[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 36 points 2 months ago

Despite what the tech companies say, there are absolutely techniques for identifying the sources of their data, and there are absolutely techniques for good faith data removal upon request. I know this, because I've worked on such projects before on some of the less major tech companies that make some effort to abide by European laws.

The trick is, it costs money, and the economics shift such that one must eventually begin to do things like audit and curate. The shape and size of your business, plus how you address your markets, gains nuance that doesn't work when your entire business model is smooth, mindless amotirizing of other people's data.

But I don't envy these tech companies, or the increasing absurd stories they must tell to hide the truth. A handsome sword hangs above their heads.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 15 points 2 months ago

Is this what competing product releases look like now? Illya runs off and promises to "never release any software until it's superintelligent" and I guess that forces Sam to compete for debt by promises to release software AND superintelligence?

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 21 points 2 months ago

Out of my sample of Anime fans who actively participate in the hobby and spend money on it,

100% of them hate genAI primarily because, and I quote, "if I pay you $40 for something and it is exactly equivalent to what a $0.05 prompt garbage result would be, I won't pay you again."

Fans, the real fans, can tell. Like, this is their whole hobby brah.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 12 points 3 months ago

Honestly, Yes. The hardest thing for a rich person to do is spend their money. Eventually this catches up with them: to spend no money is to lose it comparatively, to spend money is to risk not getting it back. So a great deal of the money world revolves primarily around persuasion, and the very odd things that happen along the way.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 16 points 3 months ago

I don't get it. If scaling is all you need, what does a "cracked team" of 5 mean in the end? Nothing?

What's, the different between super intelligence being scaling, and super intelligence, being whatever happens? Can someone explain to me the difference between what is and what SUPER is? When someone gives me the definition of super intelligence as "the power to make anything happen," I always beg, again, "and how is that different precisely from not, that?"

The whole project is tautological.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 11 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

This kind of thing is a fluff piece, meant to be suggestive but ultimately saying nothing at all. There are many reasons to hate Bostrom, just read his words, but this is two philosophers who apparently need attention because they have nothing useful to say. All of Bostrom's points here could be summed up as "don't piss on things, generally speaking."

As for consciousness. Honestly, my brain turns off instantly when someone tries to make any point about consciousness. Seriously though, does anyone actually use the category of "conscious / unconscious" to make any decision?

I don't disrespect the dead (not conscious). I don't bother animals or insects when I have no business with them (conscious maybe not conscious?). I don't treat my furniture or clothes like shit, and am generally pleased they exist. (not conscious). When encountering something new or unusual, I just ask myself, "is it going to bite me?" first. (consciousness is irrelevant) I know some of my actions do harm either directly or indirectly to other things, such as eating, or consuming, or making mistakes, or being. But I don't assume myself a hero or arbiter of moral integrity, I merely acknowledge and do what I can. Again, consciousness kind of irrelevant.

Does anyone run consciousness litmus tests on their friends or associates first before interacting, ever? If so, does it sting?

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 18 points 3 months ago

Yeah, this lines up with what I have heard, too. There is always talk of new models, but even the stuff in the pipeline not yet released isn't that differentiable from the existing stuff.

The best explanation of strawberry is that it isn't any particular thing, it's rather a marketing and project framing, both internal and external, that amounts to... cost optimizations, and hype driving. Shift the goal posts, tell two stories: one is if we just get affordable enough, genAI in a loop really can do everything (probably much more modest, when genAI gets cheap enough by several means, it'll have several more modest and generally useful use cases, also won't have to be so legally grey). The other is that we're already there and one day you'll wake up and your brain won't be good enough to matter anymore, or something.

Again, this is apparently the future of software releases. :/

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 12 points 4 months ago

Their minds are open to all ideas, so long as the idea is a closed form solution that looks edgy.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 20 points 4 months ago

I kind of wonder if this whole movement of rationalists believing they can "just" make things better than people already in the field comes from the contracting sense that being rich and having an expensive educational background may in fact be less important than having background experience and situational context in the future, two things they loath?

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 17 points 4 months ago

It's... it's almost as if the law about shareholder value as intended as a metaphor for accountability, not a literal, reductive claim that results in ouroboros. Almost like, our economic system is supposed to be a means, not an end in of itself?

No. Definitely can't be that.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 21 points 4 months ago

If they squeeze this rock hard enough, maybe it'll bleed.

[-] imadabouzu@awful.systems 12 points 4 months ago

It's the same story as has ever been. "Smart People"'s position on anything is often informed by their current economic relationship wrt to the things they care about. And maybe even Yud isn't super happy about his profession being co-opted. What scraps will he have if his own delusions became true about GPT zombies replacing "authentic voices"?

No one is immune to seeing a better take when it's their shit on the line, and no is immune from being in a bubble without stake.

view more: next ›

imadabouzu

joined 5 months ago