3 ms·

"If X is here to stay, as a thing that permanently increases productivity" - matches a lot of different X. Maintaining persons health increases productivity. Go

by 112233 8mo ago

"If X is here to stay, as a thing that permanently increases productivity" - matches a lot of different X. Maintaining persons health increases productivity. Good education increases productivity. What is playing out now is completely different - it is both irresistible lust for omniscient power provided by this technology ("mirror mirror on the wall, who has recently thought bad things about me?"), and the dread of someone else wielding it. Plus, it makes natural moat against masses of normal (i.e. poor) people, because requires a spaceship to run. Finally intelligence can also be controlled by capital the way it was meant to, joining information, creativity, means of production, communication and such things

mattgreenrocks 8mo ago
> Plus, it makes natural moat against masses of normal (i.e. poor) people, because requires a spaceship to run. Finally intelligence can also be controlled by capital the way it was meant to, joining information, creativity, means of production, communication and such things I'd put intelligence in quotes there, but it doesn't detract from the point. It is astounding to me how willfully ignorant people are being about the massive aggregation of power that's going on here. In retrospect, I don't think they're ignorant, they just haven't had to think about it much in the past. But this is a real problem with very real consequences. Sovereignty must be occasionally be asserted, or someone will infringe upon it. That's exactly what's happening here.
- fennecbutt 8mo ago
  >massive aggregation of power that's going on here Which has been happening since what at least the bad old IBM days and nobody's done a thing about it? I've given up tbh. It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix.
  - luqtas 8mo ago
    > It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix. it's much worse. a great demographic of hacker news love gen. AI.. these are usually highly educated people showing their true faces on the plethora of problems this technology violates and generates
    - int_19h 8mo ago
      There's nothing wrong with generative AI as a technology. The problem is that it's in the hands of sociopaths. But that is a general problem with our socioeconomic system, not with AI.
  - zenmac 8mo ago
    >I've given up tbh. It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix. Especially at cost of diverting power and water for farmers and humans who need them. And the benefit of the AI seems quite limited from recent Signal post here on HN.
    - pixl97 8mo ago
      Water for farmers is its own pile of bullshit. Beef uses a stupid amount of water. Same with almonds. If you're actually worried about feeding people and not just producing an expensive economic product you're not going to make them. Same goes for people living in deserts where we have to ship water thousands of miles. Give me a break.
      - tormeh 8mo ago
        Very important. There is more than just 1 bullshit line of business.
      - datsci_est_2015 8mo ago
        And one of my favorites, alfalfa in Arizona for Saudi Arabian horses. Water usage must be taxed according to its use, unfortunately.
      - fennecbutt 8mo ago
        I came back to agree that we should be eating a lot less meat than we do, I'm guilty of it too. We didn't eat meat all day every day as we evolved; if we love it it's because it was scarce and we need to create an artificial scarcity by choosing not to indulge (the same goes for fats, sugars etc in general). As for the other responses regarding AI. I think that AI could very well become the best thing to ever happen to our species, if we were ready for it but we are not by a long shot. Regarding wastage: AI research is just fine imo, but corpos have gotten their parasite hooks into the technology and as per usual are more interested in making money right now rather than when it's appropriate. Energy and water use would not be a problem if everyone & their mum weren't desperately seeking VC funding for a technology they know nothing about. Regarding culture: besides the obvious capitalisation of capitalism doing capitalism things, we aren't ready in a cultural sense either; our tribalism and social structure is incredibly juvenile. They say that civilisation first started when one human tended to the wounds of another human and took care of them while they healed. From what I see of the world around me we have gone backwards - we call this civilisation? UBI would just be one step in a long list of cultural change required to prepare for AI. Our deficiencies are long and complex to solve. The only solution that I see is that one day we do crack AGI. And that "it happens" and turns out to be banevolent in that it forces us to be good. Because we have to be forced to; we are selfish and will never vote in each other's interests.
strken 8mo ago
The difference is that we've more or less hit a stable Pareto front in education and healthcare. Gains are small and incremental; if you pour more money into one place and less into another, you generally don't end up much better off, although you can make small but meaningful improvements in select areas. You can push the front forward slightly with new research and innovation, but not very fast or far. The current generation of AI is an opportunity for quick gains that go beyond just a few months longer lifespan or a 2% higher average grade. It is an unrealised and maybe unrealistic opportunity, but it's not just greed and lust for power that pushes people to invest, it's hope that this time the next big thing will make a real difference. It's not the same as investing more in schools because it's far less certain but also has a far higher alleged upside.
- KellyCriterion 8mo ago
  > if you pour more money into one place and less into another, you generally don't end up much better off, although you can make small but meaningful improvements in select areas "Marginal cost barrier" hit, then?
- 112233 8mo ago
  > The difference is that we've more or less hit a stable Pareto front in education and healthcare. Gains are small and incremental; You probably mean gains between someone receiving healtcare and education now, as compared to 10 years ago, or maybe you mean year to year average across every man alive. You certainly do not mean that person receiving appropriate healthcare is only 2% better off than one not receiving it, or educated person is noly 2% better of than an uneducated one? Because I find such notion highly unlikely. So, here you have vast amounts of people you can mine for productivity increase, simply by providing things that exist already and are available in unlimited supply to anyone who can produce money at will. Instead, let's build warehouses and fill them with obsolete tech, power it all up using tiny Sun and .. what exactly? This seems like a thinly disguised act of an obsessed person that will stop at nothing to satisfy their fantasies.
  - deleted 8mo ago
    [deleted]
gom_jabbar 8mo ago
> Finally intelligence can also be controlled by capital The relationship between capital and AI is a fascinating topic. The contemporary philosopher who has thought most intensely about this is probably Nick Land (who is heavily inspired by Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk and Friedrich Hayek). For Land, intelligence has always been immanent in capitalism and capitalism is actively producing it. As we get closer to the realization of capitalism's telos/attractor (technological singularity), this becomes more and more obvious (intelligible).

by 112233 8mo ago

mattgreenrocks 8mo ago

> Plus, it makes natural moat against masses of normal (i.e. poor) people, because requires a spaceship to run. Finally intelligence can also be controlled by capital the way it was meant to, joining information, creativity, means of production, communication and such things I'd put intelligence in quotes there, but it doesn't detract from the point. It is astounding to me how willfully ignorant people are being about the massive aggregation of power that's going on here. In retrospect, I don't think they're ignorant, they just haven't had to think about it much in the past. But this is a real problem with very real consequences. Sovereignty must be occasionally be asserted, or someone will infringe upon it. That's exactly what's happening here.

fennecbutt 8mo ago
>massive aggregation of power that's going on here Which has been happening since what at least the bad old IBM days and nobody's done a thing about it? I've given up tbh. It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix.
- luqtas 8mo ago
  > It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix. it's much worse. a great demographic of hacker news love gen. AI.. these are usually highly educated people showing their true faces on the plethora of problems this technology violates and generates
  - int_19h 8mo ago
    There's nothing wrong with generative AI as a technology. The problem is that it's in the hands of sociopaths. But that is a general problem with our socioeconomic system, not with AI.
- zenmac 8mo ago
  >I've given up tbh. It's like the apathetic masses want the billionaires to become trillionaires as long as they get their tiktok fix. Especially at cost of diverting power and water for farmers and humans who need them. And the benefit of the AI seems quite limited from recent Signal post here on HN.
  - pixl97 8mo ago
    Water for farmers is its own pile of bullshit. Beef uses a stupid amount of water. Same with almonds. If you're actually worried about feeding people and not just producing an expensive economic product you're not going to make them. Same goes for people living in deserts where we have to ship water thousands of miles. Give me a break.
    - tormeh 8mo ago
      Very important. There is more than just 1 bullshit line of business.
    - datsci_est_2015 8mo ago
      And one of my favorites, alfalfa in Arizona for Saudi Arabian horses. Water usage must be taxed according to its use, unfortunately.
    - fennecbutt 8mo ago
      I came back to agree that we should be eating a lot less meat than we do, I'm guilty of it too. We didn't eat meat all day every day as we evolved; if we love it it's because it was scarce and we need to create an artificial scarcity by choosing not to indulge (the same goes for fats, sugars etc in general). As for the other responses regarding AI. I think that AI could very well become the best thing to ever happen to our species, if we were ready for it but we are not by a long shot. Regarding wastage: AI research is just fine imo, but corpos have gotten their parasite hooks into the technology and as per usual are more interested in making money right now rather than when it's appropriate. Energy and water use would not be a problem if everyone & their mum weren't desperately seeking VC funding for a technology they know nothing about. Regarding culture: besides the obvious capitalisation of capitalism doing capitalism things, we aren't ready in a cultural sense either; our tribalism and social structure is incredibly juvenile. They say that civilisation first started when one human tended to the wounds of another human and took care of them while they healed. From what I see of the world around me we have gone backwards - we call this civilisation? UBI would just be one step in a long list of cultural change required to prepare for AI. Our deficiencies are long and complex to solve. The only solution that I see is that one day we do crack AGI. And that "it happens" and turns out to be banevolent in that it forces us to be good. Because we have to be forced to; we are selfish and will never vote in each other's interests.

strken 8mo ago

The difference is that we've more or less hit a stable Pareto front in education and healthcare. Gains are small and incremental; if you pour more money into one place and less into another, you generally don't end up much better off, although you can make small but meaningful improvements in select areas. You can push the front forward slightly with new research and innovation, but not very fast or far. The current generation of AI is an opportunity for quick gains that go beyond just a few months longer lifespan or a 2% higher average grade. It is an unrealised and maybe unrealistic opportunity, but it's not just greed and lust for power that pushes people to invest, it's hope that this time the next big thing will make a real difference. It's not the same as investing more in schools because it's far less certain but also has a far higher alleged upside.

KellyCriterion 8mo ago
> if you pour more money into one place and less into another, you generally don't end up much better off, although you can make small but meaningful improvements in select areas "Marginal cost barrier" hit, then?
112233 8mo ago
> The difference is that we've more or less hit a stable Pareto front in education and healthcare. Gains are small and incremental; You probably mean gains between someone receiving healtcare and education now, as compared to 10 years ago, or maybe you mean year to year average across every man alive. You certainly do not mean that person receiving appropriate healthcare is only 2% better off than one not receiving it, or educated person is noly 2% better of than an uneducated one? Because I find such notion highly unlikely. So, here you have vast amounts of people you can mine for productivity increase, simply by providing things that exist already and are available in unlimited supply to anyone who can produce money at will. Instead, let's build warehouses and fill them with obsolete tech, power it all up using tiny Sun and .. what exactly? This seems like a thinly disguised act of an obsessed person that will stop at nothing to satisfy their fantasies.
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]

gom_jabbar 8mo ago

> Finally intelligence can also be controlled by capital The relationship between capital and AI is a fascinating topic. The contemporary philosopher who has thought most intensely about this is probably Nick Land (who is heavily inspired by Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk and Friedrich Hayek). For Land, intelligence has always been immanent in capitalism and capitalism is actively producing it. As we get closer to the realization of capitalism's telos/attractor (technological singularity), this becomes more and more obvious (intelligible).