So the problem isn’t the technology. The problem is unethical big corporations.
Same as it ever was…
Technology is a cultural creation, not a magic box outside of its circumstances. “The problem isn’t the technology, it’s the creators, users, and perpetuators” is tautological.
And, importantly, the purpose of a system is what it does.
Technology is a product of science. The facts science seeks to uncover are fundamental universal truths that aren’t subject to human folly. Only how we use that knowledge is subject to human folly. I don’t think open source or open weights models are a bad usage of that knowledge. Some of the things corporations do are bad or exploitative uses of that knowledge.
You should really try and consider what it means for technology to be a cultural feature. Think, genuinely and critically, about what it means when someone tells you that you shouldn’t judge the ethics and values of their pursuits, because they are simply discovering “universal truths”.
And then, really make sure you ponder what it means when people say the purpose of a system is what it does. Why that might get brought up in discussions about wanton resource spending for venture capitalist hype.
That’s not at all what I am doing, or what scientists and engineers do. We are all trained to think about ethics and seek ethical approval because even if knowledge itself is morally neutral the methods to obtain that knowledge can be truly unhinged.
Scientific facts are not a cultural facet. A device built using scientific knowledge is also a product of the culture that built it. Technology stands between objective science and subjective needs and culture. Technology generally serves some form of purpose.
Here is an example: Heavier than air flight is a possibility because of the laws of physics. A Boeing 737 is a specific product of both those laws of physics and of USA culture. It’s purpose is to get people and things to places, and to make Boeing the company money.
LLMs can be used for good and ill. People have argued they use too much energy for what they do. I would say that depends on where you get your energy from. Ultimately though it doesn’t use as much as people driving cars or mining bitcoin or eating meat. You should be going after those first if you want to persecute people for using energy.
It does not appear to me that you have even humored my request. I’m actually not even confident you read my comment given your response doesn’t actually respond to it. I hope you will.
Think, genuinely and critically, about what it means when someone tells you that you shouldn’t judge the ethics and values of their pursuits, because they are simply discovering “universal truths”.
No scientist or engineer as ever said that as far as I can recall. I was explaining that even for scientific fact which is morally neutral how you get there is important, and that scientists and engineers acknowledge this. What you are asking me to do this based on a false premise and a bad understanding of how science works.
And then, really make sure you ponder what it means when people say the purpose of a system is what it does.
It both is and isn’t. Things often have consequences alongside their intended function, like how a machine gets warm when in use. It getting warm isn’t a deliberate feature, it’s a consequence of the laws of thermodynamics. We actually try to minimise this as it wastes energy. Even things like fossil fuels aren’t intended to ruin the planet, it’s a side effect of how they work.
It’s a very common talking point now to claim technology exists independent of the culture surrounding it. It is a lie to justify morally vacant research which the, normally venture capitalist, is only concerned about the money to be made. But engineers and scientists necessarily go along with it. It’s not not your problem because we are the ones executing cultural wants, we are a part of the broader culture as well.
The purpose of a system is, absolutely, what it does. It doesn’t matter how well intentioned your design and ethics were, once the system is doing things, those things are its purpose. Your waste heat example, yes, it was the design intent to eliminate that, but now that’s what it does, and the engineers damn well understand that its purpose is to generate waste heat in order to do whatever work it’s doing.
This is a systems engineering concept. And it’s inescapable.
It’s wild how we went from…
Critics: “Crypto is an energy hog and its main use case is a convoluted pyramid scheme”
Boosters: “Bro trust me bro, there are legit use cases and energy consumption has already been reduced in several prototype implementations”
…to…
Critics: “AI is an energy hog and its main use case is a convoluted labor exploitation scheme”
Boosters: “Bro trust me bro, there are legit use cases and energy consumption has already been reduced in several prototype implementations”
Not only the pollution.
It has triggered an economic race to the bottom for any industry that can incorporate it. Employers will be forced to replace more workers with AI to keep prices competitive. And that is a lot of industries, especially if AI continues its growth.
The result is a lot of unemployment, which means an economic slowdown due to a lack of discretionary spending, which is a feedback loop.There are only 3 outcomes I can imagine:
- AI fizzles out. It can’t maintain its advancement enough to impress execs.
- An unimaginable wealth disparity and probably a return to something like feudalism.
- social revolution where AI is taken out of the hands of owners and placed into the hands of workers. Would require changes that we’d consider radically socialist now, like UBI and strong af social safety nets.
The second seems more likely than the third, and I consider that more or less a destruction of humanity
It’s been a while since I’ve seen this meme template being used correctly
Turns out, most people think their stupid views are actually genius
This conveniently ignores the progress being made with smaller and smaller models in the open source community.
As with literally every technical progress, tech itself is no problem, capitalism usage of it is.
The problem is the concentration of power, Sam “regulate me daddy” Altman’s plan is to get the government to create a web of regulation that makes it so only the big tech giants have access to the uncensored models.
The root problem is capitalism though, if it wasn’t AI it would be some other idiotic scheme like cryptocurrency that would be wasting energy instead. The problem is with the system as opposed to technology.
The root problem is human ideology. I do not know if we can have humans without ideology.
This sounds like some Žižekian nonsense. Capitalism’s Court Jester: Slavoj Žižek
I’m open to trying a non-Capitalist system, but I’m pretty sure hierarchical bullshit will happen and the majority will end up being exploited.
Whether anyone else is open to it before humans extinguish themselves, I don’t know.
Stupid AI will destroy humanity. But the important thing to remember is that for a brief, shining moment, profit will be made.