I was thinking “Hey I want that markdown!” (although maybe not for time magazine), but the actual example is dystopian.
If you want to stare at the abyss it’s achievable with curl -H 'user-agent: ClaudeBot' https://url_to_article, and it’s like 70% SEO crap tailored to brainwash LLMs (more realistically “agents” in limited context).
At my place It has reached the stage of: use AI to "improve" your work, be careful about budget though!
I think he falls under the category of “does too much all the time” and “vaguely techo optimist” which definitely put him at risk. I’m not too sure how harshly I should judge him yet, I guess it depends on what he does next.
It continues to amaze me how much digital ink they can spill about this issue.
You’ve gotta love falling for the reverse 1 grain of sand shtick. I don’t think anyone anyone serious would deny that a large amount of sand is a heap.
Encyclical from the pope about the dangers of AI, mostly sane actually: (provided link skips quite a bit about social justice and referencing previous literature)
EDIT, snippets:
- We cannot be satisfied with […] the so-called “alignment” of AI […] without […] openly discussing the ethical frameworks involved and subjecting them to shared standards of social justice. Otherwise, those who control AI will impose their own moral vision, which will become the invisible infrastructure of these systems. A more moral AI is not enough if that morality is determined by a few. […]
- [ about post and transhumanism ] From the perspective of the Church’s Social Doctrine, the key issue is not the use of technology as such, but the vision that underlies it. If the human being is treated as something to be perfected or surpassed, it becomes easier to accept that some lives are less useful, less desirable or less worthy. In the name of progress, “necessary sacrifices” may begin to be justified, placing the burden on the most vulnerable in pursuit of a supposed optimization of the species. […]
Also what is even the meaning of adding citations if you never came across the source?
[I vaguely understand that there is a lot of window-dressing that comes with writing papers, but this is too perverse.]
The dreaded midnight hour of oblivion!
Agreed, agreed.
EDIT: Though as far as ambiguous anarchist utopias go, I think I’d rather live on Anarres in “The Dispossessed”, even though the material welfare and personal freedoms are much much lower.
You’ve gotta love finding fault with “not preserving heritage” over “imperialistic complete lack of democracy”.
I would phrase this as “good marks” and “foolish” rather than “stupid”, it’s important to stay humble enough that no one is safe from a con.
Echoing something that has been said here before (too lazy to find proper credit sorry): “Rationality™ is a get smart quick scheme”, falling for one family of scams makes you more likely to fall for a similar one.
There are some amazing justifications from many amongst the red-pushing side:
It’s a bit baffling how many strongly they refuse the “blue-selection” as possibly moral/rational. Even so far as calling people pressing blue evil or subhuman, simply baffling.
I don’t meet that many people either, but I get the general vibe that people understand that it’s somewhat shitty, but it still fills a social need (compare/contrast horoscopes).
Completely anecdotally, I recently saw a short video of a french woman, saying to an impressive know-it-all-tv-quizz-champion [intended as a compliment I think]: “Wow you sound like Chat GPT!”
Too me that was very illustrative of the perception of Chat GPT from a less tech-literate perspective.
Shame alone isn’t enough though, especially not for the stuff people do in private, like ask LLMs for advice. Push too much shame and people might just end up simply doing it without telling anyone.
I think rephrasing the main point of the essay “Teach people enough, and they will understand that any use is misuse” can be a very powerful idea.
Teach people about germs, contaminants and proper technique, before shaming them into washing their hands.
Ahh sh*t if all my rent-seeking employee-reducing dreams come true, i’ll lose money on my product subscriptions rents! Quick! I should come up with bullshit that will solve everything!
🤓☝️ technically AP is a non-profit providing a (worldwide) public utility service. (On paper and mostly in practice it’s a journalist co-op). Her Job is to report factual information correctly, that’s (at least historically) the whole selling point of wire services.
Looking at her wiki page:
[…] spent two years at The Tampa Tribune before joining the Associated Press (AP) in 2007 as a video producer. She was the AP’s first multimedia political journalist. Pace covered the 2008 presidential election and began covering the White House […]
Definitely a journalist by training, given her career journey, it makes sense that she champions video content. But still, amongst the six senior VPs at AP, she has title the “Executive Editor”, arguably the most “Journalist” title of all of them. (Chief Technology Officer, Chief Revenue Officer, General Counsel/Corporate Secretary, Executive Editor, Chief Financial Officer, Chief People Officer)
One funny (definition of funny not included, conditions may apply) bit from the AP article:
The AP is trying new forms of fact-checking, including use of video, and more often putting its journalists in public to explain how they got particular stories, she [Julie Pace, Senior VP at AP] said.
Call me crazy, but that isn’t fact-checking right? At the most charitable this is education/fact-conveying, not the actual important groundwork of fact-checking and editing.
The replausibility crisis.
The sad lens into their prevalent relationship with “correcting biases” being more about dominance in “trickery” rather than becoming better people. (and also entrenched misogyny.)