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> One hope for future LLMs is that we could teach them to intervene when people believe stuff like this Would you mandate that everyone run this LLM on their d

> One hope for future LLMs is that we could teach them to intervene when people believe stuff like this Would you mandate that everyone run this LLM on their devices? That an ISP or OS should force it on people? I think many people wouldn't mind running an AI locally that did the job of "Catch common errors and misconceptions and alert me to them", but you'll run into the usual arguments of "who decides what reality is" we get now with fact checkers and I could see various websites refusing to let people post anything that didn't conform to the AI's approved worldview. Anyone who thinks the world is flat is going use an AI that supports their own views and they'll just say any AI that disagrees must have been ordered to lie by whoever is behind the round earth conspiracy. Flat earthers are a perfect example of how it doesn't matter how much proof you have that something is factual, or how much you educate people, there will still always be someone who insists on believing a clear lie

tialaramex 3y ago
In the particular case of HN I was imagining it happening when you hit "reply" but I can't say I had thought especially long about this. I was just lamenting the cost of replying explaining why these "simple" ideas, brought up every time by presumably smart people who've just assumed everybody else is an idiot, are wrong. Today an LLM isn't suited for this because it hallucinates, so your hypothetical Flat Earther can probably quickly get an LLVM to invent a groundbreaking 1996 Canadian study which proved the entire "planet" is actually within 87.35km of Ottawa, creating plausible sounding details as long as you remain interested. Ideally it should be easier for such a system to be self-correcting because the conspiracies always need layer upon layer of conspiracy until basically everyone is "in on it" so as to keep up the deceit with a Grand Conspiracy. The largest successful secrets were probably WWII projects like Ultra and Manhattan, maybe Operation Neptune. None very large, most exposed within a few years (obviously Neptune much faster, you can't keep an invasion secret). So if a belief requires these vast conspiracies that's just wrong, try again.
- autoexec 3y ago
  By now, I think it's safe to say the flat earth thing is nuts, but I'm careful about assuming that conspiracies will get exposed quickly or that people can't keep secrets. Tuskegee was kept quiet from 1932 to 1972. The guy who eventually leaked it was hired in 1965, learned about it from co-workers, reported it one year later, then again two years after that, and then after four more years finally leaked information to the press. Tons of people knew, others had previously protested it as well. Operation Sea-Spray was hidden for 27 years. It was ~25 before the Pentagon Papers leaked. Even large numbers of people can keep a secret long enough to do a lot of damage. What bothers me more, is that there's not a whole lot of accountability when the truth comes out, and those who were hurt by those secrets don't seem to ever get anything close to justice. I think that as long there isn't enough morality and backbone in my country to hold people meaningfully accountable and help victims when atrocities are exposed, asking for there to always be a whistleblower ready to sacrifice everything might be asking too much. Especially since we seem to be cracking down harder and harder on whistleblowers.
  - tialaramex 3y ago
    A person can keep a secret, people can't. My understanding is that Tuskegee was not really kept quiet for as long as you state. The horrible fact is not enough people cared. If you let slip what was really going on in say 1958 (after the point where if they'd showed up at a free clinic in say New York, they'd get treated, which would not have been possible in 1932), chances are the person you're telling thinks this seems OK. They're "only" black men. It reminds me of the fact that there are postcards of lynchings. People posed, smiling, for a photograph of them witnessing the extra-legal killing of another like them, so as to make postcards. Yes, more whistleblower protection is needed, in my country (the UK) too. But I don't buy the theory that because the protection isn't good enough people just don't come forward. That's too transactional. I think they do come forward anyway and we owe them much more.

tialaramex 3y ago

In the particular case of HN I was imagining it happening when you hit "reply" but I can't say I had thought especially long about this. I was just lamenting the cost of replying explaining why these "simple" ideas, brought up every time by presumably smart people who've just assumed everybody else is an idiot, are wrong. Today an LLM isn't suited for this because it hallucinates, so your hypothetical Flat Earther can probably quickly get an LLVM to invent a groundbreaking 1996 Canadian study which proved the entire "planet" is actually within 87.35km of Ottawa, creating plausible sounding details as long as you remain interested. Ideally it should be easier for such a system to be self-correcting because the conspiracies always need layer upon layer of conspiracy until basically everyone is "in on it" so as to keep up the deceit with a Grand Conspiracy. The largest successful secrets were probably WWII projects like Ultra and Manhattan, maybe Operation Neptune. None very large, most exposed within a few years (obviously Neptune much faster, you can't keep an invasion secret). So if a belief requires these vast conspiracies that's just wrong, try again.

autoexec 3y ago
By now, I think it's safe to say the flat earth thing is nuts, but I'm careful about assuming that conspiracies will get exposed quickly or that people can't keep secrets. Tuskegee was kept quiet from 1932 to 1972. The guy who eventually leaked it was hired in 1965, learned about it from co-workers, reported it one year later, then again two years after that, and then after four more years finally leaked information to the press. Tons of people knew, others had previously protested it as well. Operation Sea-Spray was hidden for 27 years. It was ~25 before the Pentagon Papers leaked. Even large numbers of people can keep a secret long enough to do a lot of damage. What bothers me more, is that there's not a whole lot of accountability when the truth comes out, and those who were hurt by those secrets don't seem to ever get anything close to justice. I think that as long there isn't enough morality and backbone in my country to hold people meaningfully accountable and help victims when atrocities are exposed, asking for there to always be a whistleblower ready to sacrifice everything might be asking too much. Especially since we seem to be cracking down harder and harder on whistleblowers.
- tialaramex 3y ago
  A person can keep a secret, people can't. My understanding is that Tuskegee was not really kept quiet for as long as you state. The horrible fact is not enough people cared. If you let slip what was really going on in say 1958 (after the point where if they'd showed up at a free clinic in say New York, they'd get treated, which would not have been possible in 1932), chances are the person you're telling thinks this seems OK. They're "only" black men. It reminds me of the fact that there are postcards of lynchings. People posed, smiling, for a photograph of them witnessing the extra-legal killing of another like them, so as to make postcards. Yes, more whistleblower protection is needed, in my country (the UK) too. But I don't buy the theory that because the protection isn't good enough people just don't come forward. That's too transactional. I think they do come forward anyway and we owe them much more.