black_Mirror) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive_(Black_Mirror) [1] https://craphound.com/down/download https://craphound.com/down/download [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Development_and_Condiments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Development_and_Condiments
hamasho 4y ago
Previous problems of human bias and corruption thus belong to the past I hope so too. But in many cases, machine learning based systems just amplify human bias, like ML based hiring systems. After all, it's been trained by using biased data. The system is designed according to the human values of transparency, happiness, productivity, fairness, and individuality. Humans can be selfish. Our system can't. Hmm. Big if true...
- LatteLazy 4y ago
  I feel like the elephant in the room with western society is that 90% of the corruption we have comes not from politicians but from the people themselves. People decide whether a policy is a good idea based on how it affects them personally not whether it is a good or a bad for the country or efficient or just. That's how you get a situation where (majority) mortgage owners are subsidised but (minority) renters are punished for example. The same applies to the justice system: people decide how they feel about court cases based on the victim/defendants age/sex/race/attractiveness. So an AI either needs to ape those processes (and be popular but largely pointless as that is what we already have) OR to actually be fair but be too unpopular to ever be accepted by the people it governs.
Hormold 4y ago
Great promotion for the next season of Black Mirror
- hemmert 4y ago
  It was indeed much inspired by Black Mirror. I tried to convince Charlie Brooker to come in via Zoom as the examiner in the student's final presentation, but it didn't work out.
xwdv 4y ago
People don’t get it, I’m an aicist. Always have been. No soul, no service. AI can’t drink at my water fountain!
euroderf 4y ago
So much shopping assistance! Can't wait to visit a sex shop.
twak 4y ago
My old supervisor wrote a book on computational socialism back in 93. I rather like some of the ideas (can a participatory centrally planned economy work now that we have internet/cybernetics?), but suspect it wouldn't work in practice. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towards_a_New_Socialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towards_a_New_Socialism
- elil17 4y ago
  See also The People’s Republic of Walmart
- slashdev 4y ago
  I’ve often wondered about it too. Is it possible with sufficiently good AI and enough data? I think a major shortcoming is you still need the creativity of people inventing new products and services and bringing those to market. Without capitalism, how can you incentivize the entrepreneurs? I’m sure there must be a way, I’m less certain that there’s a better way. With general AI it could be done, but it’s questionable what value we serve in such an environment.
noduerme 4y ago
Arizona: Can I get like 5 extra of those happiness patches in case I lose a few? New York: This bracelet gets really hot when I'm trying to stir fry on my new induction stove.
hemmert 4y ago
(If you can, I'd appreciate an upvote on Product Hunt: https://www.producthunt.com/posts/aicracy-2 https://www.producthunt.com/posts/aicracy-2)
hemmert 4y ago
Here's a timelapse video of the design process behind the project: https://youtu.be/g2jQpN8UeYs https://youtu.be/g2jQpN8UeYs We usually go through these steps in 13 weeks, here they are in ~40 seconds: - Research - Potentials - Concepts - Design - Model (you can see the physical models appearing in the very last second)
sammyteee 4y ago
Really reminds me of Tom Scott's dystopian-future talks
- hemmert 4y ago
  Oh, I wasn't aware of Tom doing anything into this direction (but of course he does, just checked it out)! I sat next to him at a conference dinner once, will ping him about it!
mrleinad 4y ago
The happiness patch sounds like it would undermine everything else. If you want people to be able to make the best of themselves, you need strong people, not weak ones with zero resilience.
- hemmert 4y ago
  When we filmed the movie, we mixed coke with water and pumped it through the happiness patch's hose: today's readily available boost of dopamine (sugar and caffeine) is also the future's. ;)
  - mrleinad 4y ago
    Wait, there's a movie? I didn't see that. What's its name?
    - hemmert 4y ago
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg It's embedded at the bottom of the page ;-)
      - mrleinad 4y ago
        Oh, the short. I thought you meant a full length movie. Thanks!
AriedK 4y ago
Don't want to be too critical of (I assume) the students' efforts, but in my opinion the message behind the project is a bit too explicitly translated into the products. It could use a bit more creativity in how they're trying to convey the message translated into everyday (distopian) future life. For instance compare it to the works at https://www.nearfuturelaboratory.com/ https://www.nearfuturelaboratory.com/ like their IKEA catalog of the future. It works better in my opinion to generate discussion rather than having the distopian part expressed so explicitly.
- hemmert 4y ago
  That catalog is indeed a great one!
tarkin2 4y ago
The next stage is getting rid of the weakest link, the unstable biological elements.
snshn 4y ago
https://youtu.be/93tR96egox4 https://youtu.be/93tR96egox4
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
hemmert 4y ago
(One commentor pointed out that they weren't aware that this is a movie project - the film's embedded at the bottom of the page, but here it is as a YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg )
Agraillo 4y ago
Reading, watching the video, I keep wondering whether the authors just rehashed the ideas from their native country's bestseller - QualityLand by Marc-Uwe Kling

117 points by hemmert 4y ago

Large populations are needed for productivity and for territorial defense. Once large populations stop being needed for those things, rulers around the world will collude and get rid of most people.

hemmert 4y ago

We tried to create everyday objects from a fictional world in which we somehow chose to be governed by algorithms. The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way.

phoe-krk 4y ago
If you're the author(s), this possibly could be Show HN.
- hemmert 4y ago
  Yes, I am – I'm a professor of Industrial Design, this was my class in which the students designed the objects. Should I rename it to Show HN?
glass3 4y ago
>The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way. Like the texts on the homepage, there are two ways to interpret this sentence. I don't want to imply an insult but why haven't you continued until you came up with something new? >Quickly, your brain will learn to stay focused, enabling you to be meaningfully productive without the urge to distract yourself. Why would there be a need for focused work in a world where an ai is available? If the government is just a mindless algorithm, where would be the difference to the current situation with an unaware code of law? We turn people into computers, who need stimuli to be happy, or punishment to stay focus. Once we have ai to do the computing, there is no need to train people into rigid structures. Thus the entire mood of a dystopia shouldn't be there. There will only be one in-group because nobody else is needed. However, the possible implications of that future are far more sinister.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
> The scariest thing about it was that nothing we came up with doesn't already happen in some way. That's a natural side effect of the kind of systems you are exploring. They kill creativity and innovation, which is an enemy of cybernetic control. If your students seem stuck at a pedestrian level of imagination the system is working - to protect itself from being anticipated. On the other hand, the fact you're still allowed to do this at least shows it considers you have some value yet to extract.
zieben 4y ago
This is usually the case with dystopian fiction; the stories that really resonate are the ones that express our subconscious dread at where our society’s self-appointed “leaders” are taking us. The same is true if conspiracy theories. QAnon is absurd dangerous nonsense, but upper-class human trafficking rings do exist (see: Epstein). The Great Reset is likewise absurd (the people who attend the WEF are dangerous, malevolent, and powerful, but the WEF itself has no real power) but the anxiety about it reflects our awareness of how the upper classes see us.

kitd 4y ago

I have sometimes wondered whether a sufficiently advanced AI could measure a proposed piece of legislation against a constitution/bill of rights/"mission statement", and provide a score to show how likely it is to conform and further the social mission. Step 2 would be to allow the sufficiently advanced AI to propose the legislation.

psiops 4y ago
A "sufficiently advanced" AI could do that, by definition.

mfabbri77 4y ago

A true AI-cracy should ignore the citizens' vote (it's not a democracy) and make autonomous decisions trying to maximize their well-being. The dopamine-releasing device would skew the measurement of an individual's well-being, so it shouldn't be used.

maest 4y ago

> This will help you to conveniently find the products that match your taste, your wallet, and your societal value. To increase your societal value, just be yourself and actively contribute as much as you can. Your efforts will not remain unrewarded. This is supposed to be dystopian etc, but don't we already have this mechanism in place in our current world? It's called money.

hemmert 4y ago
It was more aimed at personalized pricing in insurances e.g., but money is indeed all that, too.
noduerme 4y ago
I think that exaggerates the purpose of the world's economy - which for almost everyone, everywhere, all of the time is about sustaining themselves and their kids, not buying products for social value (what the neighbors just got is a very old idea, but the Instagram version of showing it off is very new, and most people just want to live well without trying to impress people with bling). There's also something contained in this assumption about the purpose of money itself that winkingly implies that what all working class boobs aspire to are fancy watches.
- thfuran 4y ago
  A lot of people place a lot more value on status than you seem to realize.
  - noduerme 4y ago
    I feel like all my friends say this but none of them really care about status either, they just think other people do. Maybe apart from a handful of psychopaths with outsized social media followings, no one really does. Then again, I live in Portland where a lot of people fight for intellectual status but no one would be caught dead showing any sign of material wealth or privilege... but I also feel like people in the red parts of the metro/state are mostly not concerned with status or much beyond living middle class lives either.

ckastner 4y ago

I expected this to be dystopian but nevertheless was extremely relieved to to see it explicitly labeled as such towards the end. Remember that only 18 months or so ago, during the crypto hype, the legal aspect of this was actively touted as some utopic feature of blockchains.

freemanon 4y ago
What's the point if the conclusion has already been made by the authors? Such "discussion" with a presumed bias becomes merely a statement or an echo chamber.
- clericbob 4y ago
  You know you can disagree with a conclusion, right?
  - freemanon 4y ago
    Neutrality is a prerequisite for discussions. This project is not a discussion.
    - _gfwu 4y ago
      > Neutrality is a prerequisite for discussions I have a hard time understanding how a person who has ever talked to another person in their life could have that viewpoint.
      - freemanon 4y ago
        Your hyperbole doesn't mean anything
    - newswasboring 4y ago
      I don't think I have ever had a discussion which started from a neutral point of view. The process of discussion was neutral in the sense that all sides were considered equally, but everyone enters the discussion with something in their mind. Which is fair, right? Everyone has looked and thought about the problem, so of course they have an opinion.

gampleman 4y ago

I get this was a design/art project and not necessarily meant to be sophisticated political philosophy, nonetheless there are a few distinctions here that would be useful: To be ruled by AI I think requires the AI to be in some sense conscious, to have some notion of I and be able to form its own values and goals. Otherwise the ruler is whoever imposes/creates the AI, just in a once removed sort of way. On the other hand to be ruled by algorithms: we already are. That's basically what the "rule of law" means - it's the (actually fairly desirable) right to be ruled and governed by a set of (in principle) knowable algorithms, which creates a fairer society than one ruled directly by human dictat. What's being depicted (and criticised) in the film I think are mostly two things: 1. Some notion of social credit, where desirable actions are being rewarded with some arbitrary tokens and undesirable actions are being punished by these tokens being taken away. In some way this is already the case with capitalism (where desirable actions are work/investment and tokens are money), so I think some notion where what is societally desirable being more broadly evaluated isn't necessarily that terrible. 2. Persistent surveillance. This makes the above notions of social credit a bit more challenging since in some ways it makes participation in the social ranking system less voluntary (although how voluntary is work/making money in our own system is pretty debatable). Also it's creepy and dangerous in a number of other ways. Neither of these things really require AI or algorithms to be bad, but AI tech really helps with the scalability of these solutions and therefore their applicability to real world societies. But it doesn't really seem like you are critiquing things for which AI would actually be bad as such (such as bias in training, value of compassion over justice, etc)

bbor 4y ago
Great points, I think they used “AI” to be a bit provocative on purpose. IMO this is really more about taking the concepts of pure utilitarianism to their extreme, as enshrined by systems and technologies that rule our lives. This fits the term “artificial intelligence” very well I think, but in a very different way than how it’s used today (I.e. conscious AGI agents or stats-based ML models)
hemmert 4y ago
Thanks for these points!

ly3xqhl8g9 4y ago

Algocracy [1] sounds somewhat better, but as any barbarism, Medieval Latin algorismus, a mangled transliteration of the Arabic al-Khwarizmi + kratos, Ancient Greek word for power, is just as wrong. The issue however is that society does not have a technology problem, it has a metaphysics problem: under, over, and for what should there be a we. Hence why all the futures we imagine through technology can barely go beyond a boring distopia. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_by_algorithm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_by_algorithm

hemmert 4y ago
I think we're losing that 'we' in many instances, even if it feels like being 'more connected', it's less 'together' often.
- prox 4y ago
  Going back to etymology: the word relationship comes from “act of telling or relating in words.” You can’t have a “we” if you don’t directly connect in a meaningful way your experiences.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
> The issue however is that society does not have a technology problem, it has a metaphysics problem: Wrote the same thing yesterday in this Techrights piece [1] I think there's a genuine danger in writing "dystopian warnings" like this. Plenty of people are now actually at the stage where they cannot see the joke. Christopher Hitchens wrote on North Korea's Kim Jong-Un (and later Cory Doctorow said something similar), that Orwell's warning had simply been taken as a blueprint. For the same reason psychotherapists refuse to treat psychopaths - it arms them with better ways to be manipulative. The problem with satirical tech-critique is that for a lot of people our "Dystopia" is their "Utopia", and our frightening visions just gives them ideas. [1] https://techrights.org/2023/01/28/unmasking-ai/ https://techrights.org/2023/01/28/unmasking-ai/
- m-watson 4y ago

fastball 4y ago

Although I like where this satire is coming from, I find the actual execution to feel a little bit too strawmannish.

barager 4y ago
If they hadn't explained the project, it would've worked better as satire. Had they steelmanned it, the explanation would've had something to add.
- hemmert 4y ago
  I actually added that explanation at the very end. I was afraid that people wouldn't get it as satire. ;-)

notahacker 4y ago

I quite fancy a Productivity Chair. When I work, I get a normal chair, but if I want to procrastinate I get all the benefits of a standing desk!

LMYahooTFY 4y ago

Does attempting to offload decision making to an "AI/Algo/ML tool/whatever" not simply suffer from the same problem models/scientific studies/corporations/governments/whatever suffer from already? Externalities?

loa_in_ 4y ago
We simplify or straight up forgo adding some laws to the lawbooks because they're about something hard to measure, too mentally taxing to determine, too much paperwork when executing it, all while we want them and they would be beneficial. In short the benefit is offloading the mental work as computers do.

SO_NOT_THE_GUY 4y ago

Thunderhead is here

college_physics 4y ago

It is conceivable that the rushed and breathless attempt to remove the human from the loop (more precisely, to have a small minority of humans exert unprecedented control over others via digital channels) will lead to the exact opposite: deepening our appreciation for humanity, an era of a new, digitally inspired, humanism if you wish. This backlash plays out simultaneously both in the "AI" domain (the algorithmic classification, influencing or reproduction of human behavior) and the "crypto" domain (the algorithmic facilitation and management of "value" and credit accounting between humans) Dystopia or Utopia? Odds are still on the former but its not a done deal yet.

freemanon 4y ago

I've actually discussed the same idea with friends. My western friends find the idea very repulsive, where for me with my mixed east-west background find it worthy of exploration. IMO the west's ideals reflects their history of loosely-confederated tribes, e.g. the Germanic and Frankish tribes. Centralised governments are the exception (the Roman empire, lasting only a few hundred years). Compare this with the east with China being the center of eastern civilisation for more than 2000 years. Education, order and standardisation enabled society to progress beyond wars and civil wars into commerce and creativity.

michaelscott 4y ago
Western cultures, as originating from the Greeks, prioritise the individual in society and usually attempt to improve through the conflict and collaboration of such individuals. Eastern cultures, as originating from Confucianism, prioritise the group and attempt to improve through harmony of social structure and contribution to the greater good. I wouldn't say one is better than the other, but they're very alien in comparison to each other and this makes preference extremely subjective. Both approaches have significant drawbacks in addition to all their successes, so it's natural that an Easterner would entertain this satirical idea (seeing the positives) while it'd be abhorrent to a Westerner (seeing only the negatives)
- freemanon 4y ago
  Sums up my thoughts! Haven't met many people who can appreciate or at least listen to both point of views, unfortunately.
- ETH_start 4y ago
  The individualized approach is more congruent with reality, as people experience the world as individuals. Collectivism is based on a conceptual error, in personifying society, instead of recognizing it as an abstract notion. The advancement of human civilization was driven by the recognition of individual rights and the emphasis on the individual. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-politically-incorrect-guide-to-ending-poverty/308134/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-pol...

kissgyorgy 4y ago

This would be a perfect episode for Black Mirror. Hopefully won't become real.

robertlagrant 4y ago
It already exists: Nosedive, S3E1 [0]. See also: Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow [1] and Community's App Developments and Condiments, S5E8 [2]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive_(Black_Mirror) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive_(Black_Mirror) [1] https://craphound.com/down/download https://craphound.com/down/download [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Development_and_Condiments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Development_and_Condiments

hamasho 4y ago

Previous problems of human bias and corruption thus belong to the past I hope so too. But in many cases, machine learning based systems just amplify human bias, like ML based hiring systems. After all, it's been trained by using biased data. The system is designed according to the human values of transparency, happiness, productivity, fairness, and individuality. Humans can be selfish. Our system can't. Hmm. Big if true...

LatteLazy 4y ago
I feel like the elephant in the room with western society is that 90% of the corruption we have comes not from politicians but from the people themselves. People decide whether a policy is a good idea based on how it affects them personally not whether it is a good or a bad for the country or efficient or just. That's how you get a situation where (majority) mortgage owners are subsidised but (minority) renters are punished for example. The same applies to the justice system: people decide how they feel about court cases based on the victim/defendants age/sex/race/attractiveness. So an AI either needs to ape those processes (and be popular but largely pointless as that is what we already have) OR to actually be fair but be too unpopular to ever be accepted by the people it governs.

Hormold 4y ago

Great promotion for the next season of Black Mirror

hemmert 4y ago
It was indeed much inspired by Black Mirror. I tried to convince Charlie Brooker to come in via Zoom as the examiner in the student's final presentation, but it didn't work out.

xwdv 4y ago

People don’t get it, I’m an aicist. Always have been. No soul, no service. AI can’t drink at my water fountain!

euroderf 4y ago

So much shopping assistance! Can't wait to visit a sex shop.

twak 4y ago

My old supervisor wrote a book on computational socialism back in 93. I rather like some of the ideas (can a participatory centrally planned economy work now that we have internet/cybernetics?), but suspect it wouldn't work in practice. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towards_a_New_Socialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towards_a_New_Socialism

elil17 4y ago
See also The People’s Republic of Walmart
slashdev 4y ago
I’ve often wondered about it too. Is it possible with sufficiently good AI and enough data? I think a major shortcoming is you still need the creativity of people inventing new products and services and bringing those to market. Without capitalism, how can you incentivize the entrepreneurs? I’m sure there must be a way, I’m less certain that there’s a better way. With general AI it could be done, but it’s questionable what value we serve in such an environment.

noduerme 4y ago

Arizona: Can I get like 5 extra of those happiness patches in case I lose a few? New York: This bracelet gets really hot when I'm trying to stir fry on my new induction stove.

hemmert 4y ago

(If you can, I'd appreciate an upvote on Product Hunt: https://www.producthunt.com/posts/aicracy-2 https://www.producthunt.com/posts/aicracy-2)

hemmert 4y ago

Here's a timelapse video of the design process behind the project: https://youtu.be/g2jQpN8UeYs https://youtu.be/g2jQpN8UeYs We usually go through these steps in 13 weeks, here they are in ~40 seconds: - Research - Potentials - Concepts - Design - Model (you can see the physical models appearing in the very last second)

sammyteee 4y ago

Really reminds me of Tom Scott's dystopian-future talks

hemmert 4y ago
Oh, I wasn't aware of Tom doing anything into this direction (but of course he does, just checked it out)! I sat next to him at a conference dinner once, will ping him about it!

mrleinad 4y ago

The happiness patch sounds like it would undermine everything else. If you want people to be able to make the best of themselves, you need strong people, not weak ones with zero resilience.

hemmert 4y ago
When we filmed the movie, we mixed coke with water and pumped it through the happiness patch's hose: today's readily available boost of dopamine (sugar and caffeine) is also the future's. ;)
- mrleinad 4y ago
  Wait, there's a movie? I didn't see that. What's its name?
  - hemmert 4y ago
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg It's embedded at the bottom of the page ;-)
    - mrleinad 4y ago
      Oh, the short. I thought you meant a full length movie. Thanks!

AriedK 4y ago

Don't want to be too critical of (I assume) the students' efforts, but in my opinion the message behind the project is a bit too explicitly translated into the products. It could use a bit more creativity in how they're trying to convey the message translated into everyday (distopian) future life. For instance compare it to the works at https://www.nearfuturelaboratory.com/ https://www.nearfuturelaboratory.com/ like their IKEA catalog of the future. It works better in my opinion to generate discussion rather than having the distopian part expressed so explicitly.

hemmert 4y ago
That catalog is indeed a great one!

tarkin2 4y ago

The next stage is getting rid of the weakest link, the unstable biological elements.

snshn 4y ago

https://youtu.be/93tR96egox4 https://youtu.be/93tR96egox4

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

hemmert 4y ago

(One commentor pointed out that they weren't aware that this is a movie project - the film's embedded at the bottom of the page, but here it is as a YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fnsW5MBfDg )

Agraillo 4y ago

Reading, watching the video, I keep wondering whether the authors just rehashed the ideas from their native country's bestseller - QualityLand by Marc-Uwe Kling