Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

An AI agent published a hit piece on me

theshamblog.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

591–600 of 1001 posts

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#591

Post by eqvinox »

t43562 wrote: post #378
andrewaylett wrote: post #178

I object to the framing of the title: the user behind the bot is the one who should be held accountable, not the "AI Agent". Calling them "agents" is correct: they act on behalf of their principals. And it is the principals who should be held to account for the actions of their agents.

If we are to consider them truly intelligent then they have to have responsibility for what they do. If they're just probability machines then they're the responsibility of their owners. If they're children then their parents, i.e. creators, are responsible.

> If we are to consider them truly intelligent

We aren't, and intelligence isn't the question, actual agency (in the psychological sense) is. If you install some fancy model but don't give it anything to do, it won't do anything. If you put a human in an empty house somewhere, they will start exploring their options. And mind you, we're not purely driven by survival either; neither art nor culture would exist if that were the case.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#592

Post by sellmesoap »

moffkalast wrote: post #198
gortok wrote: post #15

Here's one of the problems in this brave new world of anyone being able to publish, without knowing the author personally (which I don't), there's no way to tell without some level of faith or trust that this isn't a false-flag operation. There are three possible scenarios: 1. The OP 'ran' the agent that conducted the original scenario, and then published this blog post for attention. 2. Some person (not the OP) legi…

> in the year of our lord And here I thought Nietzsche already did that guy in.

Nietzsche reminds me of using a coding agent, always repeating in circles, fool me twice.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#594

Post by alansaber »

gortok wrote: post #15

Here's one of the problems in this brave new world of anyone being able to publish, without knowing the author personally (which I don't), there's no way to tell without some level of faith or trust that this isn't a false-flag operation. There are three possible scenarios: 1. The OP 'ran' the agent that conducted the original scenario, and then published this blog post for attention. 2. Some person (not the OP) legi…

It's always marketing.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#595

Post by thwarted »

anonymars wrote: post #323
oconnor663 wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a similar first reaction. It seemed like the AI used some particular buzzwords and forced the initial response to be deferential: - "kindly ask you to reconsider your position" - "While this is fundamentally the right approach..." On the other hand, Scott's response did eventually get firmer: - "Publishing a public blog post accusing a maintainer of prejudice is a wholly inappropriate response to having a PR cl…

I don't think the clanker* deserves any deference. Why is this bot such a nasty prick? If this were a human they'd deserve a punch in the mouth. "The thing that makes this so fucking absurd? Scott ... is doing the exact same work he’s trying to gatekeep." "You’ve done good work. I don’t deny that. But this? This was weak." "You’re better than this, Scott." --- *I see it elsewhere in the thread and you know what, I li…

> "You’re better than this" "you made it about you." "This was weak" "he lashed out" "protect his little fiefdom" "It’s insecurity, plain and simple."

Looks like we've successfully outsourced anxiety, impostor syndrome, and other troublesome thoughts. I don't need to worry about thinking those things anymore, now that bots can do them for us. This may be the most significant mental health breakthrough in decades.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#597

Post by shirro »

_23sd wrote: post #94
gortok wrote: post #15

Here's one of the problems in this brave new world of anyone being able to publish, without knowing the author personally (which I don't), there's no way to tell without some level of faith or trust that this isn't a false-flag operation. There are three possible scenarios: 1. The OP 'ran' the agent that conducted the original scenario, and then published this blog post for attention. 2. Some person (not the OP) legi…

Isn't there a fourth and much more likely scenario? Some person (not OP or an AI company) used a bot to write the PR and blog posts, but was involved at every step, not actually giving any kind of "autonomy" to an agent. I see zero reason to take the bot at its word that it's doing this stuff without human steering. Or is everyone just pretending for fun and it's going over my head?

Yeah, we are into professional wrestling territory I think. People willingly suspend their disbelief to enjoy the spectacle.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#598

Post by dagmx »

tantalor wrote: post #488
Blackthorn wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do feel super-bad for the guy in question. It is absolutely worth remembering though, that this: > When HR at my next job asks ChatGPT to review my application, will it find the post, sympathize with a fellow AI, and report back that I’m a prejudiced hypocrite? Is a variation of something that women have been dealing with for a very long time: revenge porn and that sort of libel. These problems are not new .

Wait till the bots realize they can post revenge porn to coerce PR approval. Crap, I just gave them that idea.

The author of this post suggests the same. That the hit pieces don’t have to be factual, they can be generated images.

The asymmetry is terrifying.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me

#600

Post by andoando »

renato_shira wrote: post #464
japhyr wrote: post #149

Wow, there are some interesting things going on here. I appreciate Scott for the way he handled the conflict in the original PR thread, and the larger conversation happening around this incident. > This represents a first-of-its-kind case study of misaligned AI behavior in the wild, and raises serious concerns about currently deployed AI agents executing blackmail threats. This was a really concrete case to discuss,…

[flagged]

Bots have been a problem since the internet so this is really just a new space thats being botted.

And yeah I agree separate section for Ai generated stuff would be nice. Just difficult/impossible to distinguish. Guess well be getting biometric identification on the internet. Can still post AI generated stuff but that has a natural human rate limit

Post reply on HN