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I resigned from OpenAI

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Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#131

Post by pembrook »

kennywinker wrote: post #16

Anybody who stays at openai is signing on to build machines that will be used to kill innocent people and control people who think that’s a bad idea.

Anyone who leaves OpenAI is also signing the death warrant of countless young soldiers by refusing to help build the technology to help remove humans from old school combat.

The current state of affairs of modern warfare is: lots of deaths, lots of collateral damage.

Improving the technology used is more likely to lead to less collateral deaths of innocent people and your own soldiers as well.

There’s already enough weapons to blow the entire world up a thousand times over. Making armies smarter about how they use these deadly weapons is a good thing.

Technologists and intellectuals are notoriously terrible at these sorts of broader societal calculations. They all thought the internet and Social Media would obviously lead to global freedom, which it didn’t.

Now technologists think their new thing, AI coding/spreadsheet bots, will destroy the global economy and kill us all or lead to communist techno-utopia. What if we stop with the moralistic grandstanding and self-aggrandizement and take a deep breath. None of the overpaid pontificators at OpenAI has ever seen real combat, so to make confident claims about what nascent technology will do to it is silly.

This whole thread is going to age like milk.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#132

Post by kelseyfrog »

Towaway69 wrote: post #126
kelseyfrog wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that's the result. My question is, given that result, why continue to have them if they don't influence one's choices? You're making a case that our current economic system is incompatible with having morals.

Morals are there so that folks go to church with their families on Sunday, have an affair with their sectaries during the week and drink too much with their mates on Friday night because they feel bad about their moral choices.

You're saying the purpose of morals is not to inform choice making, but to make people feel bad?

Why have them then? The conclusion doesn't follow from the premise.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#133

Post by kennywinker »

pembrook wrote: post #131
kennywinker wrote: post #16

Anybody who stays at openai is signing on to build machines that will be used to kill innocent people and control people who think that’s a bad idea.

Anyone who leaves OpenAI is also signing the death warrant of countless young soldiers by refusing to help build the technology to help remove humans from old school combat. The current state of affairs of modern warfare is: lots of deaths, lots of collateral damage. Improving the technology used is more likely to lead to less collateral deaths of innocent people and your own soldiers as well. There’s already enough…

And how exactly does collaborating with the US gov on mass surveillance of citizens help save the lives of young soldiers?

But ok, let’s stick to weapons. The premise that we can wage war without sacrificing lives is a tantalizing one. But do you genuinely think that would prevent death? The drone warfare era under bush and obama shows that killing from afar with no skin in the game doesn’t lead to restraint or lack of war. It just leads to blowing up entire wedding parties.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#134

Post by pembrook »

kennywinker wrote: post #133
pembrook wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone who leaves OpenAI is also signing the death warrant of countless young soldiers by refusing to help build the technology to help remove humans from old school combat. The current state of affairs of modern warfare is: lots of deaths, lots of collateral damage. Improving the technology used is more likely to lead to less collateral deaths of innocent people and your own soldiers as well. There’s already enough…

And how exactly does collaborating with the US gov on mass surveillance of citizens help save the lives of young soldiers? But ok, let’s stick to weapons. The premise that we can wage war without sacrificing lives is a tantalizing one. But do you genuinely think that would prevent death? The drone warfare era under bush and obama shows that killing from afar with no skin in the game doesn’t lead to restraint or lack…

Do you realize that prior to drones, we would just carpet bomb entire cities?

Collateral damage would be the entirety of the city itself and a huge percentage of the people in it, not just a wedding party.

Also, China is doing mass surveillance just fine without OpenAI. So this is an irrelevant, mute point.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#135

Post by kennywinker »

Towaway69 wrote: post #101
kennywinker wrote: post #16

Anybody who stays at openai is signing on to build machines that will be used to kill innocent people and control people who think that’s a bad idea.

> Anybody who stays at openai And paying off their mortgage and feeding their families and has a job in unstable times. Morals come a distant last in the current state of affairs.

Unstable times. What on earth happened recently to make software engineer an unstable job…?

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#136

Post by tdeck »

Towaway69 wrote: post #101
kennywinker wrote: post #16

Anybody who stays at openai is signing on to build machines that will be used to kill innocent people and control people who think that’s a bad idea.

> Anybody who stays at openai And paying off their mortgage and feeding their families and has a job in unstable times. Morals come a distant last in the current state of affairs.

I'm sorry but with this justification anything that makes you money can be justified. You can pay the mortgage by robbing a bank too, and that's likely to get fewer people killed.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#137

Post by kennywinker »

pembrook wrote: post #134
kennywinker wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how exactly does collaborating with the US gov on mass surveillance of citizens help save the lives of young soldiers? But ok, let’s stick to weapons. The premise that we can wage war without sacrificing lives is a tantalizing one. But do you genuinely think that would prevent death? The drone warfare era under bush and obama shows that killing from afar with no skin in the game doesn’t lead to restraint or lack…

Do you realize that prior to drones, we would just carpet bomb entire cities? Collateral damage would be the entirety of the city itself and a huge percentage of the people in it, not just a wedding party. Also, China is doing mass surveillance just fine without OpenAI. So this is an irrelevant, mute point.

When we chose to go to war, carpet bombing was common, yes. But would Obama have gone to war in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan if he hadn’t had drones? The choice to go to war is influenced by the tech you have.

> Also, China is doing mass surveillance just fine without OpenAI. So this is an irrelevant, mute point.

The east german stasi was doing mass surveillance just fine without computers… yet they couldn’t implement what china has done. We have yet to see the full reality of what AI-enabled mass surveillance looks like - but what the stasi did, and what china does, will look like freedom compared to what is coming.

Also just fyi it’s “moot” point not “mute” point.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#138

Post by tdeck »

sudo_cowsay wrote: post #37
mrcwinn wrote: post #28

Good for Caitlin. Sam Altman is awful. He literally admitted on Twitter that they rushed their military contract to get it done. Are you kidding me? You rushed your military contract? Any employee who stays, especially given the financial cushion they have, is complicit. Shame on all of them. But here’s the sad truth: most of the knowledge workers at OpenAI won’t be of any value sometime soon because of the very tool…

You cant just blame everyone at OpenAI Everyone has their own unique situation

Bullshit. What people have are excuses they make for themselves, and they don't need our help.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#139

Post by blub »

nozzlegear wrote: post #94
OhioMan2943 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vietnam war, iraq war, afghanistan war, iran war, gaza war, allowing iraq to get and use chemical weapons on iran, forced regime change in south america (then and now). Get real it's not equivalent in any way

How can you say the Uyghur genocide isn't "equivalent" to the things you listed? What math are you using to compare them? How do you compare regime change in South America to Uyghur genocide, for example? Is there a spreadsheet somewhere that lists the value you're placing on lives, war and geopolitical actions, in order to make a fair comparison?

The UN has released a report on human rights abuses in China, but has not called these a genocide. The more credible accusations of genocide came from a handful of political bodies in Western countries, but crucially the acting governments have not defined it as such.

There’s absolutely no consensus that the legal definition is met, in contrast with another ongoing situation which enjoys wide recognition.

It feels that this is more a geopolitical cudgel, pulled out when the discourse against the US becomes negative. But given the events in the last years, this seems like a lost cause even in the West, never-mind the rest of the world.

Re: I resigned from OpenAI

#140

Post by pembrook »

kennywinker wrote: post #137
pembrook wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you realize that prior to drones, we would just carpet bomb entire cities? Collateral damage would be the entirety of the city itself and a huge percentage of the people in it, not just a wedding party. Also, China is doing mass surveillance just fine without OpenAI. So this is an irrelevant, mute point.

When we chose to go to war, carpet bombing was common, yes. But would Obama have gone to war in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan if he hadn’t had drones? The choice to go to war is influenced by the tech you have. > Also, China is doing mass surveillance just fine without OpenAI. So this is an irrelevant, mute point. The east german stasi was doing mass surveillance just fine without computers… yet they coul…

I’d make the choice to live in modern China instead of the GDR under the stasi every single time, without hesitation.
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