4 ms·

and yet: When you ask an AI like ChatGPT a question, what is it actually doing? Survey of 2,301 American adults (August 1-6, 2025) - Looking up the exact ans

by z3ugma 10mo ago

and yet: When you ask an AI like ChatGPT a question, what is it actually doing? Survey of 2,301 American adults (August 1-6, 2025) - Looking up the exact answer in a database: 45% - Predicting what words come next based on learned patterns: 28% - Running a script full of prewritten chat responses: 21% - Having a human in the background write an answer: 6% Source: Searchlight Institute most survey respondents don't even _understand_ what AI is doing, so I am a bit skeptical to trust their opinions on whether it will cause harm

tptacek 10mo ago
I'm fond of pointing out that in the 1980s, people raised the same kinds of alarms about databases.
- moron4hire 10mo ago
  You seem to be raising this as a "just so" kind of argument and absurdum, but we have extant examples of databases and information technology enabling villainy like oppression and genocide by making correlations easier to track, making tracking more efficient, and less cost prohibitive.
  - tptacek 10mo ago
    It's a pity we never regulated MySQL. The good we could have done!
    - shimman 10mo ago
      We absolutely should, some companies cannot ever be trusted with certain information. There is no reason why companies like Meta or Google should be entrusted with so much user data. The government should force a divestment from it and allow the public to own it (which should include public job guarantees that allow the public to maintain said data) or allow for smaller companies to be the handlers of such data. Google, Meta, and the rest of big tech have proven they should never be trusted.
    - Ekaros 10mo ago
      Honestly. To me that is starting to sound like very very good idea. Regulate what you can store, how you store, it how you modify it, who can access it, how is access controlled, what sort of trail should be left, how can mistakes be corrected, require that those whose information is stored can get full log on actions done on data relating to them. Sounds like over regulation to many. But it is pretty clear companies and developers have failed. So maybe strict regulation is needed.
    - mindslight 10mo ago
      It is a pity we never regulated the consumer surveillance industry out of existence. See, the original question isn't really about the technology per se. Rather it's about how it will be used. Do you have confidence in the track record (and trajectory) of our current regulatory approach when it comes to reigning in the scaling up of novel types of harm? The way I see it, the American approach has been to simply write off those who end up on the business end of the technological chainsaws as losers, and tell them they should have tried harder to be on the other side doing the damage. So why would we think "AI" will be any different?
- zeroonetwothree 10mo ago
  Citation needed
moron4hire 10mo ago
This is a fallacious argument. You don't need to understand the inner workings of a thing to see examples of harm and evaluate that harm as bad. For example, you don't need to understand how electric motors differ from internal combustion engines to understand that a mishandled car can very easily kill multiple people.
- akersten 10mo ago
  The problem, following your analogy, is seeing the consequences from the mishandled car but blaming the electric motor, in this case.
  - shimman 10mo ago
    It also neglects that car companies purposely made cars extremely unsafe while chasing profits. The only reason we have any regulations and safety standards for cars is because of one person leading the charge: Ralph Nader. You know what companies like Ford, GM, Chrysler tried to do after he released "Unsafe at any speed?" Smear his name in a public campaign that backfired. Car companies had to be dragged kicking and screaming to include basic features like seatbelts, airbags, and crumple zones.
hackyhacky 10mo ago
> most survey respondents don't even _understand_ what AI is doing, so I am a bit skeptical to trust their opinions on whether it will cause harm Why do they need to know how AI works, in order to know that it is already having a negative effect on their lives and is likely to do so in the future? I don't understand how PFAS [1] work, but I know I don't want them in my drinking water. [1] https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/pfc https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/pfc
- embedding-shape 10mo ago
  > Why do they need to know how AI works, in order to know that it is already having a negative effect on their lives and is likely to do so in the future? Because otherwise you might not actually be properly attributing the harm you're seeing to the right thing. Lots of people in the US thing current problems are left/right or socialist/authority, while it's obviously a class issue. But if you're unable to actually take a step back and see things, you'll attributed the reasons why you're suffering. I walked around on this earth for decades thinking Teflon is a really harmful material, until this year for some reason I learned that Teflon is actually a very inert polymer that doesn't react with anything in our bodies. I've avoided Teflon pans and stuff just because of my misunderstanding if this thing is dangerous or not to my body. Sure, this is a relatively trivial example, but I'm sure your imagination can see how this concept has broader implications.
lostmsu 10mo ago
None of these answers are correct btw.

by z3ugma 10mo ago

tptacek 10mo ago

I'm fond of pointing out that in the 1980s, people raised the same kinds of alarms about databases.

moron4hire 10mo ago
You seem to be raising this as a "just so" kind of argument and absurdum, but we have extant examples of databases and information technology enabling villainy like oppression and genocide by making correlations easier to track, making tracking more efficient, and less cost prohibitive.
- tptacek 10mo ago
  It's a pity we never regulated MySQL. The good we could have done!
  - shimman 10mo ago
    We absolutely should, some companies cannot ever be trusted with certain information. There is no reason why companies like Meta or Google should be entrusted with so much user data. The government should force a divestment from it and allow the public to own it (which should include public job guarantees that allow the public to maintain said data) or allow for smaller companies to be the handlers of such data. Google, Meta, and the rest of big tech have proven they should never be trusted.
  - Ekaros 10mo ago
    Honestly. To me that is starting to sound like very very good idea. Regulate what you can store, how you store, it how you modify it, who can access it, how is access controlled, what sort of trail should be left, how can mistakes be corrected, require that those whose information is stored can get full log on actions done on data relating to them. Sounds like over regulation to many. But it is pretty clear companies and developers have failed. So maybe strict regulation is needed.
  - mindslight 10mo ago
    It is a pity we never regulated the consumer surveillance industry out of existence. See, the original question isn't really about the technology per se. Rather it's about how it will be used. Do you have confidence in the track record (and trajectory) of our current regulatory approach when it comes to reigning in the scaling up of novel types of harm? The way I see it, the American approach has been to simply write off those who end up on the business end of the technological chainsaws as losers, and tell them they should have tried harder to be on the other side doing the damage. So why would we think "AI" will be any different?
zeroonetwothree 10mo ago
Citation needed

moron4hire 10mo ago

This is a fallacious argument. You don't need to understand the inner workings of a thing to see examples of harm and evaluate that harm as bad. For example, you don't need to understand how electric motors differ from internal combustion engines to understand that a mishandled car can very easily kill multiple people.

akersten 10mo ago
The problem, following your analogy, is seeing the consequences from the mishandled car but blaming the electric motor, in this case.
- shimman 10mo ago
  It also neglects that car companies purposely made cars extremely unsafe while chasing profits. The only reason we have any regulations and safety standards for cars is because of one person leading the charge: Ralph Nader. You know what companies like Ford, GM, Chrysler tried to do after he released "Unsafe at any speed?" Smear his name in a public campaign that backfired. Car companies had to be dragged kicking and screaming to include basic features like seatbelts, airbags, and crumple zones.

hackyhacky 10mo ago

> most survey respondents don't even _understand_ what AI is doing, so I am a bit skeptical to trust their opinions on whether it will cause harm Why do they need to know how AI works, in order to know that it is already having a negative effect on their lives and is likely to do so in the future? I don't understand how PFAS [1] work, but I know I don't want them in my drinking water. [1] https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/pfc https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/pfc

embedding-shape 10mo ago
> Why do they need to know how AI works, in order to know that it is already having a negative effect on their lives and is likely to do so in the future? Because otherwise you might not actually be properly attributing the harm you're seeing to the right thing. Lots of people in the US thing current problems are left/right or socialist/authority, while it's obviously a class issue. But if you're unable to actually take a step back and see things, you'll attributed the reasons why you're suffering. I walked around on this earth for decades thinking Teflon is a really harmful material, until this year for some reason I learned that Teflon is actually a very inert polymer that doesn't react with anything in our bodies. I've avoided Teflon pans and stuff just because of my misunderstanding if this thing is dangerous or not to my body. Sure, this is a relatively trivial example, but I'm sure your imagination can see how this concept has broader implications.

lostmsu 10mo ago

None of these answers are correct btw.