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PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

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Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#31
post #6
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> AI Threatens the Workforce Under communism, why is this a thing? I know that China hasn't been strictly communist since the Soviets fell but ostensibly, humanoid AI robots under semi-communism is a the dream, no?

As China is a communist country with a partly capital economy hoping to transition to socialist society. It is still in the process of transition and AI in its current form and controlled by capitalists will destroy their goal of socialist society. It is different when you have AI that any one can own and use from only the few can afford to own and run.

You got the order mixed up here btw, socialism is the precursor to communism, not the other way around!

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#32
Even the very people driving the AI rush are implicitly showing that they are skeptical: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy7vrd8k4eo

Personally, I think everyone has realized there is a huge bubble, especially the C-levels who've sunk huge amounts of money into it, and now they are all quietly panicking and trying to find ways to mitigate the damage when it finally busts. Some are probably sticking their head in the sand and hoping that they can just keep the scheme going indefinitely, but I get a real sense that the bubble is very much explicitly recognized by many of them.

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#33

> former Dean of Electronics Engineering and Computer Science at Peking University, has noted that Chinese data makes up only 1.3 percent of global large-model datasets (The Paper, March 24). Reflecting these concerns, the Ministry of State Security (MSS) has issued a stark warning that “poisoned data” (数据投毒) could “mislead public opinion” (误导社会舆论) (Sina Finance, August 5). from a technical point of view, I suppose i…

I was thinking about this yesterday.

My personal opinion is that the PRC will face a self created headwind that likely, structurally, will prevent them from leading in AI.

As the model get's more powerful, you can't simply train the model on your narrative if it doesn't align with real data/world.

At some capacity, the model will notice and then it becomes a can of worms.

This means they need to train the model to be purposefully duplicitous, which I predict will make the model less useful/capable. At least in most of the capacities we would want to use the model.

It also ironically makes the model more of a threat and harder to control. So likely it will face party leadership resistance as capability grows.

I just don't see them winning the race to high intelligence models.

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#34

> former Dean of Electronics Engineering and Computer Science at Peking University, has noted that Chinese data makes up only 1.3 percent of global large-model datasets (The Paper, March 24). Reflecting these concerns, the Ministry of State Security (MSS) has issued a stark warning that “poisoned data” (数据投毒) could “mislead public opinion” (误导社会舆论) (Sina Finance, August 5). from a technical point of view, I suppose i…

I think they're referring to this study on LLM poisoning in the pretraining step: https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.07192 (related article: https://www.anthropic.com/research/small-samples-poison)

I'll admit I'm out of my element when discussing this stuff. Maybe somebody more plugged into the research can enlighten.

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#35

Is "PRC" a common abbreviation? Does it mean "China", or does it mean something else? Why not write China? I'm from KOS* (neighbor country of KON* and ROF*), so I don't know much. * Kingdom of Sweden , Kingdom of Norway , Republic of Finland .

PRC distinguishes from ROC ("Mainland China" vs "Taiwan") just as DPRK and ROK distinguish the two governments on the Korean peninsula.

See also: "Germany" 1949-1990

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#36
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it even semi-communism though? IIRC you can't even have an independent union in China

Of course. They outlawed private schools, get companies to donate multiple % points of their wealth to the state for redistribution, all companies exist purely at the pleasure of the government, nobody's wealth has any effect on their control by the government, etc. It's a super communist state, it just happens to also embrace many parts of Capitalism.

> It's a super communist state, it just happens to also embrace many parts of Capitalism.

This is incredibly confusing thing to say. On its face, its like saying "it's a delicious apple pie, it just happens to embrace many aspects of cyanide" (or reverse cyanide/apple pie here if that its easier for you).

But I assume you could say more here? Like can we maybe at least share an understanding here that all the things you cite at the top would also not exist in a communism state? In perhaps an authoritarian state with an otherwise free market, these points make sense, they would succinctly describe that, but for a state that is supposedly precisely communist, these things simply don't apply! Maybe the school thing, but that would imply such a thing would need to be outlawed, which really doesn't make much sense in a communist society/state.

I know people get excited thinking about this stuff, I do too! But at the end of the day we must persist in using words precisely, we must at least try for something like semantic consistency. At the very least, so you and I can really see and understand our enemies, right? If I was a guy on another side, I would hope that I'd never mistake one capitalist dog for another paper tiger. It would be at the very least embarrassing! Right?

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#37

Is "PRC" a common abbreviation? Does it mean "China", or does it mean something else? Why not write China? I'm from KOS* (neighbor country of KON* and ROF*), so I don't know much. * Kingdom of Sweden , Kingdom of Norway , Republic of Finland .

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Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#38

Is "PRC" a common abbreviation? Does it mean "China", or does it mean something else? Why not write China? I'm from KOS* (neighbor country of KON* and ROF*), so I don't know much. * Kingdom of Sweden , Kingdom of Norway , Republic of Finland .

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> Yes PRC is a common abbreviation amongst literate, engaged, people.

So I'm either not literate, not engaged, or not people?

I'm surprised to learn it is as common as USA, UK, and EU.

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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> Yes PRC is a common abbreviation amongst literate, engaged, people. So I'm either not literate, not engaged, or not people? I'm surprised to learn it is as common as USA, UK, and EU.

On many products lately I have seen Made in PRC, not Made in China as it was typical 10 years ago.

Re: PRC elites voice AI-skepticism

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> Yes PRC is a common abbreviation amongst literate, engaged, people. So I'm either not literate, not engaged, or not people? I'm surprised to learn it is as common as USA, UK, and EU.

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