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What I want to know is, what gives OpenAI and other relatively small technological elites permission to gamble with the future of humanity? Shouldn't we all hav

by roca 4y ago

What I want to know is, what gives OpenAI and other relatively small technological elites permission to gamble with the future of humanity? Shouldn't we all have a say in this?

megablast 4y ago
Every time someone drives they gamble with humanity in a much more deadly activity. No one cares.
- roca 4y ago
  Car crashes don't affect the trajectory of human civilization all that much.
  - majou 4y ago
    Except the one that killed Nujabes.
thisoneworks 4y ago
There might be government regulation on AI pretty soon.. it's not crazy to think GPUs and GPU tech would be treated as defense equipment some day
- qball 4y ago
  >it's not crazy to think GPUs and GPU tech would be treated as defense equipment some day They already are. Taiwan failing to take its own defense seriously is completely rational.
qball 4y ago
>What gives a bunch of people way smarter than me permission to gamble with the future of humanity? To ask the question is to answer it.
- roca 4y ago
  That's not the question I asked. FWIW I'm actually part of one of these groups!
chillfox 4y ago
Presumably the same as always. They are rich and we are not.
krainboltgreene 4y ago
> gamble with the future of humanity what in the world are you people talking about, it's a fucking autocomplete program
- a6 4y ago
  >it's a fucking autocomplete program So like a human? I'd say they were pretty influential on the future of humanity.
  - krainboltgreene 4y ago
    Like clock work, I swear to god you're all reading from the same script. I beg of you to take some humanities courses.
haha69 4y ago
I have seen this argument a bunch of times and I am confused by what exactly you mean. Everyone is influencing the future of humanity (and in that sense gambling with it?) What gives company X the right to build feature Y? What gives person A the right to post B (for all you know it can be the starting point of a chain of actions that bring down humanity) Are you suggesting that beyond a threshold all actions someone/something does should be subject to vote/review by everyone? And how do you define/formalise this threshold?
- roca 4y ago
  There's a spectrum here. At one end of the spectrum is a thought experiment: one person has box with a button. Press the button and with probability 3/4 everyone dies, but with probability 1/4 everyone is granted huge benefits --- immortality etc. I say it's immoral for one person to make that decision on their own, without consulting anyone else. People deserve a say over their future; that's one reason we don't like dictatorships. At the other end are people's normal actions that could have far-reaching consequences but almost certainly won't. At this end of the spectrum you're not restricting people's agency to a significant degree. Arguing that because the spectrum exists and it's hard to formalize a cutoff point, we shouldn't try, is a form of the continuum fallacy.
  - haha69 4y ago
    >Arguing that because the spectrum exists and it's hard to formalize a cutoff point, we shouldn't try, is a form of the continuum fallacy. Such an argument wasn't made. It is a legitimate question. Where and when do you draw the line? And who does it? How are we formalising this? You said >Shouldn't we all have a say in this? I am of the opinion that if this instance of this company doing this is being subjected to this level of scrutiny then there are many more which should be too. What gave Elon the right to buy twitter? And I would imagine most actions that a relatively big corp takes fall under the same criteria. And most actions other governments takes also fall under this criteria? These companies have a board and the governments (most?) have some form of voting. And in a free market you can also vote with your actions. You are suggesting you want to have a direct line of voting for this specific instance of the problem? Again, my question is. What exactly are you asking for? Do you want to vote on these? Do you want your government to do something about this?

by roca 4y ago

What I want to know is, what gives OpenAI and other relatively small technological elites permission to gamble with the future of humanity? Shouldn't we all have a say in this?

megablast 4y ago

Every time someone drives they gamble with humanity in a much more deadly activity. No one cares.

roca 4y ago
Car crashes don't affect the trajectory of human civilization all that much.
- majou 4y ago
  Except the one that killed Nujabes.

thisoneworks 4y ago

There might be government regulation on AI pretty soon.. it's not crazy to think GPUs and GPU tech would be treated as defense equipment some day

qball 4y ago
>it's not crazy to think GPUs and GPU tech would be treated as defense equipment some day They already are. Taiwan failing to take its own defense seriously is completely rational.

qball 4y ago

>What gives a bunch of people way smarter than me permission to gamble with the future of humanity? To ask the question is to answer it.

roca 4y ago
That's not the question I asked. FWIW I'm actually part of one of these groups!

chillfox 4y ago

Presumably the same as always. They are rich and we are not.

krainboltgreene 4y ago

> gamble with the future of humanity what in the world are you people talking about, it's a fucking autocomplete program

a6 4y ago
>it's a fucking autocomplete program So like a human? I'd say they were pretty influential on the future of humanity.
- krainboltgreene 4y ago
  Like clock work, I swear to god you're all reading from the same script. I beg of you to take some humanities courses.

haha69 4y ago

I have seen this argument a bunch of times and I am confused by what exactly you mean. Everyone is influencing the future of humanity (and in that sense gambling with it?) What gives company X the right to build feature Y? What gives person A the right to post B (for all you know it can be the starting point of a chain of actions that bring down humanity) Are you suggesting that beyond a threshold all actions someone/something does should be subject to vote/review by everyone? And how do you define/formalise this threshold?

roca 4y ago
There's a spectrum here. At one end of the spectrum is a thought experiment: one person has box with a button. Press the button and with probability 3/4 everyone dies, but with probability 1/4 everyone is granted huge benefits --- immortality etc. I say it's immoral for one person to make that decision on their own, without consulting anyone else. People deserve a say over their future; that's one reason we don't like dictatorships. At the other end are people's normal actions that could have far-reaching consequences but almost certainly won't. At this end of the spectrum you're not restricting people's agency to a significant degree. Arguing that because the spectrum exists and it's hard to formalize a cutoff point, we shouldn't try, is a form of the continuum fallacy.
- haha69 4y ago
  >Arguing that because the spectrum exists and it's hard to formalize a cutoff point, we shouldn't try, is a form of the continuum fallacy. Such an argument wasn't made. It is a legitimate question. Where and when do you draw the line? And who does it? How are we formalising this? You said >Shouldn't we all have a say in this? I am of the opinion that if this instance of this company doing this is being subjected to this level of scrutiny then there are many more which should be too. What gave Elon the right to buy twitter? And I would imagine most actions that a relatively big corp takes fall under the same criteria. And most actions other governments takes also fall under this criteria? These companies have a board and the governments (most?) have some form of voting. And in a free market you can also vote with your actions. You are suggesting you want to have a direct line of voting for this specific instance of the problem? Again, my question is. What exactly are you asking for? Do you want to vote on these? Do you want your government to do something about this?