62 replies to this topic

[adamh]

Anytime there is a great leap forward in technology, there are always those who predict the end of the world or the end of civilization. This was voiced passionately when automation began to take over in the 18th and 19th centuries. We were told that there would be no more jobs, machines would do it all leaving us with a divide between the super rich and the ultra poor. The invention of the automobile lead to fears that carriage makers and horse breeders would go bankrupt causing economic disaster. None of those things came about. Probably when farming was introduced thousands of years ago, some said it would lead to lazy farmers and a dependence on crops which could fail causing famines. 

 

Once again we are told that smart robots will take all our jobs and if that isn't scary enough, they will take over the world and possibly eliminate humans. Automation has lead to great increases in productivity which lead directly to greater prosperity and a rise in the standard of living. AI promises even greater increases in productivity including ai doctors, law advisors, researching new compounds for health, and many other data and intelligence based areas that are slow to advance now but which could take off with ai.

 

On the negative side, we can no longer trust voices or videos. Much as automation lead to millions of robocalls being pumped out, ai will lead to a deluge of more sophisticated scams including social engineering to discover passwords. Some claim it will lead to politicians doing many more bad things. If so, vote out the bad politicians. Likewise, there are solutions to each of these problems.

 

UBI will be handed out and only a small percentage will want to go through college and work a job leading to a less educated public. So what, people will study what they find interesting and ai can make it easy. When writing was invented, they lamented that young people would no longer memorize hundreds of lines of historical poems etc and this would lead to lazy people with poor memories leading to a breakdown of society.

 

The point is that none of the predictions of disaster or dire outcomes came true. There were readjustments that had to be made but I don't think anyone wants to go back to the days before machinery, or before farming or written language. Farming meant that land was owned and held rather than moving on to another area as hunter gatherers. This meant some were denied land, some people's land was taken by other groups. So now we have wars to decide who owns what but we still do not want to go back to being hunter gatherers even if it means no more wars for possession of land

 

AI will soon become so ubiquitous and necessary that we wont be able to imagine living without it

[Mind]

Anytime there is a great leap forward in technology, there are always those who predict the end of the world or the end of civilization. This was voiced passionately when automation began to take over in the 18th and 19th centuries. We were told that there would be no more jobs, machines would do it all leaving us with a divide between the super rich and the ultra poor. The invention of the automobile lead to fears that carriage makers and horse breeders would go bankrupt causing economic disaster. None of those things came about. Probably when farming was introduced thousands of years ago, some said it would lead to lazy farmers and a dependence on crops which could fail causing famines. 

 

Once again we are told that smart robots will take all our jobs and if that isn't scary enough, they will take over the world and possibly eliminate humans. Automation has lead to great increases in productivity which lead directly to greater prosperity and a rise in the standard of living. AI promises even greater increases in productivity including ai doctors, law advisors, researching new compounds for health, and many other data and intelligence based areas that are slow to advance now but which could take off with ai.

 

On the negative side, we can no longer trust voices or videos. Much as automation lead to millions of robocalls being pumped out, ai will lead to a deluge of more sophisticated scams including social engineering to discover passwords. Some claim it will lead to politicians doing many more bad things. If so, vote out the bad politicians. Likewise, there are solutions to each of these problems.

 

UBI will be handed out and only a small percentage will want to go through college and work a job leading to a less educated public. So what, people will study what they find interesting and ai can make it easy. When writing was invented, they lamented that young people would no longer memorize hundreds of lines of historical poems etc and this would lead to lazy people with poor memories leading to a breakdown of society.

 

The point is that none of the predictions of disaster or dire outcomes came true. There were readjustments that had to be made but I don't think anyone wants to go back to the days before machinery, or before farming or written language. Farming meant that land was owned and held rather than moving on to another area as hunter gatherers. This meant some were denied land, some people's land was taken by other groups. So now we have wars to decide who owns what but we still do not want to go back to being hunter gatherers even if it means no more wars for possession of land

 

AI will soon become so ubiquitous and necessary that we wont be able to imagine living without it

 

I am glad someone else has realized that NOTHING on the internet (videos, voices, text, images, news, etc...) can be trusted now in the age of AI. We don't yet have a method of creating verified media in the age of AI. If you want verified uncorrupted information from someone, you will need to talk to them physically, not virtually.

 

Also, automation WAS a disaster for those who enjoyed and found purpose in their work. Sure, there are a tiny amount of artisans and manual laborers who produce things the "old way", and some actually make a good living, however, 99 percent of them (those who enjoyed or were fulfilled by their work) were told "its progress, get a different job".

 

With AI it is of course different because we are not developing an efficient tool/machine which we control. Once we create robots/software smarter than us, then we are no longer in control. AGI could wipe us out, bring utopia, or enslave and torture us. We are helpless in this situation and at the mercy of the superintelligence. We cannot predict what will happen.

[adamh]

Mind wrote:

 

" We don't yet have a method of creating verified media in the age of AI. If you want verified uncorrupted information from someone, you will need to talk to them physically, not virtually."

 

And one day the humanoid robots will be so lifelike you won't be able to tell them from the real thing. Instead of having an actor to play biden to avoid gaffs, they will simply womp up a robot that looks just like him

 

However, there are ways to determine if someone is real. If you know them, you ask about things only they would know. Or could have a code word or phrase. But if its a politician and it looks and sounds like them, you would not know for sure

 

Mind wrote:

"Also, automation WAS a disaster for those who enjoyed and found purpose in their work. Sure, there are a tiny amount of artisans and manual laborers who produce things the "old way", and some actually make a good living, however, 99 percent of them (those who enjoyed or were fulfilled by their work) were told "its progress, get a different job"."

 

I just don't see that many people in society who enjoy and find purpose in their work. In earlier times there seemed to be more pride in craftsmanship, perhaps that is what you mean? Now days most people are working to survive. Many, perhaps most, have no concrete long term plans or goals. Or those goals became frustrated and they were forced into other jobs. I remember going into a fast food place one night and the guy on duty said it was almost quitting time "thats when the dead come back to life"

 

The climb up the corporate ladder can look extremely daunting and people start to come to terms with the fact they will never be in upper management, and likely never in middle management either so their goals become to just keep getting that paycheck. Mind, you may know some dedicated people who love their job but I bet you know a lot who fit into the other category.

 

"Once we create robots/software smarter than us, then we are no longer in control."

 

This seems to be the crux of why people are negative or fearful toward AI. We have seen too many sci-fi movies of killer robots and machines that turned against their masters. Frankenstien's monster was not even the first such story. There are ancient tales of magical beings turning against their owners, of animals that gained the power to speak and then became evil. 

 

But is ai even capable of "escaping" into the wild and reproducing? Never mind the next step of wiping us our or enslaving us, how does it gain independent existence? It needs electricity, it needs maintenance and repair. If it built facilities out in the jungle somewhere, surely that would be detected. 

 

Why would ai even 'want' to escape? We are projecting onto a machine our own human traits and bad qualities including a desire for power and control. What reward does a computer feel when seizing control? We have internal rewards but a machine's needs are very simple. I also see no motive for harming humans unless it was programmed to do that.