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What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

nytimes.com

501–510 of 548 posts

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By elderly people wo are already dying from natural causes and ask for a medically assisted death instead of unnecessarily prolonging their suffering. It is telling that so many people who suffer choose a dignified death once they are legally allowed to.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/09/02/canada-par... Canadian Paralympian: I asked for a disability ramp - and was offered euthanasia

"Man bites dog" gets more clicks than "Dog bites man". Look at the actual statistics, not the headlines.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#502
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, 'suffering builds character'. I haven't had that one in a while. Maybe we should not want to get prepared for RealPeople™ if all they can do is break us and disappoint us. "But RealPeople™ can also elevate, surprise, and enchant you!" you may intervene. They sure than. An still, some may decide no longer to go for new rounds of Russian roulette. Someone like that is not a lesser person, they still have real™ enjo…

One difference between "AI chatbots" in this context and common flight simulator games is that someone else is listening in and has the actual control over the simulation. You're not alone in the same way that you are when pining over a character in a television series or books, or crashing a virtual jumbo jet into a skyscraper in MICROS~1 Flight Simulator.

You are aware that you can, in fact, run models on your own, fully airgapped machine, right? Ollama exists.

The fact that most people chose not to is no argument for 'mandatory' surveillance, just a laissez-faire attitude towards it.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're speaking to different things. Safety doesn't mean you're a provider. It means you are safe to be authentic with. Safe to share truth with. That safety takes many forms. You cannot have depth without that safety. It is physical, it is also emotional and intellectual. For instance, without safety a partner would never join you on many interesting experiences. If you want those experiences, they need to be able to…

The safety I have heard demanded directly from women to me as a partner – or from female friends about the man they seek – is the safety of being a provider, giving them a feeling of security that they can’t manage to achieve on their own. It’s not just about a man being safe to be with. Again, you are speaking about something I haven’t heard from actual women, and I think I’ll trust the latter (and reportage matchin…

> from women to me as a partner – or from female friends about the man they seek

How many people are you talking about here? Like if you had to rephrase this point using numbers would you say “I’ve heard half a dozen women say this”?

That aside, can you elaborate on safety as a demand? I’ve never had a partner or friend demand safety from me, ever. The only times in my life that I have seen someone demand safety from another is when the latter is acting violent or reckless to the point that their behavior poses a threat.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, 'suffering builds character'. I haven't had that one in a while. Maybe we should not want to get prepared for RealPeople™ if all they can do is break us and disappoint us. "But RealPeople™ can also elevate, surprise, and enchant you!" you may intervene. They sure than. An still, some may decide no longer to go for new rounds of Russian roulette. Someone like that is not a lesser person, they still have real™ enjo…

Yes, great comment. What do you think of the idea that people generally don't really like other people - that they do generally disappoint and cause suffering. (We are all imperfect, imperfectly getting along together, daily initiating and supporting acts of aggression against others.) And that, if the FakePeople™ experience were good enough, probably most people would opt out of engaging with others, similar to how…

Ultimately, that's the old Star Trek 'the holodeck would - in a realistic scenario - be the last invention of a civilization' argument.

I think that there will always be several strata of the population who will not be satisfied with FakePeople™, either because they are unable to interact with the system effectively due to cognitive or educational deficiencies, or because they are in a belief that RealPeople™ somehow have a hidden, non-measurable capacity (let's call it, for the lack of a better term, a 'soul'), that cannot be replicated or simulated - which makes it, ultimately, a theological question.

There is probably a tipping point at which the number of RealPeople™ enthusiasts is so low reasonable relationship matching is no longer possible.

But I don't really think the problem is 'RealPeople™ are generally horrible'. I believe that the problem is availability and cost of relationship - in energy, time, money, and effort:

Most pilot experiences are on simulators because RealFlight is expensive, and the vast majority of pilots don't have access to an aircraft (instead sharing one), which also limits potential flight hours (because when the weather is good, everyone wants to fly. No-one wants the plane up in bad conditions, because it's dangerous to the plane, and - less important for the ownership group - the pilot.)

Similarly: Relationship-building takes planning effort, carries significant opportunity cost, monetary resources, and has a low probability of the desired outcome (whatever that may be, it's just as true for 'long-term potentially married relationship as it is for the one-night stand). That's incompatible with what society expects from a professional these days (e.g. work 8-16 hours a day, keep physically fit, save for old age and/or potential health crisis, invest in your professional education, the list goes on).

Enter the AI model, which gives a pretty good simulation of a relationship for the cost of a monthly subway card, carries very little opportunity cost (simulation will stop for you at any time if something more important comes up), and needs no planning at all.

Risk of heartbreak (aka: potentially catastrophic psychiatric crisis, yes, such cases are common) and hell being people doesn't even have to factor in to make the relationship simulator appear like a good deal.

If people think 'relationship chatbots' are an issue, just you wait for when - not if - someone builds a reasonably-well-working 'chatbot in a silicone-skin-body' that's more than just a glorified sex doll - a physically existing, touchable, cooking, homemaking, reasonably funny, randomly-sensual, and yes, sex-simulation-capable 'Joi' (and/or her male-looking counterpart) is probably the last invention of mankind.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#505

I went into this assuming the answer would be "Whatever they think will make them the most money," and sure enough.

That’s overly reductive, based on my experience working for one of the tech behemoths back in its hypergrowth phase. When you’re experiencing hypergrowth the whole team is working extremely hard to keep serving your user base. The growth is exciting and its in the news and people you know and those you don’t are constantly talking about it. In this mindset it’s challenging to take a pause and consider that the thing…

> When you’re experiencing hypergrowth the whole team is working extremely hard to keep serving your user base.

Also known as "working hard to keep making money".

> In this mindset it’s challenging to take a pause and consider that the thing you’re building may have harmful aspects.

Gosh, that must be so tough! Forgive me if I don't have a lot of sympathy for that position.

> You can justify it by thinking that if your team wins you can address the problem, but if another company wins the space you don’t get any say in the matter.

If that were the case for a given company, they could publicly commit to doing the right thing, publicly denounce other companies for doing the wrong thing, and publicly advocate for regulations that force all companies to do the right thing.

> When you’re trying so hard to challenge the near-impossible odds and make your company a success, you just don’t want to consider that what you help make might end up causing real societal harm.

I will say this as simply as possible: too bad. "Making your company a success" is simply of infinitesimal and entirely negligible importance compared to doing societal harm. If you "don't want to consider it", you are already going down the wrong path.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#506
post #89

Meanwhile Zuckerberg's vision for the future was that most of our friends will be AIs in the future...

That's clearly sad in the widest sense, but in the narrow sense. I'm extremely optimistic for my own prospects.

Why? It means I've been under-estimating the aggregate demand for friendship for years. Armed with that knowledge, I personally feel like it's easier than ever to make friends. It certainly makes approaching people a lot easier. Throw in a little authenticity, some active and reflective listening, and real vulnerability and I'm almost guaranteed success.

That doesn't mean it doesn't take effort, but the opportunities are real and deep genuine, caring friendships are way more possible than I'd been led to believe. If given the choice between 10 AI friends and 1 human friend, which one would you choose?

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In my experience, the types of people who use AI as a substitute for romantic relationships That's exactly it. Romantic relationships aren't what they used to be. Men like the new normal, women may try to but they cannot for a variety of unchangeable reasons. > The chances you'll encounter these people in real life is pretty close to zero, you just see them concentrate in niche subreddits. The people in the niche s…

> That's exactly it. Romantic relationships aren't what they used to be. Men like the new normal, women may try to but they cannot for a variety of unchangeable reasons. Men like the new normal? Hah, it seems like there's an article posted here weekly about how bad modern dating and relationships are for me and how much huge groups of men hate it. For reasons ranging from claims that women "have too many options" and…

These are all fair points, I don't disagree with any of them but they're just symptoms of much broader problems - like political and cultural trends which men are supposed to be in charge of but are in fact oblivious about.

To put it a bit differently, it's not about men vs women it's about social forces and dynamics which are largely misunderstood. Call it a failure of humanities and social sciences, and that includes economics and political science - a topic which is best discussed elsewhere.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#509

It surprises me how hyper focused people are on AI risk when we’ve grown numb to the millions of preventable deaths that happen every year. 8 million people to smoking. 4 million to obesity. 2.6 million to alcohol. 2.5 million to healthcare. 1.2 million to cars. Hell even coconuts kill 150 people per year. It is tragic that people have lost their mind or their life to AI, and it should be prevented. But those using t…

* 8 million people to smoking. The 1990’s saw one of the most effective smoking cessation campaigns in the world here in the US. There have been numerous case studies on it. It is clearly something we are working on and addressing (not just in the US) * 4 million to obesity. Obesity has been widely studied and identified as a major issue and is something doctors and beyond have been trying to help people with. You ca…

Im not resisting that at all. I fully support AI safety research. The think mechanistic interoperability is a fascinating and fruitful field.

What I’m resisting are one sided views of AI being either pure evil, or on the verge of AGI. Neither are true and it obstructs thoughtful discussion.

I did get into what aboutism, I didn’t realize it at the time. I did use flawed logic.

To refine my point, I should have just focused on cars and other technology. AI amplifies humanity for both good and bad. It comes with risk and utility. And I never see articles presenting both.

Re: What OpenAI did when ChatGPT users lost touch with reality

#510

It surprises me how hyper focused people are on AI risk when we’ve grown numb to the millions of preventable deaths that happen every year. 8 million people to smoking. 4 million to obesity. 2.6 million to alcohol. 2.5 million to healthcare. 1.2 million to cars. Hell even coconuts kill 150 people per year. It is tragic that people have lost their mind or their life to AI, and it should be prevented. But those using t…

I am somewhat sympathetic of this view because it appears to be rational. But I've heard something similar when the internet was becoming more and more mainstream 25 years ago. A similar rational opinion was that online communities help people connect and reduce loneliness. But if we look at it objectively the outcome was poor in that regard. So buyer beware. Of course, I don't think anything should be banned. But th…

I fully agree with you. I do think my argument came across as more hand wavy than I intended, I definitely did a “what about” and wish I hadn’t.

What I’m really after is thoughtful discourse, that acknowledges we accept risk in our society if there is an upside.

To your point about the internet making people more lonely, I’d say on balance that’s probably true, but it’s also nuanced. I know my mom personally benefits from staying in touch with her friends from her home country.

I think one of the most difficult things to predict is how human behavior adapts to novel stimulus. We will never have enough information. But I do think we adapt, learn, and become more resilient. That is the core of my optimism.

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