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477
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • Looks like LW/Lightcone managed to convince enough people to give then $2M, which will totally not be used to settle sexual assault lawsuits in the future.

  • I'm not reading that shit but for the masochists out there who like to read HN licking VC boots, here ya go

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42682305

  • people in the Russian-speaking EA community are all busy with other things.

    i.e. working for Putin, running from Putin, or dying for Putin

  • Yeah thought the same, "can't make it much worse"

  • Yeah it's been decades since I read Rhodes' history about the atom bomb, so I missed the years a bit. My point is that even if we couldn't explain exactly what was happening there was something physically there, and we knew enough about it that Oppenheimer and co. could convince the US Army to build Oak Ridge and many other facilities at massive expense.

    We can't say the same about "AI".

  • Yeah, my starting position would be that it was obvious to any competent physicist at the time (although there weren't that many) that the potential energy release from nuclear fission was a real thing - the "only" thing to do to weaponise it or use it for peaceful ends was engineering.

    The analogy to "runaway X-risk AGI" is there's a similar straight line from ELIZA to Acausal Robot God, all that's required is a bit of elbow grease and good ole fashioned American ingenuity. But my point is that apart from Yud and a few others, no serious person believes this.

  • noodling on a blog post - does anyone with more experience of LW/EA than me know if "AI safety" people are referencing the invention of nuclear weapons as a template for regulating/forbidding "AGI"?

  • I'm increasingly convinced that this person is in a dark place mentally, and am fighting an internal battle to keep poking them for the lulz or just ignoring them.

    https://lobste.rs/s/lgqwje/does_current_ai_represent_dead_end#c_cyrxm4

    (I've seen this behavior on lobste.rs before and I think sometimes people literally get banned for their own good)

    Edit bored on a train so I did the math, in the comment thread, this user has made 30% of the comments by count and 20% by "volume" (basically number of bytes in the plaintext).

  • Back when I was an undergrad I saw a letter addressed to the department from a German gentleman who claimed to have invented a perpetual motion machine (this was the department of mechanics). I remember the letter being quite typographically florid and especially the author’s likeness in silhouette.

    My advisor had fun finding the flaw in the proposal. Took a few minutes.

    I often wondered if demolishing a PM suggestion would be a good extra credit question on an exam.

  • I recognize everyone except Leopold. Increase my suffering by telling me who it is.

  • I just got a hit of esprit d'escalier, and wished I'd replied to this

    But the road to Hackers News is paved with good intentions.

    with

    So too is the road to Roko's Basilisk.

  • as an amuse bouche for the horrors that will follow this year, please enjoy this lobste.rs reaching the melting down end stage after going full Karen at someone who agrees with a submitted post saying LLMs are a dead end when it comes to AI.

    https://lobste.rs/s/lgqwje/does_current_ai_represent_dead_end#c_tefto4

    Thankfully, accusing someone of being a crapto promoter is seen as an attack that is beyond the pale.

    Highlights from the rest of the thread include bemoaning the lack of a downvote button for registering disapproval:

    https://lobste.rs/s/lgqwje/does_current_ai_represent_dead_end#c_ft9mpj

    unilaterally deciding to reply multiple times to one comment, neccesitating them to add a meta comment with hyperlinks

    https://lobste.rs/s/lgqwje/does_current_ai_represent_dead_end#c_jjk5ei

    And of course is a MoreWronger (moroner?)

  • If you stick around and do a bunch of research you will end up better informed and much unhappier.

  • I stopped reading Gruber years ago to preserve my blood pressure, but this particular piece is not that bad. In particular the Netscape analogy rang true.