Comment on How to smash the looms today - I've always loved tech. Now, I'm a Luddite. You should be one, too.
Kasumi@lemmy.world 1 year agoThis is uniquely naïve to a frankly disturbing degree. Your work is actively going to kill people across the developed world when they fall out of the workforce with zero replacement jobs nor opportunities.
Huh. Sounds like a good argument for a UBI.
I don’t pretend to know the future. Things can change radically or things can stay the same for decades. I see no reason to assume anything. I am not optimistic, but I am not going to stop fighting just because of that.
I wasn’t optimistic about stopping the war in Iraq. I still marched against it. I wasn’t optimistic in SCOTUS ending Roe v. Wade. I still marched against it.
Maybe you don’t see the point of fighting even when change isn’t likely, but making a mark on history is worth something.
Remember this man? He knew he was not going to win. He did it anyway.
If your first reaction to criticism is to discount it as artificial I would suggest taking stock of yourself and how you engage in discussions.
AI/ML is an extremely broad field, while some assholes do have terrible motives most of the work is tool building. We build tools to help do things that are monotonous or difficult for humans to do so people can focus on more creative work… while acknowledging that the field carries some extreme dangers if misused. AI alone isn’t the problem, the concentration of wealth is devastating to society and we need to fix that before AI makes it worse - but AI itself is a tool for good.
I think you’re taking a far too narrow view if you can state that it’s not positive. At my company we’ve managed to drastically reduce the amount of dumb menial stuff that people have to do and we haven’t fired people when we’ve managed to drastically increase productivity. In some cases AI is going to be terribly misused but it’s a tool and we should use it to make people’s lives better.
Maybe your view is too narrow if it’s fueled by personal anecdotes. Technology not hurting you is just a data point, not a conclusion. Typically when we say positive, we really mean “net positive” and that’s unknown. And the argument is not that we shouldn’t use tools to make our lives better. It’s OK to recognize that tools can be harmful and seek to reduce that harm.
You’re surprised keep the status quo is a controversial opinion in a work reform subreddit?
Where in a non-AI world do you imagine workers as gaining the things you say they can’t post?
What part of work reform do you think entails keeping things the same?
You’re being dishonest if you think this movement is uncritically excited for AI with no other social movements
Zeth0s@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It’s like saying that someone who built the steam engine actively killed people. The steam engine was a great thing. Politics must deal with social changes. Because we know that any technological advance can result in social instability if left in the hand of wrong people.
Kasumi@lemmy.world 1 year ago
machinin@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I think you need a little more help with logic and reading comprehension before you respond so condescendingly.
OP’s point is that the technology will not create a paradise or hell. It is the political environment that does that. The technology is simply a tool that will be used.
NightAuthor@lemmy.world 1 year ago
But if the political environment is oppressive, do we want to give it another tool and just be like “now be sure to use it for good”.
I agree that no technology is inherently evil, not even something like the atomic bomb. But you have to consider the actual and likely future environment that the technology will be in. And this state of regulatory capture, let the largest pocket book have the most speech, ever consolidating wealth and power situation is not one in which I believe we should be contributing new potentially oppressive technologies. We should be hindering them as we simultaneously work to reform our government and economic structure.
Zeth0s@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I am well, thanks for asking.
Currently the tech I am a huge fan of is helping me a lot handling the daily business. It has been a godsend for my mental health. It is helping me in a lot of area I struggle with (paper work and meaningless corporate processes), it helps me better organizing my work, and it support me in areas where I used to heavily rely on Google and forums. It helps me to learn and improve. Overall I am a happy chatgpt customer.
Other than that, we don’t have AI yet, still layoffs are at record number. Layoffs and suffering are not caused by AI, or whatever fancy tech. They are caused by current economic system that cannot redistribute wealth. They’ve been there before AI, they’ll be there after AI.
If you believe that blocking AI will change anything… No it won’t. It won’t change anything.