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Anger, Anxiety and Agency

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Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#51

Post by tolerance »

jjulius wrote: post #35
tolerance wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People typically do not approach existential uncertainties with such intrepidness. I think this is the case for most people who hate AI. This article glosses over that.

I suppose I am one of the people who could technically be lumped into the "hate AI" category, and yet I find myself incredibly comfortable with the uncertainty around where things are going. Perhaps it's because, as I previously mentioned, I have always enjoyed the feeling of uncertainty (and I recognize that's not the norm for most), but it's also because the entire thing feels so hyperbolic from all angles that I c…

No, I think that you're on to something and I wish you kept the original version of this part of your comment (yes I caught your edit and have it on my clipboard still!) because it touched on what I think about the whole "existential" bit of my own comment a bit more direct (but I think your edit expresses your attitude more sophisticatedly).

Few people have anything that comes anywhere near any sort of philosophical foundation that they can rely on to weather their anxieties. If anything they only strengthen their sensibility to express—and compound—their worries.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#52

Post by teyopi »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #5

> Even if you don’t find what’s happening right now exciting, you can at least find it interesting I can't get myself to stop finding it terrifying When I think about my future I am scared . Not uncertain. Not merely anxious. Definitely not excited. I'm quite frightened. In fairness, I think I'm a bit of an outlier. I already felt my place in society was fairly tenuous. I struggle to make friends. I don't feel I fit…

Hey, just wanted to say you're not alone in this.

I have pretty similar feelings to what you are going through.

I was so stressed like seven or eight months ago that for two weeks I was constantly sleep deprived. Then I just asked myself "What is the worst that can happen?" The answer helped me relax a bit. I will just move to some small village somewhere, open a shop for anything and get by. Life will go on.

I seriously think software is / was hard. That means people that thrived in it were smart and disciplined.

And which other profession has so much change? My father is a civil engineer. The tools and formulas he uses has not changed in 50 years while I have to pick up whatever hype tech is asked of me. Many people are similar to me. So we are very adaptable in my most honest opinion.

If it comes to _worst of it_, smart and adaptable people is where I would put my bet on being able to find their footing in the new world.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#53

Post by qsort »

tptacek wrote: post #20
strken wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're redirecting an increasingly large portion of the world's R&D funding into building data centres to run LLMs which can barely speak English ("Good observation - that's the pivot point. I'll land the load bearing backstop.") and which turn what should be 100 lines of code into 4000. The end result for me has been that I am now a gatekeeper trying to prevent AI slop making its way into systems which I care about,…

LLMs write samey English that is of significantly higher quality than the median literate native speaker. There's a difference between obnoxious writing and bad writing, and when you claim LLMs can "barely speak English" you've run off the rhetorical cliff of your argument.

I agree with you contra GP that "barely speak English" wildly misrepresents LLM capabilities, but I think they don't write very well, and your characterization is also an overstatement. They often use stylistic elements that don't make sense in context: pointless metaphors, abuse of bullet points and tables when a simple paragraph would do, excessive parataxis, misplaced emphasis, dense technical prose even when unnecessary, occasionally weird word choices.

Those problems are much worse in languages other than English, by the way. I'm not a native speaker but I always interact with LLMs in English because their prose in Italian is terrible, it often reads as though the text had been written in English and then translated.

Obviously there's nothing wrong with each of those stylistic elements in abstract, exactly like there's nothing wrong with em-dashes or the word "absolutely", but I would argue that writing well means choosing styles that match the content; what LLMs appear to be doing instead is forcing the message into a default pattern, which we percieve as forced and therefore tend to dislike.

To be clear: their writing is fine. The primary goal of writing is to convey meaning, and LLMs have been perfectly adequate at that pretty much from day one. I can get over their quirks.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#54

Post by BeetleB »

IHLayman wrote: post #16

Wait wait wait. I don’t accept this premise: “But anger is different from anxiety because anger needs to be directed somewhere.” Citation needed; where did this come from? I think it is very possible to be angry without a source or obvious target of that anger; IANAP but my 10-minute googles could not find any authority in the field that would claim this statement. From the perspective of the article, it seems that n…

> Also, I don’t see any use in saying someone shouldn’t be angry or anxious in a particular situation.

If you make a statement like that, I will have to ask you to reread the article. He's clear in saying:

1. Anger and anxiety should not be conflated.

2. Anxiety is OK.

> You can’t control your emotions like that.

The thesis (by him and other sources I've read) is that anger is an emotion that you do create (most of the time). It's a result of a narrative coupled with another emotion (anxiety in this case). You can't control the anxiety. You can control the narrative in your brain. With certain narratives, you get anger. With others, you don't.

I've known many who've made that journey. It seems the author has as well.

Now if your argument is that it's OK to be angry (you've made the narrative clear in your comment), I won't disagree.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#56

Post by cindyllm »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #32

I was taught that anger isn't an emotion. It's a reaction -a defensive surge of adrenaline, binary thinking, and motivation to fight. It can feel empowering and energizing. We aren't just sitting here. We're gonna do something . The emotion is fear. Anger is just a reaction to fear. Basically, if we are angry, we are also scared; whether or not we want to admit it. It's a long topic, and one I know well (I agree with…

[dead]

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#57

Post by dogleash »

There's something that really rubs me the wrong way when people use the language of healthy emotional regulation to spread unearned and unjustified placation.

It reminds me of (for the pedants out there, I'm not saying it's equivalent to) the consume product meme. "Don't ask questions, just complete assignment and then get excited for next industry trend."

>I don’t know what the future of this industry will look like, and I don’t know who will benefit from it and I don’t think I’m alone with that. However I can only urge anyone who feels anger and looks for a villain right to instead remain curious instead. To be curious enough to understand what is changing, excited enough to experiment with it. And then, from what we learn, earn the right to decide when resistance is warranted and where to direct it.

Sounds pleasant and vaguely inspirational. Then you read it again and notice guy thinks I don't always have the RIGHT to DECIDE to RESIST.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#58

Post by mawadev »

Anger seems to me is a form of self protection, splitting from frustration and articulation of one's own needs. If frustration reaches a certain threshold, anger pops up and explodes. Happy to read what everyone thinks about this

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#59

Post by tptacek »

qsort wrote: post #53
tptacek wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LLMs write samey English that is of significantly higher quality than the median literate native speaker. There's a difference between obnoxious writing and bad writing, and when you claim LLMs can "barely speak English" you've run off the rhetorical cliff of your argument.

I agree with you contra GP that "barely speak English" wildly misrepresents LLM capabilities, but I think they don't write very well, and your characterization is also an overstatement. They often use stylistic elements that don't make sense in context: pointless metaphors, abuse of bullet points and tables when a simple paragraph would do, excessive parataxis, misplaced emphasis, dense technical prose even when unne…

The bar they set was "barely speaks English".

The bar I set was "significantly higher quality than the median literate native speaker".

The bar you're setting is expert use of metaphors, restrained use of bullets and tables and parataxis, proper emphasis, and avoiding dense technical prose.

I suspect you have a higher opinion of the median literate speaker than is warranted.

Re: Anger, Anxiety and Agency

#60

Post by Undulating-Appa »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #32

I was taught that anger isn't an emotion. It's a reaction -a defensive surge of adrenaline, binary thinking, and motivation to fight. It can feel empowering and energizing. We aren't just sitting here. We're gonna do something . The emotion is fear. Anger is just a reaction to fear. Basically, if we are angry, we are also scared; whether or not we want to admit it. It's a long topic, and one I know well (I agree with…

-> I was taught that anger isn't an emotion. It's a reaction

After spending the last year in and out or rehab, and intensive outpatient dealing primarily with alcohol addiction, I've been told by many different people that anger is the emotion, its unhealthy to just ignore it. That's one of many things (anxiety for me) that keeps people in active addiction. Your statement is close to my belief and experience, except that Anger IS an emotion and all emotions are neutral, neither good or bad. Its how you respond to the emotion that can become the problem, weather its violence, drugs or any other harmful activity. Processing any emotion in a healthy way and being able to understand the reasons you feeling the emotion is the gamechanger. Speaking only from my own experience.

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