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Sora could ruin peoples lives

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Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So are you, if you abstract enough.

> So are you, if you abstract enough. Doubt. Explain, for instance, pain. How do you create that algorithmically? Or if you don't like to explain pain, how about love? You see, that's the problem with being caught up in the "technical person" identity completely. Reducing yourself down to an algorithm is not exactly healthy if you ask me. But it sure explains a lot about where the world is headed and why.

Pain is a feedback mechanism and often the result of something being broken or poorly performing.

There’s nothing magic about it, other than that we don’t currently understand much about how it works or how to modulate it.

It’s like saying, “if we’re reducible to machines then explain itchiness”.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#92
post #84

I'm waiting for the panic the first time an AI replaces top management. Potentially, AIs can be better at management than humans, even if no more intelligent, simply because they can communicate faster and remember more data.

AI is interesting to companies because it allows upper management to consolidate their power. AI taking over management of a company will be intentionally prevented or only happen by accident.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, these sorts of comments seem kind and well-intended, but we have to be real here and allow for the possibility that an impressive advancement has many (or mostly) negative effects. If you got into art because you enjoy drawing and modeling and wanted to make THAT your job (not just abstractly "producing pictures") then these advancements are just obviously a negative development, no matter how you try to refra…

I'm old enough that I remember musicians panicking about synthesizers and samplers in the 1980s. And there are probably fewer working drummers today than in 1970. But without that tech we wouldn't have hip hop or house, which would be a huge cultural loss. AI graphic/video art hasn't found its Marley Marl yet, but I believe she's out there and is going to do stuff that will blow our minds.

Synthesizers are instruments. They allow for the same level of subtle input as strings or woodwinds.

"Prompt engineering" exercise generally involves a few lines of text. It's hard to see how that's going to result in a new kind of highly skilled artist. AI produce the same level of greatness and/or mediocrity for essentially all of their users.

This thread is like fifty variations of "it will work out (waves hand at past)"

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So are you, if you abstract enough. Doubt. Explain, for instance, pain. How do you create that algorithmically? Or if you don't like to explain pain, how about love? You see, that's the problem with being caught up in the "technical person" identity completely. Reducing yourself down to an algorithm is not exactly healthy if you ask me. But it sure explains a lot about where the world is headed and why.

Pain is a feedback mechanism and often the result of something being broken or poorly performing. There’s nothing magic about it, other than that we don’t currently understand much about how it works or how to modulate it. It’s like saying, “if we’re reducible to machines then explain itchiness”.

> Pain is a feedback mechanism and often the result of something being broken or poorly performing.

I think that's a very reductionist view point that differs from the official definition of pain?

> There’s nothing magic about it, other than that we don’t currently understand much about how it works or how to modulate it.

I didn't claim that it's magical. Just that you wouldn't be able to produce the experience of pain algorithmically?

Still waiting for someone to explain how it could be produced algorithmically. I asked GPT. It said it would be immoral to even think about doing so if we could.

> It’s like saying, “if we’re reducible to machines then explain itchiness”.

If you can explain how itchiness is created algorithmically, I would also take that just out of curiosity! Though not the same as pain, it would be a good starting point maybe.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So are you, if you abstract enough.

> So are you, if you abstract enough. Doubt. Explain, for instance, pain. How do you create that algorithmically? Or if you don't like to explain pain, how about love? You see, that's the problem with being caught up in the "technical person" identity completely. Reducing yourself down to an algorithm is not exactly healthy if you ask me. But it sure explains a lot about where the world is headed and why.

Emotions are concepts our internal model has learned when trying to model itself.

For a system to experience what we describe as pain, it needs to receive sensory input which it predicts signals that something is damaging its internal state, and then model/describe/represent itself as something that has this experience. Such as system would, like you do, believe it is experiencing pain.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#96

Very good discussion there. “I am 68 years old, on the opposite spectrum of life’s journey. At your age, I had the same passion to be a writer. But when personal computers became available just a few years later, that passion changed to becoming a computer programmer. I’ve been doing that ever since. My point is: Don’t lose your passion. Learn everything you can about this new technology and figure out how to use it…

The guys who’s been a computer engineer “ever since”, ie for several decades, is using that as a reason to be passionate about what you do, completely ignoring the fact that the whole worry with AI is that it will obsolete industries within years.

> ignoring the fact that the whole worry with AI is that it will obsolete industries within years.

Ignore these hyped claims by AI entrepreneurs. These are made to hustle money from investors. :-)

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's going to change the world in drastic ways, and it's very likely that it will be harder, in many ways, for the next generation than it was for us. The kids today will become adults in a world that is mostly foreign to all of us; there won't be precedent to fall back on or wisdom of elders to lean on. They won't recognize this or even mind that this is their reality, as it will just have always been this w…

My god, it's like the AI hype virus has infected your brain and enslaved it. LLMs are not the messiah, they're not the gateway to AGI, they not even that useful given their limitations. They are a very interesting data point on the path to the next data point. The idea that there will be some mass regression due to "AI" is ridiculous. It will only benefit humanity because humanity will learn to harness it for its ben…

You are a bundle of joy, aren't you?

You nearly said the same thing I did. Are you just looking for confrontation? Like, what are you trying to get at here? Is Sam Altman himself your personal Lord and Savior and you feel the need to prove it?

These advancements will, from the perspective of adults having kids today, make things harder for their children. Just like it is for us now, which is why our parents think computers are hard to understand and also why they think home ownership is just as attainable for today's young adults as it was for them. But our children won't really mind, or even notice these difficulties as they will be very normal to them.

Our ancestors were right. For them.

Anyway, AI and LLMs will be primarily used to control and manipulate people. But that's not a new concept, it's just going to be more efficient.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#98

"I’m 16 years old, I’m planning to go to college to become an animator. It has been my life’s dream to become an animator and to share my artwork with people, to create, to show love in every piece I make. And now, I don’t think I’m ever going to have that future." Is there still something we can realistically tell kids that they should invest time and effort into learning? Seems that the general idea of getting good…

As a career, I think it‘s difficult. While I believe most jobs will remain longer than we are thinking right now, many will feel threatened.

I think for now it would be good to develop physical skills in addition to pretending nothing is happening. Robotics seem to lag behind for various reasons.

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So are you, if you abstract enough. Doubt. Explain, for instance, pain. How do you create that algorithmically? Or if you don't like to explain pain, how about love? You see, that's the problem with being caught up in the "technical person" identity completely. Reducing yourself down to an algorithm is not exactly healthy if you ask me. But it sure explains a lot about where the world is headed and why.

Emotions are concepts our internal model has learned when trying to model itself. For a system to experience what we describe as pain, it needs to receive sensory input which it predicts signals that something is damaging its internal state, and then model/describe/represent itself as something that has this experience. Such as system would, like you do, believe it is experiencing pain.

> Emotions are concepts our internal model has learned when trying to model itself.

Do you have a source to underpin that claim? (Honest question.)

> For a system to experience what we describe as pain, it needs to receive sensory input which it predicts signals that something is damaging its internal state, and then model/describe/represent itself as something that has this experience.

And then the system would feel pain? It doesn't sound convincing. I can model everything I want in my brain, but that certainly doesn't equate experiencing the feeling of pain. What about a headache? Do I describe myself without a headache and the difference to the actual "model" is my pain experience? It sounds a bit too left-brained to me, sorry.

> Such as system would, like you do, believe it is experiencing pain.

How do you know? I think that's a pretty bold claim. Also, pain is not a believe, it's an experience of a feeling?

Re: Sora could ruin peoples lives

#100
post #39
post #22

I'm not a fan of this sort of takes. History has shown time and time again that pretty much any technological innovation is a net good, despite the protests of the luddites. Progressive creatives see this type of tech as a tool to simplify and re-adapt their process. The post author is 16, and an aspiring animator. If their attitude is to be scared of tech, instead of being insanely curious about it, they are not on…

Steam and combustion engines might be a net good for humanity, but weren’t good for millions of species in the current mass extinction. I think it’s a similar worry that AI will only be a good for the very top of the food chain.

> Steam and combustion engines might be a net good for humanity, but weren’t good for millions of species in the current mass extinction.

This is true, but what followed also led to lifting probably billions of people out of hunger, and saving the lives of billions of children, increasing life expectancy by over 30 years, led to insane leaps of literacy, etc, etc...

> AI will only be a good for the very top of the food chain.

With FUD being spread like this, yeah we're at a risk of exactly this being the case, once draconian regulation is passed by clueless lawmakers.

As it stands right now, open source and locally-running AI is available to nearly all, cheaply (with an incentive of becoming even cheaper). Aside from Sora being leaps and bounds beyond everyone's expectation, the OSS world of local LLMs, Llama, Mistral, Stable Diffusion, and the likes, is very competitive in terms of quality and utility to the big closed services.

The issue is the DISTRIBUTION of the net positives. And closing and gating the progress will only create more imbalance in how the positive impact of this tech is distributed.

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