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CleanThroughMyJorts t1_ityu7se wrote

Reply to comment by darklinux1977 in Question for people who have optimistic views on AI. by throw28289292022-02

I have the opposite view tbh.

Big Tech is under certain constraints; they need to provide value for their shareholders first long before they consider wider public good. Only way I see them funding UBI programs over paying dividends is if the money is pried out of their hands through aggressive tax schemes.

Without this regulation, I see tech companies as pushing us straight towards the (((Bad Future))), where wealth inequality is at an all time high, and all the money in the world aggregates into the hands of a handful of AI oligarchs.

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darklinux1977 t1_iu1u67u wrote

Hello, in fact to answer you, the fiction has already been made. The nation-state was the first casualty of COVID 19. Private corporations have taken the place of unflinching states in 2020 and the world has never been calm.

Then, on a personal note: politics and its personnel has become as obsolete as the notions of right and left, nationalist and anti-fascist. The policy has failed, the mega corporation(s) are on the way to success.

Again read William Gibson's first trilogy and Charles Stross' accelerando

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Talkat t1_itzc7fm wrote

On average 100% true, however, the leaders of AI (Sam Altman, Dennis, Musk) are exactly the type of people I would want running the show. They are all deep thinkers and care deeply for humanity (look at their actions not public opinion).

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CleanThroughMyJorts t1_iu3fnvu wrote

I don't know who Dennis is. Do you mean Demis Hassabis of deepmind? If so, sure; they've certainly done great work. DeepMind in paricular has demonstrated their commitment to advancing science and making their progress work for everyone; I'm inclined to believe it's more than lip service when they talk about making the world better.

My only concern with those two (Deepmind and openai) is how much control do these founders really have over the end products? Deepmind in particular has for years been trying to negotiate with google to make themselves operate more like a non-profit for this exact reason that they don't want powerful AI they create to be controlled by 1 for-profit company, but Google declined (I speculate that it's because the whole reason they've invested billions into deepmind is to make a profit off AGI). So yeah, Demis may have the best intentions and honestly mean it, but how much power does he really have to say no to Google?

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Altman & OpenAI was having similar funding issues a few years back; they were getting bankrolled by philanthropic billionaires like Musk, but the route that they took their research: focusing on scaling for all the headline stuff, is insanely expensive, and they needed to make deals with Microsoft to make ends meet. I don't know what the nature of those deals are but I'd imagine it's similar to what deepmind and google get; I find it hard to believe that microsoft will just throw them billions in funding and compute out of the goodness of their hearts.

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As for Musk, I don't trust the guy; he's very "used car salesman" in how he talks about his work; always overblowing its capability. It erodes credibility and any benefit of doubt I'd give him. Anything Musk says I won't believe until I see it, so I'm not even going to seriously consider him on this topic

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Talkat t1_iu6q809 wrote

Yes I agree with all your points and the funding complexity/external pressure that it brings.

But out of all the tech CEOs out there I'm most impressed by these three. Both their intelligence and morals

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