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You have massively confused "AGI as a plot point" with "is what the literary work is about". For example Neuromancer is about trauma and identity. If I'm being

You have massively confused "AGI as a plot point" with "is what the literary work is about". For example Neuromancer is about trauma and identity. If I'm being charitable I could give you Erewhon, but that's only because a major theme is anthropocentrism. A vast majority of the book is a criticism of victorian society. Ellison's analysis of his own work is pretty well known and while not specifically about AGI is definitely about technology misuse, so you win there.

_yb2s 2y ago
This is an absurd level of nitpicking... the phrase "is about" means both of those things in common speech, and everyone can tell which you mean depending on context. Language is defined by regular people through its use and context, scholars only describe it after the fact- to their extreme dismay. You might be technically correct within the jargon of, e.g. an academic literature course, but you aren't correct to insist the words mean that unless you are in that context, with that audience, where it has that meaning. Moreover, I don't think you are correct, even in the literary sense, when saying, for example, what Neuromancer is about. I don't really care what an author says it's about, most artists are channeling something unconscious and often have very little conscious understanding of what their work is actually about. I've read plenty of Gibson books. The guy is an absolute luddite, and writes on a typewriter. He is terrified of how dangerous and dehumanizing technology is, and all of his books are "about" an all-consuming fear of technology and the changes it causes.
- krainboltgreene 2y ago
  I don't really care about your opinions on academic literary analysis, it's OK to be wrong and have your own thoughts on the matter, but prepare to be confused when people don't agree that the Transformer movies are about the dangers of aliens turning into vehicles. For someone who doesn't care what Gibson thinks of his own artistic works you sure do have a strong opinion on Gibson's artistic work.
  - _yb2s 2y ago
    You are mis-representing people that intuitively understand that a phrase can have different meanings depending on context, as fundamentally confused and actually muddling the two concepts. Nobody would say "transformers are about the dangers of aliens turning into vehicles" but people would say it is "about aliens that can turn into vehicles." They might also say something like it's "about the the struggle to live day to day without being sure if everyday things are truly as they seem" - if that's were what it's about- I'm not actually familiar with transformers. As an academic and a human (both!) I think it is important to remember how to keep the jargon from whatever you study distinct in your mind from common usage, so you can still communicate with people that didn't study whatever you studied.
    - krainboltgreene 2y ago
      You're welcome to make assumptions about what I'm doing, but at the end of the day you have to contend with the fact that I read a comment at face value, in the context, and then multiple people tried to back that original comment up. Maybe if you were the original author your opinion on what they were "trying to say" would matter, but it doesn't.
      - _yb2s 2y ago
        Who was the original author?
    - flir 2y ago
      My son's just completed an essay on Marxist themes in Blake. I think this guy's ideas of what literary analysis is and is not are pretty idiosyncratic, to be honest.
flir 2y ago
If not Neuromancer (although I feel differently) then Queen of Angels (Greg Bear). It's the most fascinating take on AI I've ever read - the entanglement with the themes of justice and punishment is thought-provoking. The Turing Option (Harry Harrison, Marvin Minsky). I can't stress strongly enough, do not read this book. It's terrible. But it does exist.
- krainboltgreene 2y ago
  Again I must stress you've confused theme with plot point. I haven't read QOA in a long time, but I'm pretty sure it was about identity and justice.
  - flir 2y ago
    It's about an AI struggling to become conscious! Alarms go off when it uses the word "I"! The whole point of that subplot is why that AI can't achieve consciousness, but the one sent to Alpha Centauri[?] can. It writes essays meditating on its circumstances, the way humans have treated it and its sibling, it writes an essay exploring whether punishment of others is a gateway to self-awareness... You want to tell me the theme of that thread is human identity? It's our responsiblity to our creations. It's what does it mean to be sentient? It's the ethics of using a self-aware AI as a tool. (Amongst many other things).
    - krainboltgreene 2y ago
      It contains an AI struggling to become human (to gain identity), if I remember correctly. Either way, we're way off course from "it was a great fear of scifi that AGI would become a risk" to "a book with AGI as the vessel for metaphor about humanity exists".

_yb2s 2y ago

This is an absurd level of nitpicking... the phrase "is about" means both of those things in common speech, and everyone can tell which you mean depending on context. Language is defined by regular people through its use and context, scholars only describe it after the fact- to their extreme dismay. You might be technically correct within the jargon of, e.g. an academic literature course, but you aren't correct to insist the words mean that unless you are in that context, with that audience, where it has that meaning. Moreover, I don't think you are correct, even in the literary sense, when saying, for example, what Neuromancer is about. I don't really care what an author says it's about, most artists are channeling something unconscious and often have very little conscious understanding of what their work is actually about. I've read plenty of Gibson books. The guy is an absolute luddite, and writes on a typewriter. He is terrified of how dangerous and dehumanizing technology is, and all of his books are "about" an all-consuming fear of technology and the changes it causes.

krainboltgreene 2y ago
I don't really care about your opinions on academic literary analysis, it's OK to be wrong and have your own thoughts on the matter, but prepare to be confused when people don't agree that the Transformer movies are about the dangers of aliens turning into vehicles. For someone who doesn't care what Gibson thinks of his own artistic works you sure do have a strong opinion on Gibson's artistic work.
- _yb2s 2y ago
  You are mis-representing people that intuitively understand that a phrase can have different meanings depending on context, as fundamentally confused and actually muddling the two concepts. Nobody would say "transformers are about the dangers of aliens turning into vehicles" but people would say it is "about aliens that can turn into vehicles." They might also say something like it's "about the the struggle to live day to day without being sure if everyday things are truly as they seem" - if that's were what it's about- I'm not actually familiar with transformers. As an academic and a human (both!) I think it is important to remember how to keep the jargon from whatever you study distinct in your mind from common usage, so you can still communicate with people that didn't study whatever you studied.
  - krainboltgreene 2y ago
    You're welcome to make assumptions about what I'm doing, but at the end of the day you have to contend with the fact that I read a comment at face value, in the context, and then multiple people tried to back that original comment up. Maybe if you were the original author your opinion on what they were "trying to say" would matter, but it doesn't.
    - _yb2s 2y ago
      Who was the original author?
  - flir 2y ago
    My son's just completed an essay on Marxist themes in Blake. I think this guy's ideas of what literary analysis is and is not are pretty idiosyncratic, to be honest.

flir 2y ago

If not Neuromancer (although I feel differently) then Queen of Angels (Greg Bear). It's the most fascinating take on AI I've ever read - the entanglement with the themes of justice and punishment is thought-provoking. The Turing Option (Harry Harrison, Marvin Minsky). I can't stress strongly enough, do not read this book. It's terrible. But it does exist.

krainboltgreene 2y ago
Again I must stress you've confused theme with plot point. I haven't read QOA in a long time, but I'm pretty sure it was about identity and justice.
- flir 2y ago
  It's about an AI struggling to become conscious! Alarms go off when it uses the word "I"! The whole point of that subplot is why that AI can't achieve consciousness, but the one sent to Alpha Centauri[?] can. It writes essays meditating on its circumstances, the way humans have treated it and its sibling, it writes an essay exploring whether punishment of others is a gateway to self-awareness... You want to tell me the theme of that thread is human identity? It's our responsiblity to our creations. It's what does it mean to be sentient? It's the ethics of using a self-aware AI as a tool. (Amongst many other things).
  - krainboltgreene 2y ago
    It contains an AI struggling to become human (to gain identity), if I remember correctly. Either way, we're way off course from "it was a great fear of scifi that AGI would become a risk" to "a book with AGI as the vessel for metaphor about humanity exists".