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Magnifica Humanitas

vatican.va

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Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#221

Post by redsocksfan45 »

Xenoamorphous wrote: post #39
sethbannon wrote: post #22

The overarching message is that builders should deeply consider the impact of what they're building on civilization. "Technology is never neutral, because it takes on the characteristics of those who devise, finance, regulate and use it." Therefore builders "bear a particular ethical and spiritual responsibility" because "every design choice reflects a vision of humanity." The questions shouldn't just be 'can we buil…

> Scientists are actually preoccupied with accomplishment. So they are focused on whether they can do something. They never stop to ask if they should do something. From Crichton's book Jurassic Park, which like most of his books is about the perils of technological advancements. They used the quote in the movie, slightly tweaked.

[dead]

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#223

Post by tete »

And of course the AI salesforce was there pretending they take stuff seriously, maybe even believing it themselves. At least I don't believe that when the choice is maximizing profit or being a good person it will be the latter. Or at least I don't find a career path like that all too likely.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#224

Post by theletterf »

vermilingua wrote: post #89
theletterf wrote: post #85

@dang Is this item getting a lot of negative votes? I've no way of knowing, other than seeing my kharma increasing only slightly after all the points the story collected.

Votes (particularly on submissions over comments) do not directly translate to karma. I'm not sure if it's documented anywhere what the algorithm is, but it's something proportionate to the logarithm of post votes becomes profile karma. It's similar with comments, but I believe (anecdata and observation) the positive effect of votes on karma is also logarithmic, but the negative effects of downvotes is linear; so if…

Thanks! That makes sense. This was just genuine curiosity on how HN works, I couldn't care less about kharma.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#225

Post by pseudony »

Luker88 wrote: post #183
mycall wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The church was a great archive of knowledge for the longest time. They were the powerful few too.

And they hoarded and kept such knowledge for themselves and those who swore fealty for as long as they could, concentrating and maintaining power for centuries. Still, I agree with the pope this once.

Wrong - I am very far from a catholic, but this just doesn’t reflect history.

They did a lot to make the middle ages more tolerable. After that, maybe they overstayed their welcome.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#226

Post by luizfzs »

epolanski wrote: post #209
shawnhermans wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Former Catholic. I left the church for a variety of reasons, one of which being the child abuse scandal. I am aware of the Catholic Church's long and often sordid history. What I am trying to say is there is no love lost between me and the Catholic Church. With that out of the way, the Pope is right. Knowledge should be used for the benefit of humanity and I don't think any of the big AI companies have our best inter…

I don't really get this, so I genuinely want to understand. You can still follow a religion while rightfully thinking that the organization representing it to be corrupt (and how could it be otherwise, as it's made from mortal sinners?). But you either believe that St.Peter and its descendants in Rome have been tasked by god to spread (and interpret) its word or you don't. It's fine if you don't (I don't my self, I'm…

My take is that scandals can make some people realize that the Church is fallible, which can lead people to question about the legitimacy of such religion. e.g. if the church representatives can be corrupt, what if their other actions also weren't in service of God?

My point is that once you see a sort of contradiction between words and action, it may make one deeply reflect on it.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#227

Post by YetAnotherNick »

watwut wrote: post #192
YetAnotherNick wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything you say apply to the AI. Even more so that there are very good open models which anyone can host and get almost exact same power.

> anyone can host and get almost exact same power. This is not true at all. And the claim about mission of the church and mission of the ai being the same is absurd. Or ai being authority. Like, the rest of that comment does not apply to ai at all.

> This is not true at all.

In what sense is it not true?

> mission of the church and mission of the ai being the same is absurd

Did I claim that?

I just said any point you wrote against church representing powerful few is applicable to AI.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#228

Post by mattnewton »

epolanski wrote: post #209
shawnhermans wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Former Catholic. I left the church for a variety of reasons, one of which being the child abuse scandal. I am aware of the Catholic Church's long and often sordid history. What I am trying to say is there is no love lost between me and the Catholic Church. With that out of the way, the Pope is right. Knowledge should be used for the benefit of humanity and I don't think any of the big AI companies have our best inter…

I don't really get this, so I genuinely want to understand. You can still follow a religion while rightfully thinking that the organization representing it to be corrupt (and how could it be otherwise, as it's made from mortal sinners?). But you either believe that St.Peter and its descendants in Rome have been tasked by god to spread (and interpret) its word or you don't. It's fine if you don't (I don't my self, I'm…

Litmus tests about personal beliefs are not really how religious organizations function for most people in my experience. It’s about whether you want to associated with a tribe or movement, then the beliefs come with that package.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#229

Post by jfengel »

__s wrote: post #194
dgellow wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think you understand atheism? As an atheist I do not believe in any form of deity or divine authority. I do not reject a specific religion, I do not actually believe there is any form of divine order to our world. I can look at faiths as the social constructs they are, and find interest in concepts humans have been developing and created cults around but there won’t ever be a religion/deity I will look at and…

Also atheist here. Reading old+new testament was informative like reading history: whatever is true or not in those passages, have had profound impact throughout history Their point is that despite your subscription to reason, without exposure to other cultural norms, you may be blind to what Christian values you live by. Becoming aware of them can help self evaluation of your ethical framework

Thank you. Yes, exactly.

For that matter, reading the Christian scriptures through a historical lens reveals a very different kind of thought than the modern version of Christianity and Judaism. It takes a huge amount of effort to read these documents in context; just reading them in the original languages is hard enough. But the past is a very foreign country and they see things very differently there.

Re: Magnifica Humanitas

#230

Post by speak_plainly »

I know lots of people are excited because an ancient institution has something to say about AI.... But what's said is not really novel or even interesting.

The letter aims to maintain the status quo of the project of the Church.

The world is shifting under the Vatican's feet and the crappy system they once lorded over is done.

It's time for change, maybe people don't need to work anymore and maybe people should aim to reengineer humanity and eliminate illness, old age, suffering and vulnerability. We can fundamentally change how society distributes wealth.

Some of the arguments are rich coming from the Church: being scolded about centralization of power, claiming truth and shared information is a common good, and consider the history of the Church in their anti-war declarations.

The most astonishing thing in this letter is the pope declaring that modern technology has rendered Aquinas's just-war theory out of date.

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