Anyway the reason I roll my eyes at most of the discussion about "AI", "AGI", "the singularity", "intelligence self-improvement feedback loop" is that like, it happened, it's already happened, it's been happening, it's us.

mcc

RE: https://mastodon.social/@mcc/116004809011481588

Anyway the reason I roll my eyes at most of the discussion about "AI", "AGI", "the singularity", "intelligence self-improvement feedback loop" is that like, it happened, it's already happened, it's been happening, it's us. We're it.

Kurzweil talked about lusting for a machine that can make him smarter. I have that, it's a piece of paper. I can write math on a piece of paper and solve problems I can't solve in my head. I can upload all the information in the world directly into my brain (books).

mcc

What "singularity" fanatics actually want is to not have to put in the work

joël

@mcc how good is language! how good is written language! the wheel is nothing against the alphabet

Roger BW 😷

@mcc Very much like the Rapture that inspired it: the point of that is not the going to heaven, everyone always said you could do that, but the going to heaven without the painful scary dying bit first.

margot

@mcc to be fair some of them just think that if they cause it, they can control it

datarama

@mcc I've been saying for a while that the singularity is absolutely real and we're living in it. I think my grandmother's life is a good illustration.

She was born in a world where the only home in her village that had a radio was a community gathering point. Going to the "big city" (the town where I now live) was a full-day event where the family had to factor in that they needed to allow for breaks or bring extra treats because their horse hated walking on pavement. She spent most of her childhood doing menial farm labour, such as fetching buckets of water from the well.

She died owning an iPhone.

Terminal Tilt

@mcc

This is all caused by people who find books to be too hard.

Pseudo Nym

@mcc

Excellent and insightful.

I've said the same thing about Von Neumann self replicators.

Compact instruction packages, just need feedstock and energy, unpack to build factories to make more and propogate.

Look at an acorn.

Like your example of folks not wanting to put in the work, the missing element is time.

australopithecus

@mcc
This, but also additionally for grey goo / paperclip scenarios

Ted Mielczarek

@mcc this made me think about how powerful it is to realize that you can change almost anything about the way you think, feel, or react to things if you are willing to do the work. Lots of people seem unwilling or unable to even engage with the premise!

joel b

@mcc what I love is how difficult it is for one intelligence to evaluate a higher one. It's essentially impossible. Anyone of reasonable intelligence should be able to understand this.

mcc

@australopithecus capitalism is a gray goo/paperclip scenario and it's already in full swing

mcc

@pseudonym We live eighty years. Each. That's so much time. That's *so* much time.

S.T. Veje

@mcc And I can merge my brain with others to solve problems of such vast complexity and scale that it boggles the mind (cooperation)

Pseudonymous :antiverified:

@emaytch
@mcc

They can't even control themselves.

Cassandra is only carbon now

@RogerBW @mcc The other dubious "benefit" of the Rapture as per evangelical thinking appears to be that the rest of us can watch them go to heaven, that they can prove they're better people than us. A very literal holier-than-thou.

Cassandra is only carbon now

@RogerBW @mcc (The extension to the Rapture of the Techbros is... not a pleasant one to think about this far into the AI hype cycle.)