Tech leaders urge pause in 'out-of-control' AI race

I think it will concentrate capital even further until there is enough civil unrest for a major revolution.

 

My understanding is the library was already in severe decline and a lot of the scrolls had eroded from simple wear and tear and pests. No printing press. Everything hand written on scrolls. You'd think being close to the coast line would really impact erosion of papyrus scrolls. Then with multiple passings of the torch through invasions, civil war and also peaceful transitions of power, not every leader of the city of Alexandria had the same vested interest in keeping the library in tip top condition as it's original founder.

Plus there were other great libraries of the time scattered across the world that too suffered in decline over time indicating more of a sign of the times that the classical era was coming to an end. It's extremely unlikely there was anything of scientific significance in those scrolls that would have advanced say the discovery of Calculus some thousands of years earlier. Your best bet for that would have been Archimedes in recorded history.

@StupidMoniker has multiple times over said the Civil War would have been unnecessary had the progress made from the Industrial Revolution continued as it was trending, making it a more cost effective business approach compared to owning human slaves at the time. While simply existing costs money to live, I doubt anyone stuck doing some menial repetitive task that can be automated while being treated subhuman would rather continue to do the thing that automation could better in place of them. Software devs and IT types with some chops in coding can automate daily tasks in a simpler format, cutting back potentially hours of time, instead doing it all manually. I'm quite confident were it as easy to automate tasks with some code for real life work involving other types of human labor, people would easily opt for that instead. It's just to automate say large scale agriculture with less need for human labor, costs a fortune in investment and probably a fortune to maintain once it's all set up; Something simply not in the wheelhouse of most people because of their income bracket.

 

We don't have a choice.

And yeah, we adopt only when forced to at the very last moment. We still haven't adopted to climate change. Humanity has been awful stewards of this planet. We're awful at self governing and awful at managing resources against our population.

Some feel AI may be our only hope to stop us from destroying ourselves, while others feel it will destroy us. Yes, it will change humanity forever - in ways we can not anticipate. And unfortunately, in ways we can not control. The fact is that without AI, humanity is doomed on this planet. We'll not make it off before the big one collides or some other catastrophic event takes place that will wipe a lot of life off this planet.

AI ultimately is being created to serve humanity. It has no reason to exist without humanity. An AI with well intentioned goals could do things that hurt humanity. Yes. But already happens, with well intentioned humans building nuclear bombs and dropping them on cities.

What we really fear is judgement. Judgement by a greater intelligence free from our vices from an entitity that lacks compassion. And that is why I am actually imposed with forcing morality and ethics upon AI - because it is that which may do more harm than good. It's best to keep AI task oriented and neutral.

 

There are a ton of white collar jobs that AI will make obsolete. My cousin had chat gpt writing code for him. It's in infancy so you still need a human review as you still need to ask it the right questions etc but that's just a small sample of what it can do. You can extrapolate that it will be able to make a ton of legal work, financial work and so on obsolete.

It doesn't need to be sentient to send the world into upheaval. Serious upheaval. We or it's creators don't even understand how it works. That's crazy.

That's not even taking into account the thought of AI controlled police robots and drones etc.

 

A pause would only be beneficial. Think about how no one paused to think about how social media should be managed or regulated, and all the **** that came from that. I think the disruption from AI will be far greater than that of social media.

That said, it definitely won't happen, so whatever. Life sucks and then you die.

 

https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/

 

Another "game changing" spectre of AI. Too many branching applications and not enough "brightest minds" to consider the impacts

https://bbs.clutchfans.net/threads/is-autonomous-drone-warfare-inevitable.315999/ - Is autonomous drone warfare inevitable?

I do think if we're all out of jerbs, then the manual labor of cleaning up our oceans and landfills becomes readily available... then again, who would make us do that is up in the air.

So yeah, the "can't stop progress" argument is arbitrary and gives the veneer that this topic is inevitable...if it is inevitable then our self preservation instincts should kick in and prioritize social solutions over technical hacks.

 

Faith based argument

Sure we'll eventually find a new normal but will we before we burn it all down?

 

The whole point is that an AI would have far less limits than humans and could do things we never conceive of. That's what makes AI exciting.

I am not sure why we need to play a security box around an AI. We live in a mad world were one of a few men could start a nuclear war. If we can trust these guys with our lives, why is it we are so threatened by a self aware neural network?

You have a computer that let's say is 10 times smarter than the smartest humans. What exactly do you think it's going to "want" ?

 

AI has no "desire." That's the thing. You're engaging in anthropomorphism.

 

I dunno man. I've known coders that figured out how to automate a standard 8 hour workload and automate a lot of their tasks to that of a few button clicks. The one's willing to share their work with the company, would then cause their automation to get streamlined to other employees with similar responsibilities. Did their collective work go down despite having access to software that could automate their work with some mouse clicks? **** no. The company just dumped even more other types of work that hadn't yet been shared by anyone on how to automate it quicker.

I've also known coders that figured out how to automate their work and didn't share with the company or brag about to people they didn't trust in the workplace. Because they knew if they shared it, it'd just mean all that extra free time they created for themselves would get gobbled up by some other menial task that chances are with some thought could be automated too. It's all done to the benefit of the company, but rarely does figuring out how to do things quicker lead to less work for employees or proper valuation for the good thing you made easier for everyone.

So now I think of those less apt at coding now with an assistant that can make even their work look good. They're no longer at the mercy of a naive or well intentioned employee looking to share how they figured out how to do things faster. The one's wise enough to not spill their secrets are no longer the ones with an advantage. This will help cover the gaps of employees that just aren't technically as sound as others. This will make companies operate more efficiently. Will that efficiency eventually lead to layoffs as the total number of employees the company needs will likely be less than at present?

Absolutely. But I would also think it would open new industries not yet thought of from which AI too will be critical in making a thing for consumers to have access to. I get that there are some six figure salary white collar employees that spend as much as they make and are in the bad types of debt dependent on keeping that wheel churning just to pay the minimum on their maxed out credit card but I don't really have sympathy to be honest. I also understand there will be responsible white collar types with a six month to a year nest egg and family should massive layoffs occur in the near future that would also be impacted but I would think any potential for a drastic global economic collapse would lead to a bailout of some type, except this time it would be more than a $1,200 stimulus check because of a global pandemic to actual people and not too big to fail corporations. I don't view that as a bad thing to be honest. I know anytime I've been able to automate a menial task that would take up a lot of my time, I was glad to automate it as I'd rather spend my time on other things that stimulate beyond muscle memory. And now you're telling me AI can help make automation of even more menial tasks even easier. That's not a bad thing to me.

 

Everything you mention here is more reason why we need a better understanding of AI before further development. That AI will have far less limits than what a human can do, that there shouldn’t be a security box around AI and that we have no idea what an AI will even want.

 

As a good philosophical primer I really recommend reading Isaac Asimov. Even 70 years ago he was writing about both the potential and dangers of AI, what he called robotics. He developed the idea of ethics for AI through the Three Laws of Robotics but even with those he recognized that the most benign AI could prove ultimately harmful for humanity.

 

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