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AIs are now re-writing history

robertelliottsmith.com

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Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#11

Post by masklinn »

ivanche wrote: post #3

Some time ago I conducted a simple (albeit impossible in practice, for now at least) thought experiment. Let's say that average size of a JPEG image is 5 MB. Now, some machine could generate all possible valid JPEG files sized 5 MB. In some of those images there would be events which never happen, and never could (for example Usain Bolt running in 1896 Athens Olympic Games etc.) Of course, sheer number of such images…

I'm not sure you realise the scales involved. 5MB (40Mb) is enough to create 1e12626113 different files, that's a number with 12.5 million digits

For reference, the number of atoms in the visible universe is ~1e80 (1e78 to 1e82), you'd generate 1e12626033 images per atom (doesn't look any different does it? Well it's got 80 zeroes chopped off). For a second reference, assuming you're a standard-size hooman you have 1e14 cells tops (estimate vary, "An estimation of the number of cells in the human body"[0] gave 3.7e13).

So no, it's not possible. Even if you remove a few order of magnitudes to account for invalid jpegs, let's say we cut it by a thousand orders of magnitude it's still 1e12000 images to generate[1].

They're also all contained in PI. And the thought experiment is but a variant of the infinite monkeys theorem[2]

[0] http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/03014460.2013.8...

[1] if you can compute full tilt until the heath death of the universe you have ~1e47 seconds, you'd need to compute 1e11953 images per second… or 1e11873 images per second per atom in the universe

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkey_theorem

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#12

Post by AndrewKemendo »

This is really cool! I agree with the author a bit, however I think his concern stems from the fact that it was largely because he did not know it was going to happen.

I also think that Doctorow's dismissal of his concerns as "trivial on the scale" is silly and somewhat arrogant. Automated alteration of a picture to the point of making a new picture non-discernible from an original is a real different thing. In this case it was very subtle, but the application of this could really have some broad impacts. I recall for example the doctored photo from Iranian missile launches [1] or the Egyptian PM red carpet photoshop [2].

Yes this has been going on forever, but automating it makes the impacts really scale quickly.

[1]http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/10/in-an-iranian-im...

[2]http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/sep/16/mubarak-doctore...

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#13

Post by tbirdz »

mfringel wrote: post #9
munificent wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course, sheer number of such images is ginormous, but for me it's interesting (and scary) that something like this will maybe be possible... It will never be possible. A 5 MB JPEG has 5,368,709,120 bits, which means there are 2^5,368,709,120 different possible images. In scientific notation, it's 1.302... × 10^1,616,142,483. For comparison, there are about 10^80 atoms in the entire universe.

I suspect you can significantly cut down the space by limiting it to valid JPEG files.

You can cut it down but it still won't be feasible. Consider generating even just all possible 100x100 1-bit monochrome images. There will be 100 * 100 = 10000 bits per image, giving a total of 2^10000 possible images: about 1.995 * 10^3010 which is still way, way bigger than 10^80.

A 5MB JPEG image would have a much larger resolution and color pallete then this.

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#14

Post by masklinn »

tbirdz wrote: post #13
mfringel wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect you can significantly cut down the space by limiting it to valid JPEG files.

You can cut it down but it still won't be feasible. Consider generating even just all possible 100x100 1-bit monochrome images. There will be 100 * 100 = 10000 bits per image, giving a total of 2^10000 possible images: about 1.995 * 10^3010 which is still way, way bigger than 10^80. A 5MB JPEG image would have a much larger resolution and color pallete then this.

A 5MB JPEG corresponds to 12~16MP@24bpp, although many of the images would compress to the same result.

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#15

Post by whitten »

I appreciate the artistic license of saying the "AIs" are doing this, but this isn't an AI issue at all. This is a particular single purpose program "Smile!" which is producing results by combining pictures together to produce a picture the author never took with a camera.

He could have blamed Snidely Whiplash, or the greek god Zeus with just as much verity.

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#16

Post by abemassry »

ivanche wrote: post #3

Some time ago I conducted a simple (albeit impossible in practice, for now at least) thought experiment. Let's say that average size of a JPEG image is 5 MB. Now, some machine could generate all possible valid JPEG files sized 5 MB. In some of those images there would be events which never happen, and never could (for example Usain Bolt running in 1896 Athens Olympic Games etc.) Of course, sheer number of such images…

Also had a similar thought experiment, went and built it. Thanks for the other commentors as well I should link to this HN page in the README.

https://github.com/abemassry/crazip

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#17

Post by freehunter »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #12

This is really cool! I agree with the author a bit, however I think his concern stems from the fact that it was largely because he did not know it was going to happen. I also think that Doctorow's dismissal of his concerns as "trivial on the scale" is silly and somewhat arrogant. Automated alteration of a picture to the point of making a new picture non-discernible from an original is a real different thing. In this…

How do you not know it will happen? I haven't used AutoAwesome since just after it was released, but at least back then it was an opt-in. Google didn't just automatically overwrite your pictures, you selected which ones you wanted to make AutoAwesome.

Has that changed?

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#18

Post by IvyMike »

ivanche wrote: post #3

Some time ago I conducted a simple (albeit impossible in practice, for now at least) thought experiment. Let's say that average size of a JPEG image is 5 MB. Now, some machine could generate all possible valid JPEG files sized 5 MB. In some of those images there would be events which never happen, and never could (for example Usain Bolt running in 1896 Athens Olympic Games etc.) Of course, sheer number of such images…

You may be interested in Borges's short story The Library of Babel.

http://hyperdiscordia.crywalt.com/library_of_babel.html

""The Library of Babel" (Spanish: La biblioteca de Babel) is a short story by Argentine author and librarian Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986), conceiving of a universe in the form of a vast library containing all possible 410-page books of a certain format." (from wikipedia)

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#19

Post by Dylan16807 »

ivanche wrote: post #3

Some time ago I conducted a simple (albeit impossible in practice, for now at least) thought experiment. Let's say that average size of a JPEG image is 5 MB. Now, some machine could generate all possible valid JPEG files sized 5 MB. In some of those images there would be events which never happen, and never could (for example Usain Bolt running in 1896 Athens Olympic Games etc.) Of course, sheer number of such images…

The identifier for any particular 'generated' photo is equivalent to the photo itself.

In reality there is no generation at all. It's just a blank slate with every bit unknown.

It's a perceptual problem, human don't understand randomness well.

I don't blame you, it's a common mistake, but you're fundamentally wrong in calling it generation. Generation of everything is 100% equivalent to generation of nothing. Creation requires decision, is equivalent to decision.

Re: AIs are now re-writing history

#20

Post by chrisrhoden »

"I told him that algorithms are, without prompting from their human designers or the owners of the photos, creating human moments that never existed."

I'm not sure how anyone could make the argument that this occurred without prompting from their human designers.

This seems to be a continuation of a theme, where AI academics and theorists are so divorced from the realities of present-day engineering that they assume we're much closer to singularity than we are. I spend so much time making things display in the correct order.

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