TechTakes

I read both of these and what struck me was how both studies felt remarkably naive. I found myself thinking: "there's no way the authors have any background in the humanities". Turns out there's 2 authors, lo and behold, both with computer science degrees. This might explain why it feels like they're somehow incredulous at the results - they've approached the problem as evaluating a system's fitness in a vacuum.

But it's not a system in a vacuum. It's a vacuum that has sucked up our social system, sold to bolster the social standing of the heads of a social construct.

Had they looked at the context of how AI has been marketed, as an authoritative productivity booster, they might have had some idea why both disempowerment and reduced mastery could be occurring: The participants were told to work fast and consult the AI. What a shock that people took the responses seriously and didn't have time to learn!

I'd ask why Anthropic had computer scientists conducting sociological research, but I assume this part of output has just been published to assuage criticism of trust and safety practices. The final result will probably be adding another line of 'if query includes medical term then print "always ask a doctor first"' to the system prompt.

This constant vacillation between "it's a revolution and changes our entire reality!" and "you can't trust it and you need to do your own research" from the AI companies is fucking tiresome. You can't have it both ways.