7 ms·

Power and Paranoia in Silicon Valley

28 points by clarkm 12y ago

davidw 12y ago
Here is the actual article, rather than the pirated version: http://harpers.org/archive/2015/01/come-with-us-if-you-want-to-live/ http://harpers.org/archive/2015/01/come-with-us-if-you-want-...
- ExpiredLink 12y ago
  "This article is only available to magazine subscribers."
  - davidw 12y ago
    Yes, exactly. If you want to read the article, you should respect their terms.
    - ExpiredLink 12y ago
      So you post a fake link only to teach others copyright terms? Internet is a strange place.
daly 12y ago
I love the nonsense people spout. It never ceases to amaze me. I've been working in AI (robotics, expert systems, etc) most of my life. I'm currently developing episodic memory for robot-human interaction at CMU. The system learns from the episode. By "learning" I mean that it self-modifies so that it will change its behavior in the future. The people wandering around claiming that AI will take over the world soon have no idea what they are talking about. What is actually happening is the second wave of hype in AI. The first wave, in the 80s, ended up as the "AI Winter" when people realized that AI was not going to take over the world. This second "AI Winter" is going to end up causing another 30 year research desert. People have such short memories. Here is a way to think about AI. The best known systems are actually people. Imagine you had invented a person for the first time. Would it take over the world? Probably. But it would likely take tens of thousands of years. And this new "person" would be prone to faults and failures, such as when it can't remember where it put the keys, because some of these faults and failures are inherent in the system. I don't fear AI. I fear people who have no idea what they are talking about who "pump up expectations". Get all the funding you can now because a new AI Winter is coming.
- pron 12y ago
  Like the name of one of the episodes in Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (which I just looked up), I think you are asking the wrong questions. Of course AI is not going to take over the world and there's no singularity coming -- at least not any time soon. The singularity is no less a religious salvation myth than the Second Coming. The question you should be asking is why do those people believe in the singularity? The answer -- like so many answers in life -- comes from the realm of psychology and sociology rather than hard science.
  - eli_gottlieb 12y ago
    Well, honestly, why shouldn't people dream big dreams? Since when was everyone supposed to just ignore the larger issues of life and assume the real point is to accumulate money, or whatever other shit society holds we're supposed to do?
    - pron 12y ago
      Who says people shouldn't dream big? But singularity isn't a dream, it's a religious salvation story. There's nothing wrong with religion, either (well, no more than many other ideas that guide humanity), but the difference between this religion and other, older ones is that older religions focused on morality and human nature, while this one is not even about humans at all. The part about the guy weeping because previous generations didn't have Kahneman was clearly written to reflect Christian sorrow for the generations prior to the coming of Christ, but the latter group is sad about those who didn't hear Jesus's message about kindness and love, while the former was crying about those who couldn't tweak their minds to be more robot-like (not that he can, either, but at least he imagines he can).
      - eli_gottlieb 12y ago
        >But singularity isn't a dream, it's a religious salvation story. Ok, as long as we're bothering to make this distinction, I don't think that's correct. Most singulatarians I've hung out with place the locus-of-control in their story internally: they believe that, as a group, they will ensure that The Singularity comes to pass, in all its Charles-Strossian-weirdo-glory. As detailed in the article, they have actual groups that are trying to make this happen. They can be incompetent at it, but you can't say they're sitting around waiting for someone else to save them. They're more like Communists than Christians. >the difference between this religion and other, older ones is that older religions focused on morality and human nature, while this one is not even about humans at all. If you followed the article, the whole movement we're talking about has a loud, public component called Effective Altruism who follow Peter Singer's (noticeably Christlike, for all I'm not at all Christian) idea of giving away large portions of their personal income to the highest-impact disease-fighting and antipoverty charities operating in the Third World. Extreme, impersonal charity might be inhuman, in some degree, but I'd be hard-pressed to call it either immoral or disconnected from moral concerns. >The part about the guy weeping because previous generations didn't have Kahneman was clearly written to reflect Christian sorrow for the generations prior to the coming of Christ A guy wept because previous generations didn't have Kahneman and Tversky's foundational findings in behavioral economics? Excuse the following several minutes of nonstop giggling. Sorry, now, you're telling me it's patterned after some Christian thing? I can't really tell yes-or-no here, since I've got no background in Christianity. >but the latter group is sad about those who didn't hear Jesus's message about kindness and love, while the former was crying about those who couldn't tweak their minds to be more robot-like (not that he can, either, but at least he imagines he can). Well, this provides a good opportunity to sum up, and to mention a couple of things. Firstly, I too find it funny that people want to tweak themselves to better operate as fully, calculatively rational utility maximizers. There's a whole literature of bounded rationality showing that throwing out one's information and computation bounds and just trying to approximate unbounded rationality in finite space is a very bad idea ;-)! But secondly, just saying, if people once got sad about others not hearing Jesus's message of kindness and love, well, what of these people and Peter Singer's message of realizing kindness and love in the here-and-now? Or, to get one level crazier, what of the people going to Secular Solstice and weeping that mankind has not yet defeated death, and that we will all lose our loved ones, suffer ourselves, and then die ourselves? I rather imagine that the single fundamental fact of the human condition as we know it is an entirely appropriate target for religious yearnings! The Buddha said, "Existence is suffering." The extropians said, "Let's fix that." Disagree with their cause, or predict that they'll fail, and we can converse sensibly about why they're wrong. Making fun of them for falling into the common psychological modes of religion, and I think you're missing the big human-condition-shaped elephant in the room that simply isn't going to go away.
icco 12y ago
He's right though, Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality is an easy way to make someone disappear for a few days. http://hpmor.com/ http://hpmor.com/
pron 12y ago
I am a Harper's subscriber and this is pirated content. But it's so good that I'm glad people here have the chance to see it. That story is funny, sad and scary all at the same time. This is what happens when so much power is held by people who are -- how should I say it -- left of average on the autism spectrum and with so little knowledge of politics and history: you get dystopian notions such as meritocracy[1] being touted as ideals, and sad-crazy-funny-dangerous ideas such as those mentioned in this article get funded. But I think some powerful people have always been susceptible to crazy notions or to people peddling them (see Scientology or Rasputin). [1]: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment
- WhitneyLand 12y ago
  I think you do not have enough evidence to make negative statements about autistic people and random generalizations about them being "ignorant of history" and tending toward "dystopian notions". These kind of stereotypes are at best unproductive and at worst discriminatory and stigmatizing.
  - pron 12y ago
    I didn't say that, and besides, that part of my comment was said in humor. Also, I consider myself among their numbers so I'm allowed to joke about it :)
    - davorak 12y ago
      > that part of my comment was said in humor. I think more will read it seriously than not.
  - ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
    If the shoe fits... EDIT: So many people parade around their own self diagnosis (well, if you make SV money you can sure as hell buy your own aspie diagnosis).
- ExpiredLink 12y ago
jf22 12y ago
I thought this was satirical fiction...

28 points by clarkm 12y ago

Here is the actual article, rather than the pirated version: http://harpers.org/archive/2015/01/come-with-us-if-you-want-to-live/ http://harpers.org/archive/2015/01/come-with-us-if-you-want-...

ExpiredLink 12y ago
"This article is only available to magazine subscribers."
- davidw 12y ago
  Yes, exactly. If you want to read the article, you should respect their terms.
  - ExpiredLink 12y ago
    So you post a fake link only to teach others copyright terms? Internet is a strange place.

daly 12y ago

I love the nonsense people spout. It never ceases to amaze me. I've been working in AI (robotics, expert systems, etc) most of my life. I'm currently developing episodic memory for robot-human interaction at CMU. The system learns from the episode. By "learning" I mean that it self-modifies so that it will change its behavior in the future. The people wandering around claiming that AI will take over the world soon have no idea what they are talking about. What is actually happening is the second wave of hype in AI. The first wave, in the 80s, ended up as the "AI Winter" when people realized that AI was not going to take over the world. This second "AI Winter" is going to end up causing another 30 year research desert. People have such short memories. Here is a way to think about AI. The best known systems are actually people. Imagine you had invented a person for the first time. Would it take over the world? Probably. But it would likely take tens of thousands of years. And this new "person" would be prone to faults and failures, such as when it can't remember where it put the keys, because some of these faults and failures are inherent in the system. I don't fear AI. I fear people who have no idea what they are talking about who "pump up expectations". Get all the funding you can now because a new AI Winter is coming.

pron 12y ago
Like the name of one of the episodes in Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (which I just looked up), I think you are asking the wrong questions. Of course AI is not going to take over the world and there's no singularity coming -- at least not any time soon. The singularity is no less a religious salvation myth than the Second Coming. The question you should be asking is why do those people believe in the singularity? The answer -- like so many answers in life -- comes from the realm of psychology and sociology rather than hard science.
- eli_gottlieb 12y ago
  Well, honestly, why shouldn't people dream big dreams? Since when was everyone supposed to just ignore the larger issues of life and assume the real point is to accumulate money, or whatever other shit society holds we're supposed to do?
  - pron 12y ago
    Who says people shouldn't dream big? But singularity isn't a dream, it's a religious salvation story. There's nothing wrong with religion, either (well, no more than many other ideas that guide humanity), but the difference between this religion and other, older ones is that older religions focused on morality and human nature, while this one is not even about humans at all. The part about the guy weeping because previous generations didn't have Kahneman was clearly written to reflect Christian sorrow for the generations prior to the coming of Christ, but the latter group is sad about those who didn't hear Jesus's message about kindness and love, while the former was crying about those who couldn't tweak their minds to be more robot-like (not that he can, either, but at least he imagines he can).
    - eli_gottlieb 12y ago
      >But singularity isn't a dream, it's a religious salvation story. Ok, as long as we're bothering to make this distinction, I don't think that's correct. Most singulatarians I've hung out with place the locus-of-control in their story internally: they believe that, as a group, they will ensure that The Singularity comes to pass, in all its Charles-Strossian-weirdo-glory. As detailed in the article, they have actual groups that are trying to make this happen. They can be incompetent at it, but you can't say they're sitting around waiting for someone else to save them. They're more like Communists than Christians. >the difference between this religion and other, older ones is that older religions focused on morality and human nature, while this one is not even about humans at all. If you followed the article, the whole movement we're talking about has a loud, public component called Effective Altruism who follow Peter Singer's (noticeably Christlike, for all I'm not at all Christian) idea of giving away large portions of their personal income to the highest-impact disease-fighting and antipoverty charities operating in the Third World. Extreme, impersonal charity might be inhuman, in some degree, but I'd be hard-pressed to call it either immoral or disconnected from moral concerns. >The part about the guy weeping because previous generations didn't have Kahneman was clearly written to reflect Christian sorrow for the generations prior to the coming of Christ A guy wept because previous generations didn't have Kahneman and Tversky's foundational findings in behavioral economics? Excuse the following several minutes of nonstop giggling. Sorry, now, you're telling me it's patterned after some Christian thing? I can't really tell yes-or-no here, since I've got no background in Christianity. >but the latter group is sad about those who didn't hear Jesus's message about kindness and love, while the former was crying about those who couldn't tweak their minds to be more robot-like (not that he can, either, but at least he imagines he can). Well, this provides a good opportunity to sum up, and to mention a couple of things. Firstly, I too find it funny that people want to tweak themselves to better operate as fully, calculatively rational utility maximizers. There's a whole literature of bounded rationality showing that throwing out one's information and computation bounds and just trying to approximate unbounded rationality in finite space is a very bad idea ;-)! But secondly, just saying, if people once got sad about others not hearing Jesus's message of kindness and love, well, what of these people and Peter Singer's message of realizing kindness and love in the here-and-now? Or, to get one level crazier, what of the people going to Secular Solstice and weeping that mankind has not yet defeated death, and that we will all lose our loved ones, suffer ourselves, and then die ourselves? I rather imagine that the single fundamental fact of the human condition as we know it is an entirely appropriate target for religious yearnings! The Buddha said, "Existence is suffering." The extropians said, "Let's fix that." Disagree with their cause, or predict that they'll fail, and we can converse sensibly about why they're wrong. Making fun of them for falling into the common psychological modes of religion, and I think you're missing the big human-condition-shaped elephant in the room that simply isn't going to go away.

icco 12y ago

He's right though, Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality is an easy way to make someone disappear for a few days. http://hpmor.com/ http://hpmor.com/

pron 12y ago

I am a Harper's subscriber and this is pirated content. But it's so good that I'm glad people here have the chance to see it. That story is funny, sad and scary all at the same time. This is what happens when so much power is held by people who are -- how should I say it -- left of average on the autism spectrum and with so little knowledge of politics and history: you get dystopian notions such as meritocracy[1] being touted as ideals, and sad-crazy-funny-dangerous ideas such as those mentioned in this article get funded. But I think some powerful people have always been susceptible to crazy notions or to people peddling them (see Scientology or Rasputin). [1]: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment

WhitneyLand 12y ago
I think you do not have enough evidence to make negative statements about autistic people and random generalizations about them being "ignorant of history" and tending toward "dystopian notions". These kind of stereotypes are at best unproductive and at worst discriminatory and stigmatizing.
- pron 12y ago
  I didn't say that, and besides, that part of my comment was said in humor. Also, I consider myself among their numbers so I'm allowed to joke about it :)
  - davorak 12y ago
    > that part of my comment was said in humor. I think more will read it seriously than not.
- ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
  If the shoe fits... EDIT: So many people parade around their own self diagnosis (well, if you make SV money you can sure as hell buy your own aspie diagnosis).
ExpiredLink 12y ago

jf22 12y ago

I thought this was satirical fiction...