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I suppose you missed the American right over the last ten years turning aggressively towards extremism and anti-democratic values, largely meditated by propagan

I suppose you missed the American right over the last ten years turning aggressively towards extremism and anti-democratic values, largely meditated by propaganda distributed over the Internet?

jakderrida 3y ago
So...You're gonna do what he did?
rpmisms 3y ago
I would recommend reading up on FDR's tenure before casting stones.
- ben_w 3y ago
  There was a whole lot of stuff FDR did, and that he failed to do, that would be today considered reprehensible acts of commission and omission. But as FDR died before almost half of US pensioners today were born, and the US Constitution got an extra amendment to stop presidents serving three terms like he did, that's a weak argument. Also that the omissions were e.g. "didn't push for federal anti lynching laws because he thought southern states would block it" and "only stopped ethnic cleansing of Mexican Americans at federal level not state level", which leaves the commission of being openly racist towards Japanese as an ethnic group… which was a pretty severe issue even though rounding them up into concentration camps was ruled constitutional at the time.
fauigerzigerk 3y ago
But that's not exactly an AI specific problem. If a society is very polarised and even violent on the fringes then this will manifest itself everywhere. The issue is no worse than with search engines. The only way to avoid this is for the AI to be opinionated, which would obviously be very problematic in itself.
- mschuster91 3y ago
  > The only way to avoid this is for the AI to be opinionated, which would obviously be very problematic in itself. An AI should be opinionated, at least towards the core values expressed in Western constitutions, because we all (or our ancestors) democratically decided upon them: the equality of all humans, equality before the law, the rule of law before violence, the need to learn as a species from at least the largest horrors of the past (WW1/2, the Nazi and Soviet dictatorships, other genocides, the Cold War) and why institutions like the UN and EU were created (to prevent said horrors from repeating), and the core international treaties (Declaration of Human Rights, Geneva Conventions (medical, refugees), Hague Declarations (land war rules)), freedom of the press, freedom of religion. Additionally, an AI should be opinionated to other, more traditional sets of values: the Hippocratic Oath (aka, the oath of medical professionals to aid everyone in need), the obligations of sea and air travel to aid in SAR, and parts of common religious texts. In the end, an AI that develops an actual understanding of these values should show appropriate responses to everyone asking it a question - and those who get angry by an AI refusing to express a certain opinion should ask themselves if they are still part of the basic foundations of a democratic society. And, an AI should be able to apply these values to any material it ingests and heavily downrank what goes against these values to protect itself from experiencing what Tay did (the MS chatbot from a few years ago that got turned full-on Nazi after a day or so of 4chan flooding it with the absolute worst content).
  - fauigerzigerk 3y ago
    I share those values, but you're sidestepping all the difficult issues that arise when a society becomes polarised. Opinionated AIs could discuss anything that people are allowed to discuss and have any opinion that a person could have. In the US and many other liberal democracies, that includes demanding changes to the law and changes to the constitution. It includes discussing or even promoting religious beliefs that in some interpretations amount to a form of theocracy that completely contradicts our values. Same for other utopian or historical forms of society that disagree with the current consensus. There are two ways in which polarised societies can clash. One is to disagree on which specific acts violate shared values and how to respond to that. And the other is to disagree on the values themselves. An opinionated AI could take any side in such debates. I agree with you that AIs will probably have to be allowed to be opinionated. I'm just not sure wether we mean the same thing by that. Any regulation will have to take into account that these opinions will not always reflect current mainstream thinking. In the US, it might even be a violation of the First Amendment to restrict them in the way you suggest. Would you allow an AI to have an opinion on the subject of assisted suicide in connection with the hippocratic oath? Would it be allowed to argue against the right to bear arms? Or would it depend on how this opinion is distributed, who funds the AI, why it has that opinion?
jstarfish 3y ago
This is a lie you are projecting. The left are the ones engaging in this practice, because they're internet trolls who have mastered the art of misleading rhetoric. The right is being censored out of existence. Try being a conservative on Reddit or finding Kiwi Farms on Google these days. Or try this: post something critical about Jesus anywhere, then dox yourself. Compare that experience to criticizing anything transgender and doxing yourself. Then tell me more about this aggressive extremism and anti-demicratic sentiment coming from the right.

I suppose you missed the American right over the last ten years turning aggressively towards extremism and anti-democratic values, largely meditated by propaganda distributed over the Internet?

jakderrida 3y ago

So...You're gonna do what he did?

rpmisms 3y ago

I would recommend reading up on FDR's tenure before casting stones.

ben_w 3y ago
There was a whole lot of stuff FDR did, and that he failed to do, that would be today considered reprehensible acts of commission and omission. But as FDR died before almost half of US pensioners today were born, and the US Constitution got an extra amendment to stop presidents serving three terms like he did, that's a weak argument. Also that the omissions were e.g. "didn't push for federal anti lynching laws because he thought southern states would block it" and "only stopped ethnic cleansing of Mexican Americans at federal level not state level", which leaves the commission of being openly racist towards Japanese as an ethnic group… which was a pretty severe issue even though rounding them up into concentration camps was ruled constitutional at the time.

fauigerzigerk 3y ago

But that's not exactly an AI specific problem. If a society is very polarised and even violent on the fringes then this will manifest itself everywhere. The issue is no worse than with search engines. The only way to avoid this is for the AI to be opinionated, which would obviously be very problematic in itself.

mschuster91 3y ago
> The only way to avoid this is for the AI to be opinionated, which would obviously be very problematic in itself. An AI should be opinionated, at least towards the core values expressed in Western constitutions, because we all (or our ancestors) democratically decided upon them: the equality of all humans, equality before the law, the rule of law before violence, the need to learn as a species from at least the largest horrors of the past (WW1/2, the Nazi and Soviet dictatorships, other genocides, the Cold War) and why institutions like the UN and EU were created (to prevent said horrors from repeating), and the core international treaties (Declaration of Human Rights, Geneva Conventions (medical, refugees), Hague Declarations (land war rules)), freedom of the press, freedom of religion. Additionally, an AI should be opinionated to other, more traditional sets of values: the Hippocratic Oath (aka, the oath of medical professionals to aid everyone in need), the obligations of sea and air travel to aid in SAR, and parts of common religious texts. In the end, an AI that develops an actual understanding of these values should show appropriate responses to everyone asking it a question - and those who get angry by an AI refusing to express a certain opinion should ask themselves if they are still part of the basic foundations of a democratic society. And, an AI should be able to apply these values to any material it ingests and heavily downrank what goes against these values to protect itself from experiencing what Tay did (the MS chatbot from a few years ago that got turned full-on Nazi after a day or so of 4chan flooding it with the absolute worst content).
- fauigerzigerk 3y ago
  I share those values, but you're sidestepping all the difficult issues that arise when a society becomes polarised. Opinionated AIs could discuss anything that people are allowed to discuss and have any opinion that a person could have. In the US and many other liberal democracies, that includes demanding changes to the law and changes to the constitution. It includes discussing or even promoting religious beliefs that in some interpretations amount to a form of theocracy that completely contradicts our values. Same for other utopian or historical forms of society that disagree with the current consensus. There are two ways in which polarised societies can clash. One is to disagree on which specific acts violate shared values and how to respond to that. And the other is to disagree on the values themselves. An opinionated AI could take any side in such debates. I agree with you that AIs will probably have to be allowed to be opinionated. I'm just not sure wether we mean the same thing by that. Any regulation will have to take into account that these opinions will not always reflect current mainstream thinking. In the US, it might even be a violation of the First Amendment to restrict them in the way you suggest. Would you allow an AI to have an opinion on the subject of assisted suicide in connection with the hippocratic oath? Would it be allowed to argue against the right to bear arms? Or would it depend on how this opinion is distributed, who funds the AI, why it has that opinion?

jstarfish 3y ago

This is a lie you are projecting. The left are the ones engaging in this practice, because they're internet trolls who have mastered the art of misleading rhetoric. The right is being censored out of existence. Try being a conservative on Reddit or finding Kiwi Farms on Google these days. Or try this: post something critical about Jesus anywhere, then dox yourself. Compare that experience to criticizing anything transgender and doxing yourself. Then tell me more about this aggressive extremism and anti-demicratic sentiment coming from the right.