4 ms·

Local municipalities are so poorly run that I cannot help but wonder if the mundanities of a RLHF-aligned model is at all bad for the state from a pure legislat

Local municipalities are so poorly run that I cannot help but wonder if the mundanities of a RLHF-aligned model is at all bad for the state from a pure legislative perspective. Couple more thoughts: 1. It's not certain that what this world needs is a greater tangle of convoluted laws – ChatGPT inflating legislators' output seems like a net loss. The naive model-UN piece of me thinks that LLMs could help recontextualize political views and help lawmakers cross partisan divides. 2. LLMs are ironic in their utility in that their killer use case is summarization and, yet, they are incapable of critical reduction, ie "which laws should we get rid of?"

esperent 3y ago
> they are incapable of critical reduction, ie "which laws should we get rid of?" Why do you say that? I've had success in cases where I want to simplify an article or table of contents. I've shared it with GPT4 and said something along the lines of "this article/TOC is overly complex and I want to keep the only the most important parts. What would you suggest I remove to make this easier to read" or similar prompts. I've used this quite a lot as I've been writing tutorials recently and I tend to be too wordy/over explain things in my first drafts. The results have been pretty good, especially with detailed TOCs (i.e. a TOC of all the headings and subheadings in a long article).
- laborcontract 3y ago
  You know what, you're right. They're relatively much better at critical reduction than expansion. Maybe the fact that LLMs are so good at summarization means we should attempt deploying them to trim the books.
  - contravariant 3y ago
    It should be obvious that they're better at reduction than expansion. At heart they remain a statistical model of language so when expanding text it cannot add information that wasn't already in there, when reducing is possible to condense or rephrase the relevant parts of the information. One of the application I use the most is phind.com which basically summarises a web search, it reliably saves some time you'd otherwise need to find the right article.
    - codetrotter 3y ago
      > they remain a statistical model of language so when expanding text it cannot add information that wasn't already in there But the training material for the LLM for sure included texts of laws from many different countries. So when you ask it to make a law about something, it has laws about that thing from different countries across the world to draw inspiration from. For example, tell an LLM this: Write a list of ten essential laws for a newly formed country And from there you can prompt it to describe in greater detail down to the level of individual highly specific laws.
      - fl7305 3y ago
        > For example, tell an LLM this: Write a list of ten essential laws for a newly formed country Here's what I got from ChatGPT (paid version). Didn't look too bad at a first glance? But it might be argued that the "ten essential laws" should all be constitutional, from which everything else flows? --- 1. Constitutional Law: Establishes the framework for the government, defining the structure, powers, and limitations of different government branches. 2. Criminal Law: Defines illegal acts, prescribes punishments, and establishes procedures for law enforcement and the judicial system. 3. Civil Rights Law: Protects individual liberties and rights against infringement by others, including the state. 4. Contract Law: Governs agreements between individuals and entities, ensuring enforceability and remedies for breaches. 5. Property Law: Outlines rights, responsibilities, and legal processes related to ownership and usage of property. 6. Labor Law: Regulates the relationships between employers, employees, and trade unions, including work conditions, wages, and labor disputes. 7. Environmental Law: Provides regulations for the protection of the environment, including air and water quality, and land use. 8. Commercial Law: Governs business and commercial transactions, including company formation, bankruptcy, and commercial transactions. 9. Family Law: Addresses family-related matters and domestic relations such as marriage, divorce, child custody, and adoption. 10. International Law: Sets principles for the country's interactions with other nations, including trade agreements, diplomatic relations, and adherence to international treaties. ---
    - 6510 3y ago
      I, for laughs, compared the same laws in different countries a few times. We let our very expensive and time constraint law makers reinvent the wheel from scratch. As the EU shows it takes quite a bit of doing to figure out how to different languages. We could tho, start out with looking at the foreign versions (ranging from expensively empathic to corporate psycho) and uhh you know, maybe they did something right? From what I've seen (which isn't much) there is always one country that did best, sometimes with a huge margin. If you are implementing something that has been done 500 times before yours most likely wont be the best implementation. This idea use to cost quite a bit of money (still worth it) but with an LLM? It could do the expansion without inventing anything. It could even use real world data in stead of the usual lets imagine what would happen.
  - andybak 3y ago
    Great. Let's get them to settle tort reform.

esperent 3y ago

> they are incapable of critical reduction, ie "which laws should we get rid of?" Why do you say that? I've had success in cases where I want to simplify an article or table of contents. I've shared it with GPT4 and said something along the lines of "this article/TOC is overly complex and I want to keep the only the most important parts. What would you suggest I remove to make this easier to read" or similar prompts. I've used this quite a lot as I've been writing tutorials recently and I tend to be too wordy/over explain things in my first drafts. The results have been pretty good, especially with detailed TOCs (i.e. a TOC of all the headings and subheadings in a long article).

laborcontract 3y ago
You know what, you're right. They're relatively much better at critical reduction than expansion. Maybe the fact that LLMs are so good at summarization means we should attempt deploying them to trim the books.
- contravariant 3y ago
  It should be obvious that they're better at reduction than expansion. At heart they remain a statistical model of language so when expanding text it cannot add information that wasn't already in there, when reducing is possible to condense or rephrase the relevant parts of the information. One of the application I use the most is phind.com which basically summarises a web search, it reliably saves some time you'd otherwise need to find the right article.
  - codetrotter 3y ago
    > they remain a statistical model of language so when expanding text it cannot add information that wasn't already in there But the training material for the LLM for sure included texts of laws from many different countries. So when you ask it to make a law about something, it has laws about that thing from different countries across the world to draw inspiration from. For example, tell an LLM this: Write a list of ten essential laws for a newly formed country And from there you can prompt it to describe in greater detail down to the level of individual highly specific laws.
    - fl7305 3y ago
      > For example, tell an LLM this: Write a list of ten essential laws for a newly formed country Here's what I got from ChatGPT (paid version). Didn't look too bad at a first glance? But it might be argued that the "ten essential laws" should all be constitutional, from which everything else flows? --- 1. Constitutional Law: Establishes the framework for the government, defining the structure, powers, and limitations of different government branches. 2. Criminal Law: Defines illegal acts, prescribes punishments, and establishes procedures for law enforcement and the judicial system. 3. Civil Rights Law: Protects individual liberties and rights against infringement by others, including the state. 4. Contract Law: Governs agreements between individuals and entities, ensuring enforceability and remedies for breaches. 5. Property Law: Outlines rights, responsibilities, and legal processes related to ownership and usage of property. 6. Labor Law: Regulates the relationships between employers, employees, and trade unions, including work conditions, wages, and labor disputes. 7. Environmental Law: Provides regulations for the protection of the environment, including air and water quality, and land use. 8. Commercial Law: Governs business and commercial transactions, including company formation, bankruptcy, and commercial transactions. 9. Family Law: Addresses family-related matters and domestic relations such as marriage, divorce, child custody, and adoption. 10. International Law: Sets principles for the country's interactions with other nations, including trade agreements, diplomatic relations, and adherence to international treaties. ---
  - 6510 3y ago
    I, for laughs, compared the same laws in different countries a few times. We let our very expensive and time constraint law makers reinvent the wheel from scratch. As the EU shows it takes quite a bit of doing to figure out how to different languages. We could tho, start out with looking at the foreign versions (ranging from expensively empathic to corporate psycho) and uhh you know, maybe they did something right? From what I've seen (which isn't much) there is always one country that did best, sometimes with a huge margin. If you are implementing something that has been done 500 times before yours most likely wont be the best implementation. This idea use to cost quite a bit of money (still worth it) but with an LLM? It could do the expansion without inventing anything. It could even use real world data in stead of the usual lets imagine what would happen.
- andybak 3y ago
  Great. Let's get them to settle tort reform.