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ㅤ I work in the AI safety field (my team discovered Prompt Injection) and I absolutely advocate the Dune solution. I even have a tattoo on my arm that I got s

ㅤ I work in the AI safety field (my team discovered Prompt Injection) and I absolutely advocate the Dune solution. I even have a tattoo on my arm that I got so that people will ask me about this and I can explain the proposal. The tattoo says "The 1948 Initiative" which has two layers of meaning: (1) It is a proposal for humanity to protect ourselves from being slaughtered by AGI by pre-emptively implementing a total global ban on all integrated circuit fabrication, voluntarily reducing ourselves to a ~1948 level of electronics technology in order to forestall our obliteration. (2) The year 1948 represents the power of human unity for the purpose of saving our species. The west, the Soviets, and China united together to fight and defeat the Nazi's (perpetrators of the Holocaust) and the Empire of the Rising Sun (perpetrators of the Rape of Nanjing). America, the USSR, Western Europe, and China united to stand against the forces of pure evil, and we won. A ban on IC's (integrated circuits) still allows spaceflight (compellingly illustrated in the setting of the Star Wars universe if you pretend that droids are powered through magic or by having souls, not IC's) and this 1948 level of electronics tech also still allows sophisticated medical technology including the level of genetic engineering which will be necessary to unlock human immortality. ㅤ ㅤ

upwardbound 3y ago
(here are some pictures of the tat, in case anyone would like to get similar artwork done) ㅤ https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y7uy5qyyY80t9DeWWLWUfD-aekz1oC7j/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y7uy5qyyY80t9DeWWLWUfD-aekz... https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JoPSfsAzHfMbQhsl8dPGvs12Flnmknu3/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JoPSfsAzHfMbQhsl8dPGvs12Fln... ㅤ
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  Buddy, you’re a cool dude for doing this but you could have told your artist about kerning.
  - upwardbound 3y ago
    Hahaha true... :)
tucnak 3y ago
Disclaimer: OP @upwardbound doesn't hide, and in fact, takes great pride in their involvement with U.S. state-side counterintelligence on (nominally) AI safety. Take what they have say on the subject with a grain of salt. I believe the extent of US intel community's influence on "AI safety" circles warrants a closer look, as it may provide insight into how these groups are structured and why they act the way they do. "You’re definitely correct that [Helen Toner's] CV doesn’t adequately capture her reputation. I’ll put it this way, I meet with a lot of powerful people and I was equally nervous when I met with her as when I met with three officers of the US Air Force. She holds comparable influence to a USAF Colonel." Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38330819 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38330819
- upwardbound 3y ago
  Agreed. I see this less as a matter of jingoism (though I do love the US as the "least bad" nation in a world where no nation is purely blameless) and more as a matter of pragmatism and embracing what power I can in order to help save our species ㅤ I also think the US Constitution + Thirteenth Amendment is quite noble and it's something I genuinely believe in. ㅤ
Simon_ORourke 3y ago
Ha! Good one! Let's just roll back all our healthcare research, logistics, environmental advancements etc. because some boogey man tech might do something bad perhaps at sometime in the future maybe!
- upwardbound 3y ago
  The majority of our healthcare research, logistics, and environmental advancements, and most other aspects of 21st-century living can be switched over to alternative technologies that do not require computers. The main thing we will definitely lose is social media, which many people would be glad to see removed from our lives, as it provides shallow and addictive dopamine hits, much like cigarettes, while diminishing the amount of time left in the day that people get to spend together in person. Moving to non-computer-based technological alternatives takes significant cleverness. The engineers of the analog electronics era were geniuses compared to us today, and we can re-attain that lost level of skill. I welcome the challenge.
  - Simon_ORourke 3y ago
    Who's going to agree to take on all that cost for no good reason? Why incur all that cost, even if it was feasible, for a mere unquantified possibility of something bad happening. Even if there was a firm date and "bad stuff" readily understood, e.g., Skynet going self-aware sometime in mid 2037, then folks will just do the bare minimum to forestall it at minimum cost. Social media is going nowhere, especially if it currently makes money, just because of some idea of it potentially being bad.
  - war321 3y ago
    No one, not the most screen addicted teenager nor the smarmiest snake-oil beauracrat, is gonna stand by ANYONE that suggests we need to remove ALL computers from society. Even the people critical of AI and social media are more than fine with computers and smartphones. How would you even begin to enforce that?
    - upwardbound 3y ago
hsuduebc2 3y ago
Damn that's very good joke or very stupid comment. Damn can't really distinguish between them.

upwardbound 3y ago

(here are some pictures of the tat, in case anyone would like to get similar artwork done) ㅤ https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y7uy5qyyY80t9DeWWLWUfD-aekz1oC7j/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y7uy5qyyY80t9DeWWLWUfD-aekz... https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JoPSfsAzHfMbQhsl8dPGvs12Flnmknu3/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JoPSfsAzHfMbQhsl8dPGvs12Fln... ㅤ

kridsdale1 3y ago
Buddy, you’re a cool dude for doing this but you could have told your artist about kerning.
- upwardbound 3y ago
  Hahaha true... :)

tucnak 3y ago

Disclaimer: OP @upwardbound doesn't hide, and in fact, takes great pride in their involvement with U.S. state-side counterintelligence on (nominally) AI safety. Take what they have say on the subject with a grain of salt. I believe the extent of US intel community's influence on "AI safety" circles warrants a closer look, as it may provide insight into how these groups are structured and why they act the way they do. "You’re definitely correct that [Helen Toner's] CV doesn’t adequately capture her reputation. I’ll put it this way, I meet with a lot of powerful people and I was equally nervous when I met with her as when I met with three officers of the US Air Force. She holds comparable influence to a USAF Colonel." Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38330819 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38330819

upwardbound 3y ago
Agreed. I see this less as a matter of jingoism (though I do love the US as the "least bad" nation in a world where no nation is purely blameless) and more as a matter of pragmatism and embracing what power I can in order to help save our species ㅤ I also think the US Constitution + Thirteenth Amendment is quite noble and it's something I genuinely believe in. ㅤ

Simon_ORourke 3y ago

Ha! Good one! Let's just roll back all our healthcare research, logistics, environmental advancements etc. because some boogey man tech might do something bad perhaps at sometime in the future maybe!

upwardbound 3y ago
The majority of our healthcare research, logistics, and environmental advancements, and most other aspects of 21st-century living can be switched over to alternative technologies that do not require computers. The main thing we will definitely lose is social media, which many people would be glad to see removed from our lives, as it provides shallow and addictive dopamine hits, much like cigarettes, while diminishing the amount of time left in the day that people get to spend together in person. Moving to non-computer-based technological alternatives takes significant cleverness. The engineers of the analog electronics era were geniuses compared to us today, and we can re-attain that lost level of skill. I welcome the challenge.
- Simon_ORourke 3y ago
  Who's going to agree to take on all that cost for no good reason? Why incur all that cost, even if it was feasible, for a mere unquantified possibility of something bad happening. Even if there was a firm date and "bad stuff" readily understood, e.g., Skynet going self-aware sometime in mid 2037, then folks will just do the bare minimum to forestall it at minimum cost. Social media is going nowhere, especially if it currently makes money, just because of some idea of it potentially being bad.
- war321 3y ago
  No one, not the most screen addicted teenager nor the smarmiest snake-oil beauracrat, is gonna stand by ANYONE that suggests we need to remove ALL computers from society. Even the people critical of AI and social media are more than fine with computers and smartphones. How would you even begin to enforce that?
  - upwardbound 3y ago

hsuduebc2 3y ago

Damn that's very good joke or very stupid comment. Damn can't really distinguish between them.