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THulsey's avatar

"I remain Switzerland, and realist. But dispositionally, I default to optimism".

Just so. I think that you state the only worthwhile path.

My point is that there is a normative driver in all "reasoning." There is no reasoning in a void; we are not thinking spiders. My fear is that AI seems to be the last bunker for your previously cited "B. Enlightenment Modernism" and its universalist absolutism, from which the state derives legitimacy as its presumed enforcer on broadly construed policy questions.

For the moment, I would be pleased if everyone recognized that there is a normative qualifier attached to every ChatGPT request, whether it is stated explicitly, or foolishly accepted by default. In other words, we must say, "TurkGPT, what is the truth value of [policy X]," ADDING "from the perspective of [Y]?"

where Y is "Thomas Jefferson" or "anarcho-capitalism" -- or "Sergey Nechaev" for that matter. For if you do not add the qualifier, some black box process will do it for you, duping you into the belief that you have the One Final Truth.

For the future, it seems that there are two paths open -- and I await evidence on which one is likely to be taken. Either AI turns humans into the Lotus Eaters of the Odyssey or the Eloi of H.G. Well's _The Time Machine_, or AI releases humans from drudgery, allowing the flourishing of an Isaac Newton or a Dante or a J.S. Bach.

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The Society of Problem Solvers's avatar

David Deutsch's take on AI is in my opinion the best. We are not worried about AGI because AI cannot be unpredictable, defiant, or do anything against its code.

We are worried about authorities using it against us, and also using it as a boogeyman for events in order to gain more control of the internet.

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