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The only AI I'm terrified of is AI overhyped by people and then used for something it's way too stupid for. AI existential risk to me is fundamentally a nerd re
by Barrin92 4y ago
The only AI I'm terrified of is AI overhyped by people and then used for something it's way too stupid for. AI existential risk to me is fundamentally a nerd revenge fantasy.
AI fears come out of a modern enlightenment tradition that elevates disembodied minds to some kind of godlike status. It falsely equates reason and intellect with power. In reality that's never really the case, or all the rationalist, 200 IQ people would run the world and stop all the AI risks. In reality all they do is write blog posts for each other, despite the fact that many of them are probably two standard deviations smarter than all the politicians. Closely related is that XKCD crypto meme with the crowbar that everyone knows.
Any virtual AI is going to be physically subject to humans. So unless you voluntarily build the AI a gigantic killer robot, Fallout style, how smart it is won't matter. The idea that being smart isn't all that it's made out to be just never crosses the minds of AI risk people.
- inkblotuniverse 4y agoPart of why those smart people don't rule the world is because high IQ (in humans!) correlates with social problems and mental illness. The assumption is that this is limitation of human brains and that an AI would be less trade-off-y, and you could get one with Aaronson's understanding of quantum computers and the charisma of the greatest politician in recorded history. And when such a nascent AI needs stuff done in the real world, I imagine it could get in on the 'scamming the elderly' game (very lucrative, I hear!) and then pay some humans to do what it wants.