yeahiknow3

@yeahiknow3@lemmings.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Oh my god. So the machine won’t do terrible immoral things because they are unpopular on the internet. Well ladies and gentlemen, I rest my case.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m fairly certain my explanations are so succinct and simple they can be grasped by a teenager. I don’t have the talent to simplify them any further.

  Take a class in theoretical computer science. In the mean time, I beg you to stfu.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Omg. Why do you talk about shit you don’t understand with such utter confidence? Being a fucking moron has to be the chillest way to go through the world. I think I agree with your zombie AI about the culling. We gotta cull you dude, sorry. Best harm-reduction strategy to empower humanity.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  What the hell does “empower humanity” mean? When you tell it to reduce harm, how do you know it won’t undertake a course of eugenics? How do you know it won’t see fit that people like you, by virtue of your stupidity, are culled or sterilized?

  Why do you expect an unthinking, non-deliberative zombie process to know what you mean by “empower humanity”? There are facts about what is GOOD and what is BAD that can only be grasped through subjective experience.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  if I’m wrong list a task that a conscious being can do that an unconscious one is unable to accomplish.

  These have been listed repeatedly: love, think, understand, contemplate, discover, aspire, lead, philosophize, etc.

  There are, in fact, very few interesting things that a non-thinking entity can do. It can make toast. It can do calculations. It can design highways. It can cure cancer. It can probably fold clothes. None of this shit is particularly exciting. Just more machines doing what they’re told. We want a machine that can tell us what to do, instead. That’s AGI. No such machine can exist, at least according to our current understanding of mathematical logic, theoretical computer science, and human cognition.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Feed it the entire internet and let it figure out what humans value

  There are theorems in mathematical logic that tell us this is literally impossible. No mechanical process can generate a consistent set of axioms to summarize or even approximate human intuitions. Such a process would get things wrong and output contradictions.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  we’re talking about something where nobody can tell the difference, not where it’s difficult.

  You’re missing the point. The existence of black holes was predicted long before anyone had any idea how to identify them. For many years, it was impossible. Does that mean black holes don’t matter? That we shouldn’t have contemplated their existence?

  Seriously though, I’m out.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Economics is descriptive, not prescriptive. The whole concept of “a job” is completely made up and arbitrary.

  This has been fun, but I’m bored now.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  The definition is the exact opposite of arbitrary.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Matter to whom?

  We are discussing whether creating an AGI is possible, not whether humans can tell the difference (which is a separate discussion).

  Most people can’t identify a correct mathematical equation from an incorrect one, especially when the solution is irrelevant to their lives. Does that mean that doing mathematics correctly “doesn’t matter?”

  It would be weird to enter a mathematical forum and ask “why do you care? Why does it matter?”

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  The discussion is over whether we can create an AGI. An AGI is an inorganic mind of some sort (which would have various properties, such as the capacity for independent thought). We don’t need to make an AGI. I personally see no reason to do so. The question was can we? The answer is No.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  A malfunctioning nuke can also destroy humanity. Destroying humanity is not a defining feature of AGI. The question is not whether we can create a machine that can destroy humanity. (Yes.) The question is whether we can create a machine that can think. (No.)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  This is such an odd response. Yes, we can create the illusion of thought by executing very complicated instructions. Who cares? That’s not what anyone is talking about. There’s a difference between a machine that does what it’s told and one that thinks for itself. The latter cannot be done at the moment, because we don’t know how. But sure, we can have cheap parlor tricks. Good enough to amuse the sub-100 IQ crowd at least.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s fine, but most people aren’t interested in an illusion or a magic trick. When they say AGI, they mean an actual thinking mind capable of rationality (such as mind would be sensitive and responsive to reasons).

  Calculators, LLMs, and toasters can’t think or understand or undertake rational (let alone moral) deliberation by definition. They can only do what they’re told. We don’t need more machines that do what they’re told. We want machines that can think and understand for themselves. Like human minds, but more powerful. That would require subjective understanding that cannot be programmed by definition. For more details, see Gödel’s incompleteness theorems. We can’t even axiomatize mathematics, let alone program human intuitions about the world at large. Even if it’s possible we simply don’t know how.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Reasoning literally requires consciousness because it’s a fundamentally normative process. But hey, I get it. This is your first time encountering this fascinating topic and you’re a little confused. It’s okay.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Material scientist wet dream⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  It is hilarious to be wrong, yes.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨agi graph slop, wtf does goverment collapse have to do with ai?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  The only way to create AGI is by accident. I can’t stress how much we haven’t the first clue how consciousness works. I don’t mean we are far, I mean we are roughly at the starting point, with a variety of vague abstract theories with no connection to empirical reality. We can’t even agree on whether insects have emotions (they don’t — unless you think they do, in which case fight me) let alone explain subjective experience.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm so vegan I could eat a burger and still be a vegan⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  How dare some people make an obviously correct moral decision that highlights my own inadequacies?

  Seriously though, I’m not even slightly vegan. I’m just also not a total fucking moron.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm so vegan I could eat a burger and still be a vegan⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  We should do one for regular diets where it goes from ignorantly contributing to animal suffering to torturing them yourself and then diabetes and colon cancer.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨cherry pickers⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I thought it was because they were all dying and fertilizing the soil with their corpses.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Make your complaints heard about bad games, says Dragon Age veteran Mark Darrah, but "your $70 doesn't buy you cruelty"⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The art direction and the combat mechanics. But I can’t be sure.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I think that there are a lot of good reasons not to use the word “retard”. And there aren’t many good reasons to use it. I know of plenty of alternatives.

  Agreed. That’s my feeling as well.

  But how often do people use the word cretin?

  Most people have no clue what that word means or how it originated. I certainly don’t use “cretin,” since I have no use for disparaging someone for being mentally and physically crippled. Maybe that’s your point, that properly understanding the genesis of some term can undermine your desire to use it? And you’re right. Cretinism, the disease, makes me really sad, as does the fact that assholes chose to turn it into a pejorative. So maybe that’s has something to do with my unwillingness to ever use the word.

  In my mind, “retard” was more of a vague diagnosis mental slowness, so it makes me less sad. Still, I’m far less willing to use it than an alternative word like “idiot” whose meaning is totally divorced in my imagination from any origin story. After all, once you use a word (a bunch of sounds) to mean something long enough, it eventually makes no difference what the word used to mean. That said, I can see your point. The cretin example is a good one. Very persuasive.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I agree with everything you’ve written, but we are sort of going in a big circle. Earlier I wrote that

  using the r-word to insult someone autistic is cruel and unacceptable.

  For that reason, I can endorse everything you’re written here. However, I thought our disagreement was over whether there should be a concerted effort to banish a particular pejorative term from our vocabularies (namely the r-word). I had argued no, since it seemed like an overreaction, whereas you made it clear that groups of people were being offended/hurt by the casual use of that term.

  So then the question becomes:

  1. To what extent are we responsible for moderating our private speech in order to appease random people we’ve never met?

  • My intuition is that the answer is never. I think words should be struck from our vocabulary for a very different reason. Namely, when they represent an evil ideology. That is to say, I think that removing words from our vocabulary is a drastic thing to do and should be reserved for truly heinous verbiage (the sort of language that, if you used it, the only possible outcome between us would be violence). Some of these words are so evil, I can’t even euphemize them without feeling angry and sick.
  • My understanding is that you have looser parameters for unacceptable language, which must meet a certain thresholds of causing offense to be a candidate for censorship.
• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I really like your response and I needed a minute to read it. Let me reply later.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  But “autist” is used colloquially. All the time. That’s my point. I mean that it hasn’t entered wider usage outside of high schools, twitch, and discord servers. Boomers don’t use it as an insult (yet).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  A slur is an insulting or disparaging remark (according to the dictionary). Our contention is not over the definition of that word (I hope), but over whether the use of offensive language (such as slurs) is categorically unacceptable.

  There are lots of slurs, but only a handful cross the line (for me at least), because I consider them to exclusively and belligerently perpetuate some evil ideology (usually racism). I don’t want to list these words here, but I can think of maybe 3 or 4.

  There is no such thing as empirical evidence for an emotionally qualitative claim.

  Well, history is not a matter of emotion. It is a matter of empirical fact. We can trace the origins and common usage of words, and the n-word is no exception. That body of knowledge is the product of research (historical data). The (mis)use of the medical term “retard” is also well understood. Its transference to colloquial slang is actually unexceptionable. Consider “psycho” or “cretin.” In the same vein, the word “autist” is now being used disparagingly among teenagers being goofy or weird, and so on.

  “Autist” may not be sticky enough to require the medical community to come up with an alternative, more technical (and therefore less appealing) term for that mental disorder.

  Regardless, people will continue to look for ways to call each other stupid, and the best thing we can do is encourage researchers to come up with long and convoluted names for medical conditions so they don’t get co-opted by teenagers looking for creative ways to insult each other.

  The unfortunate truth is, yes. We are blameworthy for all acts independent of intention or context, because we have to be responsible for everything we do.

  Well, yes and no. You have a responsibility to be mindful of those around you. But they also have a responsibility to at least attempt to understand what you’re trying to say. If we ignore your intentions, the result is tantamount to willful misunderstanding.

  Remember, we are apes. Nothing more. Language is complex, and the average person is painfully, animalistically stupid. That’s why we have to be charitable to one another and give folks leeway to communicate without losing our shit over misunderstandings.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  We disagree on the facts. You have once again, without self-awareness or so much as a morsel of empirical evidence, equated “retard” with the n-word, which is preposterous and honestly kind of racist, so I’m out.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  My understanding is that words like “moron” and “retard” were conceived as medical terms that outlived their usefulness when they inevitably entered the vernacular, because, again (and this is important), you can’t stop people from calling each other stupid.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  People who use words do so for a particular purpose. That’s what I mean by design. The n-word had one and only one purpose: a humiliating slur against a group of people.

  Since this is obviously not the case with the word “retard” or “moron,” etc., I find the comparison obtuse at best and bad faith at worst. If you’re not willing to be honest, then there’s simply no reason for us to have this conversation.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Based Red Dead⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Um, that’s the point. A “moron” was also a medical diagnosis, just like “idiot.”

  If you choose to be offended every time I call someone a moron that’s your prerogative and none of my concern.