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The easiest thing we can do to destroy ourselves is to continue on as we are without changing our use of fossil fuels, concrete, farming practices, transportati

The easiest thing we can do to destroy ourselves is to continue on as we are without changing our use of fossil fuels, concrete, farming practices, transportation, etc. The mass extinction combined with a 2+C world will kill enough of us fast enough that most of these imagined problems probably won’t be a threat. Who will care about killer robots when feeding ourselves, getting clean water, and finding clean air will be a constant challenge?

ben_w 3y ago
Easiest? Perhaps. Certainly the default if nothing else were to happen. But between PV, vat-grown meat, the fact other edibles like Quorn and yeast and Spirulina are on old-news vat-grown foods, etc. I'm focussing most of my attention on the killer robots that want to maximise shareholder value by ${insert any of a bajillion examples of how almost any goal expressed in natural language has a literal interpretation that's catastrophically bad}.
- agentultra 3y ago
  The interlocutor here in this scenario isn’t “AI,” it is, as always, unfettered capitalism. I’m all down for regulation and forcing AI companies, as the others, to pay for the externalities the enforce on us. It isn’t a rogue language model that it suddenly going to brute force it’s way to sentience and kill us all; it’s billionaire tech companies with profit motivations. That they can point the finger to a computer and say, “AI did it and you didn’t listen to us when we tried to warn you,” is some fabulously weird post-capitalism.
  - ben_w 3y ago
    > The interlocutor here in this scenario isn’t “AI,” it is, as always, unfettered capitalism. One of them is. AI also enables every conversation to be transcribed and indexed in a way that would make the Stasi envious. This is because evil isn't limited to fat-cats twirling moustaches — such villains are just the easy-to-spot examples in the modern world because the big scary Communists fell on their faces decades ago. > it’s billionaire tech companies with profit motivations Could be. Could also be the next Pol Pot. Did the PRC's Great Leap Forward cause such death on purpose, or by accident? Were Stalin and Sir Robert Peel malicious or incompetent with the Holomodor and the Great Famine of Ireland respectively?

ben_w 3y ago

Easiest? Perhaps. Certainly the default if nothing else were to happen. But between PV, vat-grown meat, the fact other edibles like Quorn and yeast and Spirulina are on old-news vat-grown foods, etc. I'm focussing most of my attention on the killer robots that want to maximise shareholder value by ${insert any of a bajillion examples of how almost any goal expressed in natural language has a literal interpretation that's catastrophically bad}.

agentultra 3y ago
The interlocutor here in this scenario isn’t “AI,” it is, as always, unfettered capitalism. I’m all down for regulation and forcing AI companies, as the others, to pay for the externalities the enforce on us. It isn’t a rogue language model that it suddenly going to brute force it’s way to sentience and kill us all; it’s billionaire tech companies with profit motivations. That they can point the finger to a computer and say, “AI did it and you didn’t listen to us when we tried to warn you,” is some fabulously weird post-capitalism.
- ben_w 3y ago
  > The interlocutor here in this scenario isn’t “AI,” it is, as always, unfettered capitalism. One of them is. AI also enables every conversation to be transcribed and indexed in a way that would make the Stasi envious. This is because evil isn't limited to fat-cats twirling moustaches — such villains are just the easy-to-spot examples in the modern world because the big scary Communists fell on their faces decades ago. > it’s billionaire tech companies with profit motivations Could be. Could also be the next Pol Pot. Did the PRC's Great Leap Forward cause such death on purpose, or by accident? Were Stalin and Sir Robert Peel malicious or incompetent with the Holomodor and the Great Famine of Ireland respectively?