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When someone is aware of the damage they cause, and then they still continue, what would you call that behavior? Because the word "studiously" implies that they

When someone is aware of the damage they cause, and then they still continue, what would you call that behavior? Because the word "studiously" implies that they are aware of what they are doing. You yourself said that tech workers, or "tech bros" as you so nicely put it, are perceived and portrayed as uncaringly and knowingly destroying peoples life. If you think that that is a fair assessment of most tech workers motivations, then you are constructing a caricature. Tech workers - like most people - are unaware of the extent of suffering that they don't directly perceive. You and I know that there are people suffering in third-world countries - but knowing is not understanding or awareness, and if we had to spend some time in the company of these people, our perspective would shift enormously and we would feel a much stronger urge to actually remedy these injustices. Tech workers know that they are displacing workers, but again, knowing is not understanding. Hurling insults and making sly accusations is not going to convince anyone that they may lack perspective on this issue. I mean, take a look around this thread, take a look around other discussions - I don't see many people trying to convey their experience without painting the tech crowd as money hungry assholes. Not to forget that AI isn't evil either. You can make many moral arguments for developing AI systems as fast as possible. The most emotionally effective point would be medical research - after all, who are we to place our own lives above the ones that may be saved with the help of future AI developments? And another note: many tech workers argue that it is irrelevant whether or not they personally continue to develop AI, because someone most definitely will. Also, there is no adversary. I would love for the AI skeptic crowd to make compelling and convincing arguments. We need people that warn about the problems introduced by AI and people that campaign for policies that address them, but we need them to do it in a way that would actually be able to change someone's mind. The reality is that we're not having the right discussions in a productive way; instead we pontificate endlessly on irrelevant but emotionally satisfying details. > Sir, this is not a textbook, this is the comments section on a popular Internet website. If you want 'way more justification', you will have to wait for my thesis. Do you really think there is no midpoint between making a massive, fundamental assertion about the stability of every human society without any further elaboration or studies and writing a textbook or thesis?

1attice 4y ago
> When someone is aware of the damage they cause, and then they still continue, what would you call that behavior? Pretty standard human behaviour, I'd say. Reference points include Exxon, Shell, et al, at any time in the past forty years. The crucial part is that it's possible to be aware at one level and deny the problem thoroughly at another. Please do not tell me I have to prove the existence of the possibility of the psychology of denial? :) > Because the word "studiously" implies that they are aware of what they are doing. That is exactly what they are doing. They are constructing themselves as unaware. As Upton Sinclair put it, it's hard to get a man to understand something when his paycheque depends on not understanding it. > You yourself said that tech workers, or "tech bros" as you so nicely put it, are perceived and portrayed as uncaringly and knowingly destroying peoples life. I didn't say uncaringly, but yes, for certain values of 'unknowingly', this is the case. Contrived innocence is the order of the day. One example (there are many): Tech bros in major west coast cities with large homeless populations routinely pass within centimetres of people whose suffering they -- through capitalist competition -- underwrite, whether they want to or not. We have priced whole communities out of their historic neighbourhoods. Evictions are commonplace, and despite the fact that we know they help manufacture unnecessary poverty, they are allowed to persist, in part because we -- the housed professionals -- are the quiet beneficiaries. (See recent HN-trended https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/20/matthew-desmond-poverty-by-america-book-review https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/20/matthew-desmon...) The main psychological tools I see deployed to deal with the so-called "unfortunate" (take a moment to unpack that word) are: aversion, bad faith (in the Sartrean sense,) angry denial (anger is such good anesthetic) and libertarian dogma that falsely localizes the problem either in inevitable facts-of-life or personal failure. We are now extending that 'read' to include those who are about to be professionally (and perhaps literally) displaced by the GPT revolution. > If you think that that is a fair assessment of most tech workers motivations, then you are constructing a caricature. See, again, you managed to construct a caricature of the position of the person telling you that you'd constructed a caricature. This is impressive. Would suggest introspection.
- Last5Digits 4y ago
  I'll be honest here, I debated whether or not to reply to this comment. This is now the second time where you completely (and I think deliberately) ignored the main points of my argument and instead replied with a nicely formulated version of "LOL!! SELF-OWN XD" together with a sermon that fails to address anything I said. You understand that by "you" I was referring to people who have that perspective right, as highlighted by the fact that I wrote "are perceived and portrayed" before, not "are perceived and portrayed by you"? Should I now tell you that you too managed to construct a caricature of the position telling you that you constructed a caricature? Is that where this series of le epic owns leads? I'll make sure not to include any argument as to why I think it's a caricature either. Maybe I should add some snarky remark as well, now that'd be a good use of both of our time, right?

1attice 4y ago

> When someone is aware of the damage they cause, and then they still continue, what would you call that behavior? Pretty standard human behaviour, I'd say. Reference points include Exxon, Shell, et al, at any time in the past forty years. The crucial part is that it's possible to be aware at one level and deny the problem thoroughly at another. Please do not tell me I have to prove the existence of the possibility of the psychology of denial? :) > Because the word "studiously" implies that they are aware of what they are doing. That is exactly what they are doing. They are constructing themselves as unaware. As Upton Sinclair put it, it's hard to get a man to understand something when his paycheque depends on not understanding it. > You yourself said that tech workers, or "tech bros" as you so nicely put it, are perceived and portrayed as uncaringly and knowingly destroying peoples life. I didn't say uncaringly, but yes, for certain values of 'unknowingly', this is the case. Contrived innocence is the order of the day. One example (there are many): Tech bros in major west coast cities with large homeless populations routinely pass within centimetres of people whose suffering they -- through capitalist competition -- underwrite, whether they want to or not. We have priced whole communities out of their historic neighbourhoods. Evictions are commonplace, and despite the fact that we know they help manufacture unnecessary poverty, they are allowed to persist, in part because we -- the housed professionals -- are the quiet beneficiaries. (See recent HN-trended https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/20/matthew-desmond-poverty-by-america-book-review https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/20/matthew-desmon...) The main psychological tools I see deployed to deal with the so-called "unfortunate" (take a moment to unpack that word) are: aversion, bad faith (in the Sartrean sense,) angry denial (anger is such good anesthetic) and libertarian dogma that falsely localizes the problem either in inevitable facts-of-life or personal failure. We are now extending that 'read' to include those who are about to be professionally (and perhaps literally) displaced by the GPT revolution. > If you think that that is a fair assessment of most tech workers motivations, then you are constructing a caricature. See, again, you managed to construct a caricature of the position of the person telling you that you'd constructed a caricature. This is impressive. Would suggest introspection.

Last5Digits 4y ago
I'll be honest here, I debated whether or not to reply to this comment. This is now the second time where you completely (and I think deliberately) ignored the main points of my argument and instead replied with a nicely formulated version of "LOL!! SELF-OWN XD" together with a sermon that fails to address anything I said. You understand that by "you" I was referring to people who have that perspective right, as highlighted by the fact that I wrote "are perceived and portrayed" before, not "are perceived and portrayed by you"? Should I now tell you that you too managed to construct a caricature of the position telling you that you constructed a caricature? Is that where this series of le epic owns leads? I'll make sure not to include any argument as to why I think it's a caricature either. Maybe I should add some snarky remark as well, now that'd be a good use of both of our time, right?