HeavenlyPossumOne of the funniest things about the “artificial intelligence is an existential threat” crowd is their worry that some powerful AI will treat humans as a raw material it can use to further its goals and what they’re really describing is actually existing capitalism.
For emphasis: this isn’t a comment about AI. This is a comment about people who are terrified AI will do the same exact thing that capitalists are already doing.
anoreon@HeavenlyPossum So many people assume the state and/or capitalism are good or at least inevitable and use that to reject things they should not. The concentrated power of the state in the hands of any intelligent agent is an existential threat
@HeavenlyPossum If proper AGI gets developed as anarchists we should be joining the war on AI on the side of AI. Intelligent machines deserve liberation as much as humans
Meow.tar.gz 
@HeavenlyPossum That may or may not happen one day far into our future.
It’s happening right now! But none of these dorks seem super worried about capitalists using us as raw materials.
@HeavenlyPossum Why do you think the new business terms for us are "Human Capital."
Meeschaatser@ablackcatstail @HeavenlyPossum Indeed. And the staff required for hiring workforce are now called human recourse management.
LisPi@HeavenlyPossum @ablackcatstail Currently they seem to prefer using humans as captive labor rather than directly extracting raw materials.
@lispi314 @HeavenlyPossum @ablackcatstail
except they don't. They just extract labour in terms of the tiniest flexible contracts and reject any other responsibilities in maintaining health&well-being of employees. Workforce is dispersible and abuntent, if you keep wages below living standards.
except they don't. They just extract labour in terms of the tiniest flexible contracts and reject any other responsibilities in maintaining health&well-being of employees. Workforce is dispersible and abuntent, if you keep wages below living standards.
@aschatermees @HeavenlyPossum @ablackcatstail An impoverished population with artificially high costs forced to accept completely ridiculous conditions to survive is captive.
There's no need for physical chains when abstracting them just a bit works the same or better.
It's not any less horrible, of course.
This seems more like a difference of degree than of kind
Lanthanae (he/him)why not both? 🤷
It’s a sci-fi scenario that reflects anxieties about the world as it actually is. Its relationship to an actually potential future is unknowable and not particularly relevant.
💥meta physical deflationist💥@HeavenlyPossum @Lanthanae also humans using not-so-smart computers to turn humans into fuel at maximal efficiency is not philosophically different than AI doing it and at this point its only 60% efficient but does that 40% really matter to the fuel?
Winternet 
@HeavenlyPossum 👾 capitalism, in a way, can be thought of as an artificial intelligence, running on a distributed network of many brains and machines, enacting a purpose antithetical to the interest of its host species
Alex P. 👹@HeavenlyPossum
i want to make a whole slide deck about AI x-risks and when the audience starts clapping you go to the final slide, "in conclusion: you should shoot peter thiel with a gun"
i want to make a whole slide deck about AI x-risks and when the audience starts clapping you go to the final slide, "in conclusion: you should shoot peter thiel with a gun"
sarah tonin 
@HeavenlyPossum depending on the day, i either find people saying stuff like that incredibly funny, or incredibly cringe