A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
nytimes.com
A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
1–10 of 20 posts
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#2Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#3I would counter with, “When any political faction (lib / cons) treats its moral convictions as self-evident global truths, and sympathetic media outlets and so called journalists amplify that certainty, our democratic discourse erodes at a rate far greater than anything AI could do.”
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#4I would counter with, “When any political faction (lib / cons) treats its moral convictions as self-evident global truths, and sympathetic media outlets and so called journalists amplify that certainty, our democratic discourse erodes at a rate far greater than anything AI could do.”
That’s a criticism of direct democracy, not republics; it’s been a known failure mode (and base case) for millennia.
The novel elements are social media and AI. I am increasingly convinced that ad-funded social media should be banned and/or tightly regulated like utilities are.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#5Is it possible to develop a camera that takes pictures in a special format that records an encrypted signature, some kind ledger technology for images?
The idea is authenticity of images could be challenged. If in doubt, the original photographer or source can provide verification - automated or otherwise, that only superficial X, Y, or Z edits have been made such as lighting or contrast changes.
Copies of the images would contain this ledger or a link. In the future maybe photos without this technology are never to be trusted as a source, or perhaps disallowed on certain platforms.
So it's inverted from "we must detect fake" to "we must detect authenticity." The latter being easier to control.
I mean, nice things are under threat. There's no escaping it. If technology got us into this mess, technology can dig us out.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#6I would counter with, “When any political faction (lib / cons) treats its moral convictions as self-evident global truths, and sympathetic media outlets and so called journalists amplify that certainty, our democratic discourse erodes at a rate far greater than anything AI could do.”
That’s a criticism of direct democracy, not republics; it’s been a known failure mode (and base case) for millennia. The novel elements are social media and AI. I am increasingly convinced that ad-funded social media should be banned and/or tightly regulated like utilities are.
Ah yes, let’s the replace all ad-funded social media with state/gvn’t funded social media. That will be much better.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
That’s a criticism of direct democracy, not republics; it’s been a known failure mode (and base case) for millennia. The novel elements are social media and AI. I am increasingly convinced that ad-funded social media should be banned and/or tightly regulated like utilities are.
Ah yes, let’s the replace all ad-funded social media with state/gvn’t funded social media. That will be much better.
> state/gvn’t funded social media
Not how things that are "banned and/or tightly regulated like utilities are" are funded.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#8Is it possible to develop a camera that takes pictures in a special format that records an encrypted signature, some kind ledger technology for images? The idea is authenticity of images could be challenged. If in doubt, the original photographer or source can provide verification - automated or otherwise, that only superficial X, Y, or Z edits have been made such as lighting or contrast changes. Copies of the images…
What's keeping anyone from using a trustworthy camera to take a trustworthy picture of a screen displaying an AI generated image?
And that's the low tech version. Taking a trustworthy camera and plugging the CMOS sensor connector into an LLM that generates its output as RAW data that feeds into the sensor isn't that hard if you want to make extra sure you're not detected.
Such a system might even cause more harm than good by giving people the impression that real/AI images can actually be certified.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
That’s a criticism of direct democracy, not republics; it’s been a known failure mode (and base case) for millennia. The novel elements are social media and AI. I am increasingly convinced that ad-funded social media should be banned and/or tightly regulated like utilities are.
Ah yes, let’s the replace all ad-funded social media with state/gvn’t funded social media. That will be much better.
We pay for utilities directly. Also, even it if it was funded from state budget(s), there are known and working controls to make publicly funded state controlled.
Re: A.I. Is Starting to Wear Down Democracy
#10I thought democracy was doomed not long after I first learned about it as I had already seen how 'well' people check that their beliefs match with reality. I thought I was wrong (partly to keep my sanity), that there must be some system that keeps it stable. Nowadays it is clear I was wrong - the clown show of current global democracy is nothing like what I imagined. I thought it was going to be smart, greedy leaders with complex lies that are hard to check, but instead, people are being robbed and the processes keeping them alive and fed are being destroyed all in the open, there are mostly no complex lies or smart leaders involved.
It's hard to blame AI for something that was obvious three decades ago.