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Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

gatesnotes.com

211–220 of 243 posts

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#211

> I doubt I would have put in the same work if I had had an AI companion back then. They talk to you in ways you’re already comfortable with. They don’t push you outside your comfort zone. They are always available and never get mad at you. This gives them the potential to become highly addictive and to rob us of the lessons we learn from connecting with other people. I've been waiting for a long, long time for us to…

Anecdotally, I find AIs, and the doom and gloom they will cause, are great water cooler conversation topics that engages most of the team. However, ever since the advent of LLMs developers have stopped speaking of programming languages and software technologies almost entirely. The number of conversations on manual crafts, artistic endeavors and entrepreneurship has gone up.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#212
post #30
post #13

> We have to think now about how to reduce job losses so that everyone can share in the prosperity that AI creates. And I thought he is a smart man. This is so last century thinking. We need to prepare that there will definitely be no jobs for everyone and that will be falling all the time, it’s not a one-time event you should “prepare for”. There’s nothing to prepare, we already have funds and productivity to feed a…

> all of us waiting for government bureaucrats to realise that UBI is a right You'll be waiting forever, then. This isn't something that you can wait to be given to you, it must be taken . Or, put much more eloquently by one of the greatest Americans: "This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a deman…

How do the gears of capitalism keep turning without UBI in such a scenario? Who is buying from Amazon? Mega yachts don't make the world go round.

UBI is how capitalism keeps going, else a new system will be needed.

UBI will be given but we should take even more control and take a % of ownership.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#213

This essay kind of rubs me the wrong way. Starting from the very beginning. During my entire life I’ve only had two jobs. In the first one, I played a role in developing software to empower people through my work at Microsoft. Yikes. We all know powerful people have an incentive to whitewash their pasts but there is whitewashing and then there is whatever that is. I have to mention this because we can't forget that M…

> Even his talk of taxing AI tokens and robots would ultimately benefit Microsoft and other Big tech companies and hurt open source.

I'm curious, how? He proposes taxing bots in lieu of taxing humans, because they will be doing most of the work... but we already tax humans, and it hasn't hurt open source.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#214
post #213

This essay kind of rubs me the wrong way. Starting from the very beginning. During my entire life I’ve only had two jobs. In the first one, I played a role in developing software to empower people through my work at Microsoft. Yikes. We all know powerful people have an incentive to whitewash their pasts but there is whitewashing and then there is whatever that is. I have to mention this because we can't forget that M…

> Even his talk of taxing AI tokens and robots would ultimately benefit Microsoft and other Big tech companies and hurt open source. I'm curious, how? He proposes taxing bots in lieu of taxing humans, because they will be doing most of the work... but we already tax humans, and it hasn't hurt open source.

Because it will make it more expensive for people or groups of people to run open source models to do work on their own hardware. You would be taxing people or groups of people to run a program on the computers they own. This is contrary to the principles of the free and open source software movements.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#215
post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everywhere. Switzerland has a direct democracy, which should be emulated by the rest of the world. https://www.aboutswitzerland.eda.admin.ch/en/direct-democrac... FWIW I am not from Switzerland, I only live there. Direct democracy works great.

There's nothing convincing in your link. More importantly, even if it did contain the solution, there is no obvious way for a country with an already corrupt government to transition to such a thing.

I think you mean no obvious pacific way. Which is what any democratic citizen wants and seeks out. There are other solutions and way too obvious, in fact you have examples all over the world going back centuries.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#216
post #123
post #70

If all jobs are taken away for the sake of robot driven productivity, who will consume the products and services being offered that result in profit?! (EDIT: I am not against AI at all, just trying to understand where this all leads)

Don't discount that tech billionaires pursuing this are themselves nihilistic. They would enjoy the fruits of our labor and will not care what comes after they die.

"Après nous, le déluge"

-- Madame de Pompadour

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's nothing convincing in your link. More importantly, even if it did contain the solution, there is no obvious way for a country with an already corrupt government to transition to such a thing.

I think you mean no obvious pacific way. Which is what any democratic citizen wants and seeks out. There are other solutions and way too obvious, in fact you have examples all over the world going back centuries.

Right. I was referring to the parent's "should be emulated by the rest of the world" suggestion, which had thanksimcured energy.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#218
post #13

> We have to think now about how to reduce job losses so that everyone can share in the prosperity that AI creates. And I thought he is a smart man. This is so last century thinking. We need to prepare that there will definitely be no jobs for everyone and that will be falling all the time, it’s not a one-time event you should “prepare for”. There’s nothing to prepare, we already have funds and productivity to feed a…

UBI as a concept does not add up. It assumes an even production of all goods that people might need, but there isn't, you are giving everyone fiat currency that is not inherently tied to any physical good. Very fast you will descend into either plan economy where you get food stamps, or an economy where people are trading goods that are actually tied to value.

For example, you go to the store to get eggs, since everyone has UBI, they decide to also get eggs, the eggs either run out, or the store raises the price, at which either you will get food queues like in the USSR, or everyone will need more UBI to afford eggs. The solution to this is to increase egg production, but this is not instant, and not necessarily a priority, while money transfers are instant.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol if voting changed anything they'd make it illegal.

You mean like the SAVE act? Or restrictions on mail-in voting?

Good point. They seem to be getting nervous about us voters voting.

Re: Bill Gates: The turbulent AI era is here

#220
post #13

> We have to think now about how to reduce job losses so that everyone can share in the prosperity that AI creates. And I thought he is a smart man. This is so last century thinking. We need to prepare that there will definitely be no jobs for everyone and that will be falling all the time, it’s not a one-time event you should “prepare for”. There’s nothing to prepare, we already have funds and productivity to feed a…

I don't understand why people always spring for UBI. I don't want free money; I want to earn my living. I want to work.

Why do we not push for labor reform, as we did a century ago? Depending on the actual productivity gains from AI broadly, set a new standard of 4-hour workdays. Or 3-day work weeks.

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