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To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

musings.martyn.berlin

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Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#291

Post by em-bee »

Glawen wrote: post #270
thewebguyd wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. Look at the issue of public drug use by the unhoused in PNW cities, as an example. If you state any opinion other than silent acceptance of the issue, you get called a far-right nutjob. Trying…

> I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. I grew up in a small village, 300 people. There you learn to accept your neighbor political rant, otherwise you're socialy dead and that's a pretty bad place to be. I learned to dissociate the person from its opinions. I'm living now in the city, where you don't n…

"how can you be friend with a person from the other end politicaly?"

how can you be open minded and avoid being stuck in a bubble if you can't be friends with someone like that?

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#292

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

oulipo2 wrote: post #255
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Each time you criticize the techno-fascist system that props up AI here Every time I criticize the Vikings on The Ultimate Vikings Enthusiast-and-Reenactment Society web forums, they downvote me too. It's ridiculous. Don't they have any integrity? Do they not believe in freedom of speech? One guy even started to rant about how the subforum's topic was specifically about a torment where the vikings would cut out of a…

If you think that people working in tech shouldn't be capable of criticizing their own domain, and taking a step back to understand what they're helping build, I can't do much for you

>shouldn't be capable

Where did you get that idea? Capability isn't in question. Intelligent, well-informed on the subject, positioned to see issues, problems, and drawbacks first. They spend most of their waking hours chewing over every tiny detail.

They just don't want to. It'd be like asking a paleontologist why they hate dinosaurs. And if you can't see that, then I don't know how to explain it to you in a way that will ever make sense. On 4chan, they'd say something along the lines of "not your army", and that goes the same here. We're not your army to mobilize against AI. Nothing will ever change that. Somehow though, you think our positions are reversed, but they're not. I'm comfortable here, I'm comfortable with the zeitgeist and everyone's attitude on the subject, it's you that seems to be in distress. I don't want anything from you and I don't need your help.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#293

Post by doom2 »

thewebguyd wrote: post #87
derac wrote: post #24

It's funny, I have the opposite experience of everyone around me hating AI. I'm not aggressively pro-AI around them at all but you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm used to it though, I've been excited by the concept of AI since reading about Turing and such as a child 20 years ago. The idea has always been met with negativity, IMO because people want to feel that they have a par…

> you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. Look at the issue of public drug use by the unhoused in PNW cities, as an example. If you state any opinion other than silent acceptance of the issue, you get called a far-right nutjob. Trying…

> There's no room for a middle ground or nuance anymore. You are either entirely in one tribe, or entirely out.

A question I find myself selfishly asking a lot is: why do I have to be the one who is accepting or tolerant of others when they may not be accepting of me or my friends and family? I should speak respectfully of rural areas and their inhabitants but cities are free game to be portrayed as dens of crime, drugs, filth, and illegal immigrants? I should respect evangelical Christian communities but my transgender friends can't enjoy the same rights, benefits, and protections of society as cisgender/heterosexual people anywhere they go in the US? To make it explicitly political, Democrats are being asked to moderate and not be so intolerant but no such demands seem to be being made of Republicans or their voters.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#294

Post by em-bee »

bawolff wrote: post #282
em-bee wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a tiny minority can't but somewhere between 10% or a quarter is enough to pressure the rest to support them. for example to force the majority of restaurants to make sure their food is halal, because otherwise muslims would not eat there. or to port your software to run on macs, etc... it depends of course on the cost of compliance. halal food is fine, because everyone can eat it. a minority of vegans could not force…

While i agree with your general point, i'm not sure i agree with your example. i don't think a minority of muslims (or jews) are going to convince all resturants to stop serving pork, because bacon is too popular.

in some places i have traveled to that were predominately christian but had a minority muslim population, pork was very rare, and most shops and restaurants indicated that they were halal. now pork could have been rare for other reasons, but places advertising halal food clearly can only come from the muslim minority. although, maybe it was just muslims running all the restaurants. no idea. i don't know what it takes to be allowed to advertise halal food. i know kosher food requires an inspection by someone authorized. and it also takes considerable effort.

this example just came to mind from my observations. i didn't check any statistics other than the religions in the region. also i just realize, i don't remember seeing this in singapore, which also has a 15% muslim population. so yeah, it looks like you are right, and it is a bad example after all.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#295

Post by newaccountman2 »

hahahacorn wrote: post #290
newaccountman2 wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite a stretch. The open source stuff is nice and all, but I wouldn't say React, GraphQL, Cassandra, or any of the other stuff is "beneficial to humanity" lol wtf > facebook marketplace Craigslist exists, plus other startups were aiming to do that and one would have found its footing if not for Facebook marketplace. Either way, this doesn't make up for any of the negatives people ascribe to Facebook. > messenger con…

I am at least objective in my criticism. I'm not going to reply to 5 different emotionally charged strawman arguments, especially because I don't care to defend Meta. If you're going to engage in discussion, at least try to interpret the other parties argument charitably. You're wasting both our time replying to the dumbest interpretation of what I said.

You gave one sentence statement to try to explain why you think the company does anything that would count as "extremely beneficial" (your words), and it's just a list of stuff you didn't bother to elaborate on (including, laughably, Facebook Messenger, as if anyone could possibly count that as "extremely beneficial"). You didn't even make a cogent argument.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#296

Post by [deleted] »

pixl97 wrote: post #277
Glawen wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. I grew up in a small village, 300 people. There you learn to accept your neighbor political rant, otherwise you're socialy dead and that's a pretty bad place to be. I learned to dissociate the person from its opinions. I'm living now in the city, where you don't n…

>are more open minded than city dwellers. I mean it's a bit difficult to be open minded to someone that would gladly have you killed.

[deleted]

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#297

Post by isabelc »

thewebguyd wrote: post #87
derac wrote: post #24

It's funny, I have the opposite experience of everyone around me hating AI. I'm not aggressively pro-AI around them at all but you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm used to it though, I've been excited by the concept of AI since reading about Turing and such as a child 20 years ago. The idea has always been met with negativity, IMO because people want to feel that they have a par…

> you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. Look at the issue of public drug use by the unhoused in PNW cities, as an example. If you state any opinion other than silent acceptance of the issue, you get called a far-right nutjob. Trying…

The overly tribal, lack of nuance, is overwhelmingingly from the millennial generation. I don't see older people being like that.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#298

Post by ozozozd »

thewebguyd wrote: post #87
derac wrote: post #24

It's funny, I have the opposite experience of everyone around me hating AI. I'm not aggressively pro-AI around them at all but you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm used to it though, I've been excited by the concept of AI since reading about Turing and such as a child 20 years ago. The idea has always been met with negativity, IMO because people want to feel that they have a par…

> you aren't allowed to have any positive or nuanced opinion of the tech. I'm finding this isn't unique to AI, it's as if our entire society has become black and white, overly tribal. There's little room for shades of gray now. Look at the issue of public drug use by the unhoused in PNW cities, as an example. If you state any opinion other than silent acceptance of the issue, you get called a far-right nutjob. Trying…

I am pretty certain that the book of at least 1 of the Abrahamic religions explicitly states that you either believe all of it, or you are not a believer.

What you’re describing is religion applied to every opinion.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#299

Post by bmacho »

nerdsniper wrote: post #63
ambicapter wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the hate surrounding AI is that it is being sold as AI, but it really, really isn't the AI of the kind you read as a child 20 years ago.

When I was a kid, “AI” was quake 2 bots, starcraft pathfinding algorithms, and chessbot personalities. I dont understand why the old definition of AI keeps being retconned.

You are very wrong here.

The term "AI" never meant bots in general.

It's true that in games bots were also called AI but only in a specific context and niche, and it is not what the whole conversation is about.

Re: To have a moral stance on AI is to be an outcast, and it sucks

#300

Post by Awoooooo »

Hating AI is the majority position. Almost everyone's experience of AI is that it has replaced something or someone that did the job better before AI. That means the experience that vast majority of people have with AI is that it has made things worse.

It's only the software devs with a different experience and they're over-represented in online comment sections. Also because the software devs have no lives and only talk to other software devs they're out of touch with the vast majority of people who fucking hate this shit now.

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