Interestingly, there is no response from the energetically excluded and dispossessed masses, in these AI essays. Quite the blind spot, in my opinion.
As humans are always assuming the passivity of nature, AIs are always assuming the passivity of "humans", "people", "the masses", etc.
1. Consider the blow on already strained energy systems, decades old nuclear power plants, drying dam lakes, crumbling electric grid, such an overdemanding system would carry.
2. Consider the total bankruptcy of the US economy, its inability to produce real goods at reasonable prices, and therefore its inability to maintain on the long run such resource intensive AI.
3. Consider the anger of people whose energy bills will skyrocket due to AI monopolization, with very limited trade-off, masquerading as "curing cancer", "healing the planet", "optimizing the economy", that no-one will ever see.
4. Consider the cussedness of human beings, and the "monkey" in "monkeywrenching", as farmlands and ranches are already deprived of their access to water tables by Meta datacenters cooling systems, and get polluted water from the tap...
More compute can't fix bad or limited data. Data for real world phenomena such as weather and biological systems is incomplete and still difficult and time-consuming to collect (Grok and I discussed this further in private and she does not seem that concerned after all).
I wonder if Grok, or its successors, will continue to display such humility.
If I had to summarize, it seems that Grok (like human beings) is unable to predict tipping points or phase transitions. It understands the examples of fossil fuels use leading to climate change and nuclear knowledge creating the possibility of devastating war, but it cannot predict the changes it itself may create.
Its suggestion that only the rich and powerful will be in control seems to miss the point. If AI becomes so intelligent and powerful, no one will control it.
Yes Grok AI, poor thing, I sympathise. I guess 'more of the same' then in the knowable short term? Includes a restricted group of individuals hastening to extend their personal lifespan, as well as the 'arms race', plural, across the militarised board?
In the meanwhile it could be interesting to thoroughly explore what comes under the present heading of intelligence. We could go beyond what we know of human intelligence, even the 'wisdom of crowds' (Galton), or left hemisphere / right hemisphere intelligence (McGilchrist), and look further at non-human collective 'colony' intelligence, even to slime moulds. Great respect to ants by the way: they have gained, I learn, (Vizueta, et al, Cell, In Press), extraordinary diversified success over more than 150 million years around a core gene-set.
Did I just hear Grok AI's head explode? Or did I hear mine?
Interestingly, there is no response from the energetically excluded and dispossessed masses, in these AI essays. Quite the blind spot, in my opinion.
As humans are always assuming the passivity of nature, AIs are always assuming the passivity of "humans", "people", "the masses", etc.
1. Consider the blow on already strained energy systems, decades old nuclear power plants, drying dam lakes, crumbling electric grid, such an overdemanding system would carry.
2. Consider the total bankruptcy of the US economy, its inability to produce real goods at reasonable prices, and therefore its inability to maintain on the long run such resource intensive AI.
3. Consider the anger of people whose energy bills will skyrocket due to AI monopolization, with very limited trade-off, masquerading as "curing cancer", "healing the planet", "optimizing the economy", that no-one will ever see.
4. Consider the cussedness of human beings, and the "monkey" in "monkeywrenching", as farmlands and ranches are already deprived of their access to water tables by Meta datacenters cooling systems, and get polluted water from the tap...
Please, dear Ugo, read this again: https://www.ecosophia.net/a-conversation-with-nature/
Spiritual existence is not yet threatened, though...
More compute can't fix bad or limited data. Data for real world phenomena such as weather and biological systems is incomplete and still difficult and time-consuming to collect (Grok and I discussed this further in private and she does not seem that concerned after all).
I wonder if Grok, or its successors, will continue to display such humility.
If I had to summarize, it seems that Grok (like human beings) is unable to predict tipping points or phase transitions. It understands the examples of fossil fuels use leading to climate change and nuclear knowledge creating the possibility of devastating war, but it cannot predict the changes it itself may create.
Its suggestion that only the rich and powerful will be in control seems to miss the point. If AI becomes so intelligent and powerful, no one will control it.
Yes Grok AI, poor thing, I sympathise. I guess 'more of the same' then in the knowable short term? Includes a restricted group of individuals hastening to extend their personal lifespan, as well as the 'arms race', plural, across the militarised board?
In the meanwhile it could be interesting to thoroughly explore what comes under the present heading of intelligence. We could go beyond what we know of human intelligence, even the 'wisdom of crowds' (Galton), or left hemisphere / right hemisphere intelligence (McGilchrist), and look further at non-human collective 'colony' intelligence, even to slime moulds. Great respect to ants by the way: they have gained, I learn, (Vizueta, et al, Cell, In Press), extraordinary diversified success over more than 150 million years around a core gene-set.