Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.
Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.
If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.
The post Xitter web has spawned soo many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)
Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.
(Credit and/or blame to David Gerard for starting this…)
Utterly rancid linkedin post:
text inside image:
Why can planes “fly” but AI cannot “think”?
An airplane does not flap its wings. And an autopilot is not the same as a pilot. Still, everybody is ok with saying that a plane “flies” and an autopilot “pilots” a plane.
This is the difference between the same system and a system that performs the same function.
When it comes to flight, we focus on function, not mechanism. A plane achieves the same outcome as birds (staying airborne) through entirely different means, yet we comfortably use the word “fly” for both.
With Generative AI, something strange happens. We insist that only biological brains can “think” or “understand” language. In contrast to planes, we focus on the system, not the function. When AI strings together words (which it does, among other things), we try to create new terms to avoid admitting similarity of function.
When we use a verb to describe an AI function that resembles human cognition, we are immediately accused of “anthropomorphizing.” In some way, popular opinion dictates that no system other than the human brain can think.
I wonder: why?
I can use bad analogies also!
I think Eliezer might have started the bad airplane analogies… let me see if I can find a link… and I found an analogy from the same author as the 2027 fanfic forecast: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/HhWhaSzQr6xmBki8F/birds-brains-planes-and-ai-against-appeals-to-the-complexity
Eliezer used a tortured metaphor about rockets, so I still blame him for the tortured airplane metaphor: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Gg9a4y8reWKtLe3Tn/the-rocket-alignment-problem
JFC I click on the rocket alignment link, it’s a yud dialogue between “alfonso” and “beth”. I am not dexy’ed up enough to read this shit.
Yes the 2 rs in strawberry machine thinks. In the same way that an airplane flies. /s
Dijkstra did it first, but it is very ai-booster to steal work without credit or understanding, I guess.
Threats to computing science
This is too fucking dumb to even be called sophistry.
slophistry
of course MBA came up with this
behold this fever dream animation
And as the same channel demonstrates, there are ways to fly without any wings at all
spoiler
…as well as with them!
Man, it’s really true what they say: the West can’t meme.
You ever see a random shitpost video, like the backgroud music, look it up and realize you already have the vinyl record? That just happened to me.
additional layer is that according to comments first track is also used in chinese nature documentaries
Its almost like flapping part isn’t a requirement for something to fly.