Comment on How can AI act without initial human input? Does this show AI can have freewill or am I deceived?

• GreyEyedGhost@piefed.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  I agree with every statement here except the last. The whole history of AI is pretty much a sequence of:

  • “It will be real AI when it can do ‘this’.”
  • Programmers figure out a way to make it do ‘this’.
  • “Okay, it’s doing ‘this’, but not in a way we would call AI.”
  • “Alright, then what would you need for something to be AI?
  • Return to the top.

  LLMs are pretty amazing and they can do some things very well, and reasonably fit under the category of AI, but not so much what is referred to as AGI. And they’re developed using some really shitty practices, etc. But prior to their invention, the idea that we could have a computer do what they do was a reasonable idea of what AI would be.

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  • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Not really. LLMs are chatbots predicated on taking an information set, and determining that given a prompt of “how do I make a PB&J” It’s going to go through its’ database, Find the most common responses to that string, and may be strings related to it, and give you a synthesis of the most statistically relevant answers.

    It has no understanding of what it’s regurgitating.

    This is a dumb-as-rocks algorithm with a huge database of stolen material regurgitating the most common associations from that material based on your prompt. The algorithm is pretty clever, don’t get me wrong (and it sort does this multiple-pass thing) But it’s not particularly impressive narrow artificial intelligence.

    LLMs are pretty amazing and they can do some things very well, and reasonably fit under the category of AI,

    I never said they weren’t “AI”… I said they barely rate the term, They’re right up there with the algorithms in your phone that eventually learn that no, you did not mean “ducky” you meant “fucky”. Eliza is also an AI, but you wouldn’t look back at it.

    The reason we’re stuck in that loop is because we don’t know. So we’re looking at examples and being like ‘not yet’, then something new comes around and ‘not yet.’ for that, too.

    AGI is an entirely different monster; and the troublesome thing about it is… we don’t even know if we have free will. Determinism is something we’re actively looking at, and the only good answer is “we don’t know”. we don’t even know how to quantify consciousness- which, from evidence, arises out of complexity, but we don’t really understand how that works. (see octopus and cuddlefish intelligence. It’s totally different than ours.)

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• Postmortal_Pop@lemmy.world ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  I’m gonna preface by stating that I’m on your side and also hate this whole AI thing. It was neat at first but a bunch of dick bags decided to turn it into a scam and now I can’t afford ram for my budget pc.

  One thing I can’t quite let go of is how much the line “they’re predictive engines that predict the text that comes next based on a huge repository of mostly-stolen content.” Applies to us as well. What is the difference between thoughts stollen and thoughts consumed? Is the philosophy I read not just information stored in a meaty hard-drive? Ai doesn’t comprehend information, it just regurgitates it in a manor that looks understandable. I also contain information I don’t understand but can tell you on demand in a way that looks understandable. There’s a lot of statements about AI just being “this” but frequently I see “this” and wonder why it’s any different than when humans do it? “Ai doesn’t make art because art takes soul and feeling” but what does that say about corperate logos, clip art, or the millionth furry porn OC an artist must make to pay the bills? Those also have no soul or feeling.

  I don’t like AI either, but I want to understand the philosophical implications of these arguments.

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  • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    What is the difference between thoughts stollen and thoughts consumed? Is the philosophy I read not just information stored in a meaty hard-drive? Ai doesn’t comprehend information, it just regurgitates it in a manor that looks understandable. I also contain information I don’t understand but can tell you on demand in a way that looks understandable.

    When you encounter new information- new ideas, or art, or just have a new experience- you process that information in the context of your prior understanding; the thoughts you have are definitely yours, and not “stolen.” in the same sense as generative AI spewing out artwork.

    Some people say the same thing about Andy Wharhol, though. So we still need to have that argument out.

    There’s a lot of statements about AI just being “this” but frequently I see “this” and wonder why it’s any different than when humans do it? “Ai doesn’t make art because art takes soul and feeling” but what does that say about corperate logos, clip art, or the millionth furry porn OC an artist must make to pay the bills? Those also have no soul or feeling.

    We don’t even know if we’re not also “this”. We’re definitely conscious, we’re aware. I’d probably put generative AI and LLMs on the same level of awareness as a tree. Trees don’t seem to have anything resembling a brain or nervous system, but manage to adapt in subtle ways to their changing environments (Growing towards lightsources, taking in or giving up nutrients into the soil. they even have “community” in the sense that the mycellium spreads those nutrients around to other trees that need it…)

    I don’t like AI either, but I want to understand the philosophical implications of these arguments.

    It’s not that I don’t particularly like AI, per se. it’s what the techbros are using it for that piss me off. I would say that AI rights need to be established now so that we don’t cause the fucking AI Apocalypse. (because some incel is going to turn a sentient AI into it’s fuckdoll. or worse.)(not to mention coming after everyone’s jobs. slightly nsfw, but here’s the latest “WTF, Techbros?”

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