@davidgerard

A wrench has nefarious uses. That's not a fault of the wrench though, but of the nefarious user.

Why is there so much hate for AI, rather than hate for Capitalists, the people nefariously using the tool?

@atatassault @davidgerard

While I think there's plenty of room to hate capitalists and their nefarious schemes in general, I feel compelled to point out that a wrench has at least one legitimate, non-nefarious purpose, but I have yet to see one of those established for AI.

@tstrike78 @davidgerard

Computers put millions of people out of a job when they became a common thing 40 years ago. AI has been around for like 2 or 3 years. Or are you holding a new technology to a standard that all other forms of technology weren't held to at their creation? Might I remind the internet was called a passing fad in the early 1990s? The Internet also put thousands if not millions of people out of jobs.

The Technology is never the problem, the Capitalists are.

As for "what legitimate uses are there for AIs?". My groups GameMaster has been using it to create lots of visual aids for our TableTop RPGs. And I've seen other people post on Reddit about their GMs doing the same.

@timgatewood @atatassault @tstrike78 @davidgerard Stolen, yes... but I think that's a weak argument, because humans learn from art they see as well - every picture seen is a slight alteration to the neural network. AI just makes the link from input to output more explicit.

The DMs understand something of the role of AI in art: It sucks. But sometimes you don't need a piece of greatly talented artistic work. Sometimes you need something fast, cheap, and just barely passable. AI can do that.

@Qybat @[email protected] @tstrike78 @davidgerard Stolen work means the artists don't get paid. Until we're living in a utopia where money isn't needed to live or do things or have health, artists not getting paid is the end of the argument. Pay the artists or it's not a legitimate use.

So-called AI is being pushed by tech bros who don't understand how art is made & don't want to pay the artists to make it. It doesn't matter how great or how cruddy the outcome of using it is, it is not legit.

@timgatewood @tstrike78 @davidgerard You're getting into arguments far beyond the scope of AI there, and into fundamental issues of economics and sociology. This is far from the first time technological change reduced the commercial value of a skill and left once-successful people unemployed. There is no fundamental right to be paid, and it would take a revolution to change that.

Art just occupies an odd place, being both a deeply personal process and a firmly commercial field. Contradictory.

@Qybat @timgatewood @tstrike78 @davidgerard I mean, there's lots of ways of making money that are illegal. Like drug running, or blackmail, or beating up old people in the street.

I mean people didn't say "Fentanyl's just progress in the mu-opioid binding affinity sector": people who don't keep up with progress are just luddites.

As far as I can tell, what usually happens with these things is lawmakers look at a thing and assess its impact on human flourishing and what costs it might have externalised from the financial transaction (pollution, etc), and then decide to legislate or not.

@chiffchaff @Qybat @tstrike78 @davidgerard

"As far as I can tell, what usually happens with these things is lawmakers look at a thing and assess its impact on human flourishing and what costs it might have externalised from the financial transaction (pollution, etc), and then decide to legislate or not." <-- That is the claim of how government works. The reality is that far more often, it's what gets contributions to the legislators for re-election, aka what benefits rich folk.