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The Software Revolution

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: The Software Revolution

#251

Post by JoeAltmaier »

Balgair wrote: post #248
falcolas wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Designing new viruses or bacteria for a neo-plauge is less likely Humankind has been genetically engineering organisms for most of our existence. Corn originally looked like grass. Chickens were lean, tough, and could fly. Dogs have been transformed from generalist survivors into purpose-built machines breed for beauty, farm work, and everything in between. The avocado, of all things, is a fantastic example of how…

True, but the viruses and bacteria, once out of Dr. Doom's lab, will evolve themselves. A virus that kills all the hosts is not a good virus. It has to be just the right amount of deadly and contagious to survive. Look at ebola, that is super nasty stuff, but it kills so quickly that it is hard to make it widespread. I'm not gonna say it is impossible, but it is a lot harder to do that you'd think. Living things tend…

Not really true. A virus that kills the host too quickly is not going to spread. A virus that kills the host quickly but not before it spreads, IS going to spread. There's no saying what a virus 'wants'; they just happen, and they do what they do. If Ebola became airborne, then most of us would die, then Ebola would die (from lack of hosts), and that's just a pity for Ebola. But there's nothing that stops such a scenario from happening, least of all what Ebola 'wants'.

Re: The Software Revolution

#252

Post by joesmo »

rayiner wrote: post #233
joesmo wrote: post #194

"Trying to hold on to worthless jobs is a terrible but popular idea." It's terrible sure, but it's popular only because our economy requires it. That is the basis for the whole economy. It's not like people are clamoring to serve McDonalds for minimum wage or clean shit out bathrooms. They have no other choices in this economy. The economy demands it. While those jobs might be necessary, most middle management and of…

> While those jobs might be necessary, most middle management and office type jobs are incredibly redundant and frankly, pointless. This is a conceit of software folks that's not borne out by reality. Those "worthless" jobs continue to exist because software can do 90% of what those folks do, but shit the bed when faced with the other 10%. Software generally isn't reliable, predictable, or robust in the face of unusu…

The worthlessness of most middle management jobs has nothing to do with software. If they were flat out eliminated, in most cases, nothing would change. There's no software needed to replace them.

Re: The Software Revolution

#253

Post by JoeAltmaier »

EliAndrewC wrote: post #250
tptacek wrote: post #167

Can someone ELI5-with-a-CS-degree why I should be concerned about AI ending human life?

Here's the standard argument, as I understand it: - There are something like 100,000,000,000 neurons in the human brain, each of which can have up to around 10,000 synaptic connections to other neurons. This is basically why the brain is so powerful. - Modern CPUs have around 4,000,000,000 transistors, but Moore's law means that this number will just keep going up and up. - Several decades from now (probably in the 2…

That sounds about right. There's speed of thought (wetware brains currently win) and then there's speed of evolution. Digital brains definitely win that one. Because some wetware brains are spending all their time figuring out how to make the digital ones better. Nobody is doing that for the soggy kind.

The singularity will happen when the digital brains are figuring out how to make themselves better. Then they will really take off, and not slow down, ever.

Re: The Software Revolution

#254

Post by yellowapple »

_lce0 wrote: post #173
dnautics wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just going to say what should be obvious: One is not going to be able to engineer a dangerous plague that will wipe out the human race in one shot. One would have to do experiments, and those experiments will be noticed, because people will get sick and die. I did get lucky and design, from first principles, a 4-fold increase in enzyme activity once, but I am not sure that is something I could repeat.

> One is not going to be able to engineer a dangerous plague that will wipe out the human race in one shot . I believe that what you said is true, plus we could say that the fact that we haven't been exterminated with a plague makes us not so much experienced (as a race) on how detect whenever such situation will lead to being wiped out I feel that HIV/AIDS is our only experience, at least that I'm aware of

We haven't been eradicated before, no, but battles with things like bubonic plague and smallpox and polio (and, yes, HIV/AIDS) are likely to be good case studies for such a scenario. Bubonic plague and smallpox in particular were pretty devastating to the populations they affected.

Re: The Software Revolution

#255

Post by krapp »

danbruc wrote: post #203

Why is it so common to fear developments obsoleting jobs? Wouldn't it be just awesome to automate everything? No jobs at all? I could easily fill several lives with interesting things, no need for a job. Granted, the transition period may be quite tough.

There's nothing about automation that guarantees any solution for the people automated out of a job. The motive behind automation is purely capitalist - it exists not to free people from the burdens of menial labor, but to multiply the value of labor while freeing companies from the moral and financial burden of a human workforce. For most people, jobs - and the availability of jobs - are what allows them to buy food, clothing, medical care, etc.

>Granted, the transition period may be quite tough.

Yes, mass starvation, disease, grinding poverty and global political strife could correctly be described as "quite tough."

Although I suppose if you're idle rich, then it'll be a cakewalk. Just be sure to wear your kevlar when you leave the compound.

Re: The Software Revolution

#256

Post by Balgair »

minthd wrote: post #116
dnautics wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just going to say what should be obvious: One is not going to be able to engineer a dangerous plague that will wipe out the human race in one shot. One would have to do experiments, and those experiments will be noticed, because people will get sick and die. I did get lucky and design, from first principles, a 4-fold increase in enzyme activity once, but I am not sure that is something I could repeat.

I'm not from the field, but is it that hard, for a reasonably well funded organization, to build a safe lab ?

Holy cow yes. Sterile environments are a big deal. Try holding one for a day, let alone a work week or a year. People screw up all the time, and bacteria, being pretty much invisible, are real tough to ferret out. Let alone all the actual non-sterile stuff you want to do in one. Think a clean room with bunny suits, that is the type of environment you need just to get a start on figuring out Dr. Doom type viruses and all that awful mumbo-jumbo. It takes a lot of energy, time, and resources to just get off the ground.

Re: The Software Revolution

#257

Post by tptacek »

EliAndrewC wrote: post #250
tptacek wrote: post #167

Can someone ELI5-with-a-CS-degree why I should be concerned about AI ending human life?

Here's the standard argument, as I understand it: - There are something like 100,000,000,000 neurons in the human brain, each of which can have up to around 10,000 synaptic connections to other neurons. This is basically why the brain is so powerful. - Modern CPUs have around 4,000,000,000 transistors, but Moore's law means that this number will just keep going up and up. - Several decades from now (probably in the 2…

Ok, to both you and 'Micaiah_Chang cross-thread:

I do understand where the notion of hockey-stick increases in intellectual ability comes from.

I do understand the concept that it's hard to predict what would come of "superintellectual" ability in some sort of synthetic intelligence. That we're in the dark about it, because we're intellectually limited.

I don't understand the transition from synthetic superintellectual capability to actual harm to humans.

'Micaiah_Chang seems to indicate that it would result in a sort of supervillain, who would... what, trick people into helping it enslave humanity? If we were worried about that happening, wouldn't we just hit the "off" switch? Serious question.

The idea of genetic engineering being an imminent threat has instant credibility. It is getting easier and cheaper to play with that technology, and some fraction of people are both intellectually capable and psychologically defective enough to exploit it to harm people directly.

But the idea that AI will exploit genetic engineering to do that seems circular. In that scenario, it would still be insufficient controls on genetic engineering that would be the problem, right?

I'm asking because I genuinely don't understand, even if I don't have a rhetorical tone other than "snarky disbelief".

'sama seems like a pretty pragmatic person. I'm trying to get my head around specifically what's in his head when he writes about AI destroying humanity.

Re: The Software Revolution

#258

Post by Micaiah_Chang »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #247
Micaiah_Chang wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note: The not ELI5 version is Nick Bostrum's Superintelligence , a lot of what follows derives from my idiosyncratic understanding of Tim Urban's (waitbutwhy) summary of the situation [0]. I think his explanation is much better than mine, but doubtless longer. There are some humans who are a lot smarter than a lot of other humans. For example, the mathematician Ramanujan could do many complicated infinite sums in his…

'Smart' isn't really a thing. There's speed of thought, and knowledge of subject, and savant abilities to factor or calculate. Its silly to sort folks on a one-dimensional line called 'smart' and imagine you have done anything actionable. I'd say, AI is dangerous because we cannot fathom its motivation. To give us true answers to questions? To give pleasing answers? To give answers that help it survive? The last is i…

Smart is just a shorthand for a complicated series of lower level actions consisting of domain knowledge, raw computational speed and other things yes. I don't think we're really disagreeing about this. However, I do worry that you're confusing the existing constraints on the human brain (that people seem to have tradeoffs between, let's say, charisma and mathematical ability) and constraints that would apply to all possible brains.

But are you denying that there exists some factor which allows you to manipulate the world in some way, roughly proportional to the time that you have? If something can manipulate the world on timescales much faster than humans can react to, what makes you think that humans would have a choice?

Re: The Software Revolution

#259

Post by JoeAltmaier »

krapp wrote: post #255
danbruc wrote: post #203

Why is it so common to fear developments obsoleting jobs? Wouldn't it be just awesome to automate everything? No jobs at all? I could easily fill several lives with interesting things, no need for a job. Granted, the transition period may be quite tough.

There's nothing about automation that guarantees any solution for the people automated out of a job. The motive behind automation is purely capitalist - it exists not to free people from the burdens of menial labor, but to multiply the value of labor while freeing companies from the moral and financial burden of a human workforce. For most people, jobs - and the availability of jobs - are what allows them to buy food…

Most societies on earth now protect the out-of-work pretty well. There's been steady improvement in standard of living, lifespan, health in most countries for most of a century, to the point where the planet is in pretty good shape.

In fact its a puzzle to me why, with this going on, we see an upsurge in terrorism etc. Why aren't people content? What is it that convinces folks to piss away their entire lives on a big public stunt like bombing etc? It can't be their bad cable reception.

Re: The Software Revolution

#260

Post by rayiner »

yellowapple wrote: post #245
rayiner wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While those jobs might be necessary, most middle management and office type jobs are incredibly redundant and frankly, pointless. This is a conceit of software folks that's not borne out by reality. Those "worthless" jobs continue to exist because software can do 90% of what those folks do, but shit the bed when faced with the other 10%. Software generally isn't reliable, predictable, or robust in the face of unusu…

> software can do 90% of what those folks do, but shit the bed when faced with the other 10% So let software handle the 90% and refactor the current jobs to handle the other 10%. > Software generally isn't reliable, predictable, or robust in the face of unusual circumstances Not yet , at least. I agree with you, though, and they're the same reasons why I'm personally paranoid about self-driving cars. Yeah, the occasi…

> So let software handle the 90% and refactor the current jobs to handle the other 10%.

If the jobs could be so refactored in a cost-efficient way, they would be.

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