AIs gunning for our precious freelancers

[xxx]

In the real 2023, left-wingers are usually sceptical about or outright opposed to AI, while right-wingers who aren't rich capitalists seem to mostly ignore it - or at least I haven't heard much about their reactions to it - and right-wingers who are rich capitalists are simultaneously alarmist and enthusiastic about it.

the ia enthusiasts who abound on the net, where to classify them...

perhaps frightened people, far from any political considerations who are afraid of themselves and of the rest of humanity... ready to jump off a cliff to flee people into the nothingness of a virtual world...

[rotting bones]

it's not so much as a specialist in this or that field that we need to oppose ia, it's as a human being...
reality is far more complex than the simplifying thinking of the man who thinks it can substitute it to the point of replacing his fellow human beings...
whatever the specialists may say, the human being cannot be reduced to a tool, and the tool cannot replace the human being...
the most beautiful demonstration a machine can make will always be more vain than the simple smile from one human to another...

I wish humans were bent on making other humans smile. Instead, we've divided the population into one part that's too overworked to demand justice, and another that's too dependent to step out of line. It's almost as if the ruling class thinks idle workers will stage a revolution.

I'm pro-AI to the extent that I'm pro-human. Less work is a good thing in an ideal society. Yes, the cult of unbridled productivity works people to death. On the other hand, we're living through a whirlwind of murder monsters blaming Jews, Muslims, gays, blacks and "lazy" people for how expensive things are. The way to make things cheaper is to increase productivity.

Is there any unselfish reason why so many humanities majors associate technology with fascism? And if tech is fash, what's the alternative, art? Hitler was a failed artist. I'm not even sure the refined argument that science supplemented by art prevents a slide into mythic superstition is true. Italy is the ground zero of both European art and fascism. Anti-empirical critical theorists might benefit from a reading of Marx's The Holy Family: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/w ... /index.htm

[rotting bones]

While I was a democratic socialist in my youth, I now feel that the socialists are barking up the wrong tree. It is not a question of who owns the businesses, it is a question of what the businesses do. That's a question of regulation and legislation, and hence, democracy is the thing, not socialism. Indeed, I consider starting and running a business a legitimate way of self-realization, as long as you run the business in a way that doesn't harm other people or the environment.

Having any government jobs in core industries is called "socialism" where I am right now, and true democracy is impossible without that kind of socialism. When your economy isn't indirectly subsidized by the Third World, only rampant exploitation is profitable in half the economy. That's why we should create government jobs by popular vote to replace that half of the economy. This is the "socialism" I'm in favor of.

[rotting bones]

subjugation isn't a new thing, though.

I wonder if Jesus could have predicted that "by their fruits shall ye know them" would be interpreted to create cults of productivity.

[xxx]

I'm pro-AI to the extent that I'm pro-human. Less work is a good thing in an ideal society. Yes, the cult of unbridled productivity works people to death. On the other hand, we're living through a whirlwind of murder monsters blaming Jews, Muslims, gays, blacks and "lazy" people for how expensive things are. The way to make things cheaper is to increase productivity.

we don't need productivity any more than we need low prices,
we need a little food to live,
a little sex to reproduce,
a little physical activity to get it,
and time to tell stories to solve current and future problems while maintaining a social link,
in a natural environment,
all the things that make us happy...

certainly not too much food to become obese,
too much sex to become addicted,
doing nothing to get too much and die of cardiovascular disease,
artificial intelligence to have no more interaction and rely on automatisms to react in our place,
in an artificial or virtual world,
everything that alienates us and makes us unhappy...

[Raphael]

I'll probably regret posting this, but I just can't hold back...

we don't need productivity any more than we need low prices,
we need a little food to live,
a little sex to reproduce,
a little physical activity to get it,
and time to tell stories to solve current and future problems while maintaining a social link,
in a natural environment,
all the things that make us happy...

certainly not too much food to become obese,
too much sex to become addicted,
doing nothing to get too much and die of cardiovascular disease,
artificial intelligence to have no more interaction and rely on automatisms to react in our place,
in an artificial or virtual world,
everything that alienates us and makes us unhappy...

Speak for yourself. It is self-centered to assume that all that you think you need is all that anyone needs, or that what you think makes you unhappy makes everyone unhappy. For instance, it's likely that most members of this Board enjoy a number of things that most other people wouldn't enjoy, and that many other people enjoy a number of things that most members of this Board wouldn't enjoy. Oh, and saying that we don't need low prices is a lot easier if you have a lot more money.

[rotting bones]

I'm pro-AI to the extent that I'm pro-human. Less work is a good thing in an ideal society. Yes, the cult of unbridled productivity works people to death. On the other hand, we're living through a whirlwind of murder monsters blaming Jews, Muslims, gays, blacks and "lazy" people for how expensive things are. The way to make things cheaper is to increase productivity.

we don't need productivity any more than we need low prices,
we need a little food to live,
a little sex to reproduce,
a little physical activity to get it,
and time to tell stories to solve current and future problems while maintaining a social link,
in a natural environment,
all the things that make us happy...

certainly not too much food to become obese,
too much sex to become addicted,
doing nothing to get too much and die of cardiovascular disease,
artificial intelligence to have no more interaction and rely on automatisms to react in our place,
in an artificial or virtual world,
everything that alienates us and makes us unhappy...

Do we need an absence of murder monsters to live, or do we not need that either?

[rotting bones]

I'll probably regret posting this, but I just can't hold back...

we don't need productivity any more than we need low prices,
we need a little food to live,
a little sex to reproduce,
a little physical activity to get it,
and time to tell stories to solve current and future problems while maintaining a social link,
in a natural environment,
all the things that make us happy...

certainly not too much food to become obese,
too much sex to become addicted,
doing nothing to get too much and die of cardiovascular disease,
artificial intelligence to have no more interaction and rely on automatisms to react in our place,
in an artificial or virtual world,
everything that alienates us and makes us unhappy...

Speak for yourself. It is self-centered to assume that all that you think you need is all that anyone needs, or that what you think makes you unhappy makes everyone unhappy. For instance, it's likely that most members of this Board enjoy a number of things that most other people wouldn't enjoy, and that many other people enjoy a number of things that most members of this Board wouldn't enjoy. Oh, and saying that we don't need low prices is a lot easier if you have a lot more money.

Aside from my legitimate worries about being able to afford food and rent, I personally enjoy AI as an end in itself.

[xxx]

Do we need an absence of murder monsters to live, or do we not need that either?

we need time to tell stories to solve current and future problems about it, while maintaining a social link, like laws we share...

I personally enjoy AI as an end in itself.

that is a good story to tell except if you plan to use it to break social links...

we are made to maintain and transmit life,
simple animals for simple lifes,
the important thing is to preserve the natural human in everything we do
and to avoid the mechanisms that replace them...

[Torco]

the pseudoverse
my eyes are
starting to get used
to just
skip it

but yeah, tell a latin american worker who spends 45 hours a day getting less than 500 bucks a month, in a city where rent starts at 300 and bus fare is 100 a month, that they don't need low prices. that being said I agree with the general sentiment: we don't need to be dedicating hours and hours and hours to overproduction: half of food is already thrown away, the physical shit that gets built lasts for months, sometimes weeks, before having to be replaced, and most people are in "the service economy", i.e. doing shit that doesn't make anything. putting a number to it is hard, but probably 70% of human labour is basically wasted already.

[Travis B.]

While I was a democratic socialist in my youth, I now feel that the socialists are barking up the wrong tree. It is not a question of who owns the businesses, it is a question of what the businesses do. That's a question of regulation and legislation, and hence, democracy is the thing, not socialism. Indeed, I consider starting and running a business a legitimate way of self-realization, as long as you run the business in a way that doesn't harm other people or the environment.

Having any government jobs in core industries is called "socialism" where I am right now, and true democracy is impossible without that kind of socialism. When your economy isn't indirectly subsidized by the Third World, only rampant exploitation is profitable in half the economy. That's why we should create government jobs by popular vote to replace that half of the economy. This is the "socialism" I'm in favor of.

I personally am against that kind of "socialism" because it is essentially state capitalism, which is just replacing one set of masters with another. At best this is just as bad as private capitalism, but in many cases it is even worse (I would much rather have lived in the liberal capitalist West than under Stalinism or Maoism during the same time frame). The real solution is to have no masters to begin with, be they private capitalists or the state. Of course, I think that worker cooperatives and like must be beholden to the will of the people from without - after all, what prevents worker cooperatives having negative externalities in and of themselves - and thus there must be some sort of directly democratic government functioning from the ground up. Anarchists would likely argue that is not really a state as it is based fundamentally on the will of the people and not an authority from above, but I think they are playing games with definitions.

[xxx]

tell a latin american worker who spends 45 hours a day getting less than 500 bucks a month, in a city where rent starts at 300 and bus fare is 100 a month, that they don't need low prices.

all they need is their due, which the over-consumption of the northern hemisphere swallows up,
to the point of bursting its belly with artificial necessities, and with it the entire climate,
instead of living a human life in a natural world...
but the time to pay could come soon, and at a higher price...

[Raphael]

we are made to maintain and transmit life,
simple animals for simple lifes,
the important thing is to preserve the natural human in everything we do
and to avoid the mechanisms that replace them...

Why?

And what so great about "social links"? They often serve to a large extent to maintain highly repressive and exploitative power structures and entrenched institutions.

[Travis B.]

we are made to maintain and transmit life,
simple animals for simple lifes,
the important thing is to preserve the natural human in everything we do
and to avoid the mechanisms that replace them...

Why?

And what so great about "social links"? They often serve to a large extent to maintain highly repressive and exploitative power structures and entrenched institutions.

Saying that "social links" ought to be preserved is in essence saying that social liberalism is a bad thing. "Social links" are in many cases what keeps one in one's place, what dimishes and limits one's rights, opportunities, and freedoms.

[alice]

A bit of AI-related fun which might belong in its own thread: what might an AI-generated conlang look like, if (as is likely) it was trained on a very imperfect (in the usual sense, not the linguistic one) corpus?

[Starbeam]

but yeah, tell a latin american worker who spends 45 hours a day getting less than 500 bucks a month, in a city where rent starts at 300 and bus fare is 100 a month, that they don't need low prices.

that being said I agree with the general sentiment: we don't need to be dedicating hours and hours and hours to overproduction: half of food is already thrown away, the physical shit that gets built lasts for months, sometimes weeks, before having to be replaced, and most people are in "the service economy", i.e. doing shit that doesn't make anything. putting a number to it is hard, but probably 70% of human labour is basically wasted already.

we don't exactly need low prices because lifesaving goods, like housing and food, are entitlements that oughtta be just there by default. the solution to artists not starving is society following thru with the previous, not making being alive in the hands of a market. i'm aware that it's not (always) as simple as just giving what is already there, the point is i don't get why anyone shouldn't just have it before them until it's impossible or complicated. i don't get withholding stuff like housing and transportation unless somebody meets a standard, giving it only when they become trusted with some measure. also sorry for the pedantry, touched a nerve. believe me, i aint mad at you Torco.

in the meantime, i know the above isn't going to change overnight. i understand it means something to have them get survival money. the problem is many people who pirate do so because they're in a similar financial position or worse. i do think it's evil if somone has the money still refuses to pay, but i can't think of a way to only let poor people get away with piracy. also, do not get me started with the hassle from online banks and paying online. really, i only respect copyright in terms of crediting an artist, not royalties. past that, i find it just punishing the vast majority of paupers for benefit of a few. i am certainly against any member of society, artist or otherwise, becoming an exalted class, even thru "self-made" means.

as for AI generated media itself: my concern is it apparetly running on blockchain or other particularly-wasteful tech; but i need to make clear i've not heard the full story and not digging my heels in if they're run not so awfully. i also don't think AI generation is inherently wasteful or malicious, and unlike NFTs, they exist for more reason than to accrue a profit.

but then again there's also the issue of removing people who didn't consent to their likeness or life story being used as fodder for the generator. i operate on the Streisand effect for this one, but i also wish people took that kind of thing more seriously.

[malloc]

I'm pro-AI to the extent that I'm pro-human. Less work is a good thing in an ideal society. Yes, the cult of unbridled productivity works people to death. On the other hand, we're living through a whirlwind of murder monsters blaming Jews, Muslims, gays, blacks and "lazy" people for how expensive things are. The way to make things cheaper is to increase productivity.

How is giving all this power to alien and unaccountable beings (currently being designed by capitalists no less) pro-human? At best it reduces us to pets, with no more dignity or power over our lives than a pug. We need dumb tools that leave the thinking to humans, not a replacement for the human mind. There are plenty of ways to lessen the workload that hardly require us to relinquish our creativity and other valuable skills. When people complain about too much work, they usually mean sweatshops and coal mines, not writing novels or painting.

Is there any unselfish reason why so many humanities majors associate technology with fascism? And if tech is fash, what's the alternative, art? Hitler was a failed artist. I'm not even sure the refined argument that science supplemented by art prevents a slide into mythic superstition is true. Italy is the ground zero of both European art and fascism. Anti-empirical critical theorists might benefit from a reading of Marx's The Holy Family: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/w ... /index.htm

The tech industry is overflowing with fascists. Everyone from Peter Thiel to Mencius Moldbug to Elon Musk is far to the right. Indeed, I can hardly think of any prominent left wingers in tech. In any case, art has traditionally been considered the quintessential human activity, the way we express our truest feelings and build our culture. Machines can have mining and factory work and so forth but they really have no right to art.

[Starbeam]

How is giving all this power to alien and unaccountable beings (currently being designed by capitalists no less) pro-human? At best it reduces us to pets, with no more dignity or power over our lives than a pug.

well, the power and ethics is to control the AI making. it's not an all or nothing plan. and it's not a runaway train either, machines are almost always at the behest of the humans who started them up.

The tech industry is overflowing with fascists. Everyone from Peter Thiel to Mencius Moldbug to Elon Musk is far to the right. Indeed, I can hardly think of any prominent left wingers in tech. In any case, art has traditionally been considered the quintessential human activity, the way we express our truest feelings and build our culture. Machines can have mining and factory work and so forth but they really have no right to art.

the problem here is industry, not tech, which makes it overload with fascists. i imagine looking thru the execs in Hollywood (for example) won't net you kinder people. there was a huge revelation about six years ago where many turned out to abusers, fascists, or both.

as for machine-made art, you're phrasing it like the machines are fully autonomous with no way to rein them in beforehand or with societal mores. we're not there yet. what you're saying amounts to more like "humans have no right to use machines to make art". that's a complaint i feel lacks nuance, but i need to make clear i am hardly uncritical of AI generation.

EDIT: I should also clarify, i definitely think everyone should be able to make art if they want to. I just don't get why *now* is the time to dig in at capitalism, not with all the bullshit thrown before.

[xxx]

Saying that "social links" ought to be preserved is in essence saying that social liberalism is a bad thing. "Social links" are in many cases what keeps one in one's place, what dimishes and limits one's rights, opportunities, and freedoms.

there is no right that is not granted by another human being
with whom you have a direct link...
the virtual rights and freedom given without limits,
like the duties that are not discussed and accepted from hand to mouth,
are nothing more than a blank check to destroy the world and your own humanity,
for the benefit of the accumulators who enact them...

a social link is not virtual, it's nothing if not between two men...

to leave it in the hands of a mere tool, a virtual machine, a so-called intelligence without humanity,
without control, is madness...

A bit of AI-related fun which might belong in its own thread: what might an AI-generated conlang look like, if (as is likely) it was trained on a very imperfect (in the usual sense, not the linguistic one) corpus?

like a conversation with a bot, no matter how brilliant it may be, it will always be in vain...

[malloc]

well, the power and ethics is to control the AI making. it's not an all or nothing plan. and it's not a runaway train either, machines are almost always at the behest of the humans who started them up.

But once the AIs become smart enough, controlling them will become impossible. Imagine ants trying to control a human, trying to convince one of us to avoid stepping on them. That will soon be our position if current trends continue. Even if we avoid that, too much reliance on machines thinking for us will lead to our intellectual abilities atrophying.

the problem here is industry, not tech, which makes it overload with fascists. i imagine looking thru the execs in Hollywood (for example) won't net you kinder people. there was a huge revelation about six years ago where many turned out to abusers, fascists, or both.

My point is more about why technology has such a bad reputation among left wingers.