this post was submitted on 09 Jun 2024

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How do we stop AI? (hexbear.net)

submitted 5 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Pic unrelated bc I didn't know what to add for this

I'm going to be honest, I'm not confident in the future of AI and think it would've been ultimately better if it weren't invented to begin with.

I know that it can have genuinely incredible applications that would benefit humanity as a whole, namely healthcare, accident prevention (like with airplanes, ships, shuttles, workplace related, etc.), and weather/natural disaster predictions. I'd love if that were all that it could do.

But I've also seen AI in warfare, surveillance, and policing used to seriously harm innocent people. Employers are already using AI to unfairly filter people out of jobs, and I believe black rock also uses AI to buy up properties. Not to mention that jobs like illustrators, writers, musicians, etc will all inevitably be replaced by their employers looking to consolidate workplace power from unions and increase profit margins.

Boycotting AI art is one way to slow down its growth that I can think of, but what else can be done?

It needs to be regulated and curbed before it's too late.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I don’t know the answer but I’ve been thinking the same thing lately. Some people I talk to think it will be the great equalizer and take us closer to post-scarcity, but I just can not see how that could work in this capitalist society. Every time I see the robot dogs, I think, “well, this is what will hunt down the dissenters one day.” It’s frightening.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

We are already at 'post-scarcity'. What we are suffering from is a distribution and management issue. We let the 'free market' (a.k.a. trillions of dollars of fruitless, wasted, advertising spending) dictate our distribution, and ah damn, it looks like areas that don't have as much money don't spend as much money, better not increase investment there, unless it is for a product that richer people can buy.

Robots nor AI, nor any technology can solve this fundamental contradiction that exists within the capitalist political-economy, and it will stifle productive local growth, and kill equitable distribution of resources world-wide until it is solved.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

This is the argument I keep making. They counter with “if the production cost of everything we need is so low that it’s negligible, then the corporations can’t price gouge without people revolting.” At which point I gesture broadly, like that SpongeBob meme where he shows all the things. One of the people I discuss this with literally says at times, “I bet it cost them 50 cents to make it, and yet it costs [amount],” and still subscribes to the AI will solve the problems logic. What’s the prognosis, do they have brainworms?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago

They want an easy solution that doesn't actually require massive political and social upheavals that could potentially lead humanity to the brink of nuclear armageddon. People want the revolution to be painless, bur we know from experience it will not be.

It's not so much brainworms as wishful thinking.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I'm gonna be honest, it was sort of inevitable. We have a much larger amount of silicon computing than we know what to do with; that's unsurprising when it's powered by the imperial pastime of destroying entire continents of people. And machine learning is essentially little more than fitting a particularly nasty unknown function and then throwing so much data and computing at it that you get somewhere. Machine learning at its core uses math that feels inevitable in its application towards "AI."

[–] [email protected] 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I think you’re pretty much spot-on. The actual math behind most machine learning algorithms isn’t THAT complicated, and with tons of computational power, eventually someone was going to stumble into the ideas.
Also, the cats kind of out of the bag. We should use it as a tool to organize around, or even help us organize in general. But I think boycotting it feels like a distraction.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 5 months ago (1 children)

if i could beam one small idea indelibly into people it would be that we have essentially technologically solved distribution and production. the amount of people versus the amount of people that can be sustained with thoughtful organization of resources and labor has never been more in favor of human life. if it weren't for capitalists' dedication to literally burning it for all this really dumb AI bullshit. even the AI ideas could be more useful imo applied to actually appropriate contexts and ideas.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago

could literally have reasonable early FALGSC right now.

i want to tear my hair out because all the technology, organizational capability, global systems, and productive capability is right. fucking. here. now.

we're running out of time

[–] [email protected] 14 points 5 months ago

The pic is Hong Kong style creme brulee toast btw. I made something similar and it was amazing.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 5 months ago

It's always the same answer. Whether it's Covid, Inequality, AI, climate change, etc...

lenin-crush-capitalism

[–] [email protected] 9 points 5 months ago

Butlerian Jihad

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago

Jihad.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

This isn't a conversation about AI so much as it is about computers in general. Everything has been computerized, we've been living in the aftermath of that for decades now. What they're calling "AI" is just newer computer programmes. Which, isn't to say any of what you've outlined is wrong -- all that is and has been a problem for a while now. I believe keeping in mind that these are just programmes running on computers gives us a clearer picture of what we're dealing with.

...for example, computers are fragile as hell. Gotta keep them away from water from dust from magnets from electromagnetic radiation from static charges from too much voltage from not enough voltage... and on top of that, a lot of modern software (and even some hardware!) is completely bunk without network access.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Personally, I'm split between raising my kids to bully people who started coding at a young age so they stop it or befriending them and making sure they're socially well adjusted so they actually develop a sense of solidarity with the working class and will considers the ramification of their actions and takes responsibility for them /s

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago

It'll pop just like NFTs before it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

How do we stop AI?

I wish feeding it a delicious breakfast would radicalize it.