Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does it matter in 2026?
In constitutional / jurisdictional / legal terms, perhaps not. In forming consensus about the philosophical underpinnings of the rights we have with respect to the emerging internet? I think so.
AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
181–190 of 280 posts
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#182Yep, that's horrifying. Imagine LLMs not just denying information about, to intentionally choose a hot button example, abortions but also invisibly logging a black mark against the asker for thoughtcrime/precrime because the current ruling party has baked their ideology into law. [EDIT] Imagine subtle injection of biases into responses that support the agenda of the current ruling party and failing to include any cou…
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#183Going all the way in is talking to it about planning a mass shooting. Or producing a nuclear device or bioweapon. Sure, the knowledge itself isn't dangerous unless combined with other traditional behaviors like acquiring certain materials, but maybe there should be a line. Living free shouldn't be a suicide pact.
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
Has AI yet been a serious problem?
Yes, repeatedly, since well before this particular AI summer. One previous attempt at AI was "expert systems", and while the term fell out of use it's functionally about the same as basically all modern business systems, and doing that wrong led to a lot of people being prosecuted for crimes they didn't commit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal If you insist on learning systems, all AB testing…
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
And our robots still look far from capable of changing bike tires...
That's not OP's contention though; it's that models are incapable of even surfacing sufficient information. This doesn't pass the smell test. To wit, here is ChatGPT's "superintelligent" answer: https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a52b4a322bc81919308ec864a0cc056 Seems like a perfectly cromulent description by which a beginner could probably change a tire, perhaps with a few follow-ups to understand what certain components are.
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
He made specific predictions about what problems AI would cause, not just a vague "AI will be dangerous". Those specific predictions were entirely incorrect; they both said that things would happen that didn't, and failed to foresee any of the actual problems with AI that have happened.
Yudkowsky said AI would be a problem when very few people taken seriously in the mainstream were saying it was going to be a problem. Saying "specific predictions are wrong" is missing the forest for the trees here.
People pushed back against his AI doom claims not because the idea that AI could be bad was unthinkable (just look at literally every SF story from the last 50 years featuring AI?), but because he specifically was worried about AI becoming God. That is no closer to happening than it was 30 years ago.
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
Has AI yet been a serious problem?
Yes, repeatedly, since well before this particular AI summer. One previous attempt at AI was "expert systems", and while the term fell out of use it's functionally about the same as basically all modern business systems, and doing that wrong led to a lot of people being prosecuted for crimes they didn't commit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal If you insist on learning systems, all AB testing…
Sounds like corporations can have bad motivations, and can make bad software - no AI required.
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#188Yep, that's horrifying. Imagine LLMs not just denying information about, to intentionally choose a hot button example, abortions but also invisibly logging a black mark against the asker for thoughtcrime/precrime because the current ruling party has baked their ideology into law. [EDIT] Imagine subtle injection of biases into responses that support the agenda of the current ruling party and failing to include any cou…
[0] e.g. https://docs.bswen.com/blog/2026-03-21-detect-claude-hidden-... , https://www.anthropic.com/news/building-safeguards-for-claud... , https://www.techtimes.com/articles/319415/20260701/claude-co...
[1] e.g. https://support.claude.com/en/articles/14604842-real-time-cy...
[2] https://support.claude.com/en/articles/14328960-identity-ver...
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would have been very hesitant to run the “just killed wife“ test given that ChatGPT will indeed flag your account and if a certain threshold is crossed, escalate to humans, who will presumably contact authorities to avoid this happening again: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cq6je7e80r7o Obviously a certain percentage of the user base is running lurid hypotheticals through the system all the time, but I don’t dou…
> ChatGPT will indeed flag your account Oh no, I'll have to spin up a new e-mail address...
https://support.claude.com/en/articles/14328960-identity-ver...
> Being responsible with powerful technology starts with knowing who is using it.
Shiver.
Re: AI 2040 and the cult of intelligence
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yudkowsky said AI would be a problem when very few people taken seriously in the mainstream were saying it was going to be a problem. Saying "specific predictions are wrong" is missing the forest for the trees here.
To strain the metaphor, there's no trees! Yudkowsky predicted that there'd be a forest but it's actually grassland and you're saying that he's right because there's plants. AI has not developed in even slightly the way he claimed it would develop, none of the problems he said AI would cause have happened, and a bunch of things he never even thought of have happened. People pushed back against his AI doom claims not b…