4 ms·

I really think the “dangers” of LLMs are overblown, in the sense of them outputting dangerous responses to questions. Its no different than googling the same.

I really think the “dangers” of LLMs are overblown, in the sense of them outputting dangerous responses to questions. Its no different than googling the same. Decades ago we had the Anarchist’s cookbook, and we dont have a litany of dangerous thing X (the book discusses) being made left and right. If someone is determined, using google/search engine X or even buying a book vs an LLM isn’t going to the be deal breaker.

Enginerrrd 2y ago
Exactly this. It has NEVER been difficult to kill a large number of people. Or critically damage important infrastructure. A quick Google would give you many executable ideas. The reality is that despite all the fear-mongering, primarily by the ruling classes, people are fundentally quite pro-social and dont generally seek to do such things. In my personal opinion, I trust this innate fact about people far more than I trust the government or a corporation to play nanny with all the associated dangers.
- bumby 2y ago
  >It has NEVER been difficult to kill a large number of people. Would you agree that technological progress tends to make it easier (and often to a large degree)
  - throwup238 2y ago
    The AI isn’t the technology making it easier, though - industrial production and market economics are. Sigma Aldrich is a much bigger danger to civilization than ChatGPT is (or possibly will ever be).
    - bumby 2y ago
      I think that’s only true if you think easy access to the correct information isn’t a hurdle. That same argument would claim the internet didn’t make it easier either because we already had libraries.
      - throwup238 2y ago
        It really isn’t. For an undergraduate biologist, designing a mass casualty event is almost trivial. This has been the case for many decades. Hell, someone even moderately versed in something as stupid as homeopathic medicine could do it. Simplest example: homeopaths use DMSO because it absorbs through the skin so anything lethal (like arsenic compounds) that can be dissolved in a nonpolar solvent like DMSO can be used to kill people at tiny dosages using just skin contact. With low LD50s there are many compounds that could be sprayed by GA planes over urban areas that kill most people that come in contact with them. There is an almost universal truth here: anyone capable of acquiring the resources for an attack is just as capable of acquiring the knowledge to do so with existing (pre-AI) sources.
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  - Enginerrrd 2y ago
    Actually... no. I would not really agree. Obviously there are some exceptions. But not as appreciable as you'd think. Like, someone could have loaded a cannon with grapeshot and blasted a crowd of people in the 1700's. (Or loaded up a wagon with several barrels of black powder and grape shot.) Or chained the door shut to the local church and set fire to the building by tipping over an oil lamp. Or set fire to a few fields of crops or grain stores after harvest before winter and essentially starved a whole town. I don't think it's all that appreciably easier to kill a similar number of people today. If anything, similar attacks today might actually be quite a bit HARDER to execute due to technology, and society is both more fragile as a whole but more resilient at small scales than it was. Population density might make a bigger difference than anything as targets with a large number of people are perhaps more available.
    - bumby 2y ago
      For your stance to be correct, it implies we reached peak technological lethality hundreds of years ago. That ignores advancements in nuclear technology, drone technology, biological technology, ballistic technology etc. People could absolutely kill in prior eras. One of the biggest mass school killings was from the 1800s. That does not mean it isn’t easier in a modern era with more options and more lethal options. To the original point, the biggest mitigation is that people tend to be pro-social, not that technology is inherently benign.
      - Enginerrrd 2y ago
        Ok, I see what you mean now. Yes, I would agree that militarily it is easier with technological development. I just think for lone actors, there hasn't been a huge change.
- BobbyTables2 2y ago
  Seeing how many antisocial people are in power makes me wonder if their concerns are merely projection…
  - throwup238 2y ago
    It’s a projection of their electorate’s fear more than the politicians’ own.
Quarrelsome 2y ago
> I really think the “dangers” of LLMs are overblown, in the sense of them outputting dangerous responses to questions. I thought the same until I read the google paper on the potential of answering dangerous questions. For example; consider an idiot seeking to do a lot of harm. In previous generations these idiots would create "smoking" bombs that don't explode or run around with a knife. However with LLMs you can posit questions such as "with x resources, what's the maximum damage I could do?" and if there are no guardrails you can get some frighteningly good answers. This allows crazy to become crazy and effective, which is scary.
- southernplaces7 2y ago
  Really? There are these things called books, that people could use for all kinds of good or bad purposes, and these other things called search engines, which often let people easily find the content of said books (and other sources of information) which let you answer supposedly "dangerous" questions like your example with pretty minor effort. Should we all really be subject to some bland culture of corporate-controlled inoffensiveness and arbitrary "danger" taboos because of hypothetical, usually invented fears about so-called harmful information. This is fear-mongering of the most idiotic kind, now normalized by blatantly childish (if you're an ignorant politician or media source) or self-serving (if you're one of the major corporate players) claims about AI safety.
- theoreticalmal 2y ago
  Lack of knowledge or lack of access to knowledge typically isn’t the limiting factor to bad people wanting to do bad things.

Enginerrrd 2y ago

Exactly this. It has NEVER been difficult to kill a large number of people. Or critically damage important infrastructure. A quick Google would give you many executable ideas. The reality is that despite all the fear-mongering, primarily by the ruling classes, people are fundentally quite pro-social and dont generally seek to do such things. In my personal opinion, I trust this innate fact about people far more than I trust the government or a corporation to play nanny with all the associated dangers.

bumby 2y ago
>It has NEVER been difficult to kill a large number of people. Would you agree that technological progress tends to make it easier (and often to a large degree)
- throwup238 2y ago
  The AI isn’t the technology making it easier, though - industrial production and market economics are. Sigma Aldrich is a much bigger danger to civilization than ChatGPT is (or possibly will ever be).
  - bumby 2y ago
    I think that’s only true if you think easy access to the correct information isn’t a hurdle. That same argument would claim the internet didn’t make it easier either because we already had libraries.
    - throwup238 2y ago
      It really isn’t. For an undergraduate biologist, designing a mass casualty event is almost trivial. This has been the case for many decades. Hell, someone even moderately versed in something as stupid as homeopathic medicine could do it. Simplest example: homeopaths use DMSO because it absorbs through the skin so anything lethal (like arsenic compounds) that can be dissolved in a nonpolar solvent like DMSO can be used to kill people at tiny dosages using just skin contact. With low LD50s there are many compounds that could be sprayed by GA planes over urban areas that kill most people that come in contact with them. There is an almost universal truth here: anyone capable of acquiring the resources for an attack is just as capable of acquiring the knowledge to do so with existing (pre-AI) sources.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- Enginerrrd 2y ago
  Actually... no. I would not really agree. Obviously there are some exceptions. But not as appreciable as you'd think. Like, someone could have loaded a cannon with grapeshot and blasted a crowd of people in the 1700's. (Or loaded up a wagon with several barrels of black powder and grape shot.) Or chained the door shut to the local church and set fire to the building by tipping over an oil lamp. Or set fire to a few fields of crops or grain stores after harvest before winter and essentially starved a whole town. I don't think it's all that appreciably easier to kill a similar number of people today. If anything, similar attacks today might actually be quite a bit HARDER to execute due to technology, and society is both more fragile as a whole but more resilient at small scales than it was. Population density might make a bigger difference than anything as targets with a large number of people are perhaps more available.
  - bumby 2y ago
    For your stance to be correct, it implies we reached peak technological lethality hundreds of years ago. That ignores advancements in nuclear technology, drone technology, biological technology, ballistic technology etc. People could absolutely kill in prior eras. One of the biggest mass school killings was from the 1800s. That does not mean it isn’t easier in a modern era with more options and more lethal options. To the original point, the biggest mitigation is that people tend to be pro-social, not that technology is inherently benign.
    - Enginerrrd 2y ago
      Ok, I see what you mean now. Yes, I would agree that militarily it is easier with technological development. I just think for lone actors, there hasn't been a huge change.
BobbyTables2 2y ago
Seeing how many antisocial people are in power makes me wonder if their concerns are merely projection…
- throwup238 2y ago
  It’s a projection of their electorate’s fear more than the politicians’ own.

Quarrelsome 2y ago

> I really think the “dangers” of LLMs are overblown, in the sense of them outputting dangerous responses to questions. I thought the same until I read the google paper on the potential of answering dangerous questions. For example; consider an idiot seeking to do a lot of harm. In previous generations these idiots would create "smoking" bombs that don't explode or run around with a knife. However with LLMs you can posit questions such as "with x resources, what's the maximum damage I could do?" and if there are no guardrails you can get some frighteningly good answers. This allows crazy to become crazy and effective, which is scary.

southernplaces7 2y ago
Really? There are these things called books, that people could use for all kinds of good or bad purposes, and these other things called search engines, which often let people easily find the content of said books (and other sources of information) which let you answer supposedly "dangerous" questions like your example with pretty minor effort. Should we all really be subject to some bland culture of corporate-controlled inoffensiveness and arbitrary "danger" taboos because of hypothetical, usually invented fears about so-called harmful information. This is fear-mongering of the most idiotic kind, now normalized by blatantly childish (if you're an ignorant politician or media source) or self-serving (if you're one of the major corporate players) claims about AI safety.
theoreticalmal 2y ago
Lack of knowledge or lack of access to knowledge typically isn’t the limiting factor to bad people wanting to do bad things.