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The illusion of AI’s existential risk

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Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#141

Post by ChatGTP »

qznc wrote: post #130
ChatGTP wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am currently a bit of a doomer and if I had a magic wand, I'd pause AI research for the foreseeable future because I don't think it's creating a better world for children, at least from what I've seen so far however...to your point. I think we're only like this to animals because we are animals (we forgot), and we compete for the same type of resources they need, water, protein, calories, we're not intelligent enou…

I do agree that we might live peacefully with AIs because they need different things. Two points: We still compete for space and energy at the very least. Humans are sympathetic to animals because we are alike. We don’t want animals to suffer. However, will an AI be sympathetic to humans because we „think alike“? We don’t know.

How could something survive with other entities without things like fear and empathy though? It would just be constant chaos and nothing could get done. With no fear, you could just wipe yourself out and not thing twice about it. Without empathy, same, you'd just be killing things permanently.

I do wonder if the quest to build AI will teach us a lot about why the thing we take for granted exist. Why have fear, limits, empathy, anger etc.

I suppose bacteria is a bit like this but it’s limited in its capabilities to evolve too quickly and wipe everything out?

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#142

Post by nradov »

radicalace wrote: post #101
hashstring wrote: post #12

Yes, this is a good take. The general discussion is definitely prematurely focused on some sort of end-boss fight, while AI and large scale data collection are causing serious harm and privacy concerns to real humans already. It’s only reasonable to expect that this increases in the future. I would like to see more discussion focussing on these pressing issues. Also a pause on AI development is not an option, not a s…

name a single reason why a pause is not an option. dont say why it would be hard or unlikely or inconvenient or whatever, to exclude it as a possibility means it has to be physically impossible. of course it isnt physically impossible. AI requires large compute, large resources. you cant advance the state of the art inconspicuously. the only reason you say it isnt an option is because you dont consider AI an existent…

That's not even a valid request. There is obviously no valid reason to require such a pause in the first place. You've been watching too many scifi movies and don't understand the technology.

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#143

Post by esafak »

jiggawatts wrote: post #34

I’m just re-reading Blindsight by Peter Watts, a novel that is amazingly prescient in — amongst other things — its predictions of this coming economic upheaval. Speaking of… one scene in the book has humans communicating with an alien that appears to have “learned” human speech by training a non-sentient LLM on human ship-to-ship transmissions, and then “fine tuned” it to achieve the desired communication goal withou…

> Imagine training an LLM on cetacean recordings and then fine-tuning on “orca attack imminent”.

Decoding animal communication using machine learning is a popular research topic. See the current issue of Science, for example: Using machine learning to decode animal communication (https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adg7314)

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#144

Post by anonyfox »

loup-vaillant wrote: post #133
anonyfox wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tipping point is when some „unwashed masses“ decide to go to a billionaire mansion and explain them (forcefully) that they aren’t billionaires any longer, and neither the security staff nor the called police will step in, since they are part of the masses (family ties, defunding, …). Why should they do cruel work for a salary if they can take their part of the wealth directly?

That’s possible as long as the police aren’t robot, and the mansion isn’t orbiting in space. Now Elysium doesn’t have to happen (and good luck with the giant space station) but a sufficiently walled garden guarded by sufficiently automated defences supplied by a sufficiently automated workforce could in fact repel anyone else trying to get in with nothing more than small arms. Though I reckon an organised unwashed ma…

I see the reasoning but in practice it’s just sci-fi I believe. Even if you have the _perfect_ walled garden… there you are with your wealth. What will you do with it if everyone else refuses to deal with you? What are shares of corporations worth if no one cares that you own something? Why would the military listen to you, when they could obliterate your escape room and take over your wealth directly?

All this stuff you mention relies on the the „fact“ that capitalism and guaranteed private property rights are absolute truths - when in fact they aren’t, actually more like a temporal fashion wave in some parts of the world, and faith in this destructive obsession in „the economy“ is on the decline finally. :-)

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#145

Post by yanderekko »

ozr wrote: post #131
yanderekko wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, even the more-panicked wing is not betting the proverbial house on AI killing us within the next few years , although the possibility is there. The "don't expect to live much longer" sentiment is based on a probability horizon that extends over decades.

I've spoken to people in the article. They expect doom in <1 year.

I just don't believe that unless you have specific quotes you can point to that indicates this.

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#146

Post by jiggawatts »

gpderetta wrote: post #98
jiggawatts wrote: post #34

I’m just re-reading Blindsight by Peter Watts, a novel that is amazingly prescient in — amongst other things — its predictions of this coming economic upheaval. Speaking of… one scene in the book has humans communicating with an alien that appears to have “learned” human speech by training a non-sentient LLM on human ship-to-ship transmissions, and then “fine tuned” it to achieve the desired communication goal withou…

> non-sentient LLM I don't think it is described as non-sentient in the book, but only as lacking consciousness. Consciousness not being required for sentience is one of the two major themes of the book (the other being that consciousness is an evolutionary dead end). Still your example is very relevant. I very much believe that ChatGPT, for example, is not conscious. The question is if it has some amount of sentienc…

> I don't think it is described as non-sentient in the book, but only as lacking consciousness.

Apologies, I have a bad habit of mixing up those words, despite supposedly knowing better... at a conscious level.

Huh.

I wonder if I write some things subconsciously?

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#147

Post by fulafel »

rootusrootus wrote: post #15
janalsncm wrote: post #7

I don’t understand why economic disruption and human obsolescence isn’t considered an existential risk. We could end up in a world where 99.99% of people are redundant and useless cost centers for our GDP maximizing economic paradigm. In that case, you don’t need killer robots in order to push humanity towards near-extinction. The invisible hand will smite them. But don’t worry, TED Talk attendee. The obsoletariat mo…

> We could end up in a world where 99.99% of people are redundant and useless cost centers for our GDP maximizing economic paradigm If 99% of consumers no longer have money to spend, GDP will definitely not be maximized.

It may well be, that's what's wrong with maximizing GDP.

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#148

Post by gpderetta »

jiggawatts wrote: post #146
gpderetta wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> non-sentient LLM I don't think it is described as non-sentient in the book, but only as lacking consciousness. Consciousness not being required for sentience is one of the two major themes of the book (the other being that consciousness is an evolutionary dead end). Still your example is very relevant. I very much believe that ChatGPT, for example, is not conscious. The question is if it has some amount of sentienc…

> I don't think it is described as non-sentient in the book, but only as lacking consciousness. Apologies, I have a bad habit of mixing up those words, despite supposedly knowing better... at a conscious level. Huh. I wonder if I write some things subconsciously?

FWIW, I'm not sure that sentient means what I thought it meant. As per sibling comment, sapient might be the right word.

Re: The illusion of AI’s existential risk

#149

Post by hashstring »

radicalace wrote: post #101
hashstring wrote: post #12

Yes, this is a good take. The general discussion is definitely prematurely focused on some sort of end-boss fight, while AI and large scale data collection are causing serious harm and privacy concerns to real humans already. It’s only reasonable to expect that this increases in the future. I would like to see more discussion focussing on these pressing issues. Also a pause on AI development is not an option, not a s…

name a single reason why a pause is not an option. dont say why it would be hard or unlikely or inconvenient or whatever, to exclude it as a possibility means it has to be physically impossible. of course it isnt physically impossible. AI requires large compute, large resources. you cant advance the state of the art inconspicuously. the only reason you say it isnt an option is because you dont consider AI an existent…

We are already facing numerous existential threats at the moment, even ones that are deliberately made to be an existential threat, take nuclear weapons.

“Hey fellow nation states, let’s not create nuclear bombs, but let’s pause developments and keep the current power dynamics fixed please” is completely unrealistic. Mind that creating nuclear weapons actually requires technical operations that are factors more complex than “large compute” in many aspects… like… enriching uranium and working with supercritical masses.

> you cant advance the state of the art inconspicuously.

What evidence has led you to believe this?

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