I’m officially done with takes on AI beginning “Ethical concerns aside…”.
No! Stop right there.
Ethical concerns front and center. First thing. Let’s get this out of the way and then see if thre is anything left worth talking about.
Ethics is the formalisation of how we are treating one another as human beings and how we relate to the world around us.
It is *impossible* to put ethics aside.
What you mean is “I don’t want to apologise for my greed and selfishness.”
Say that first.
@janl
I totally feel the same. And at the same time, given the current developments, it feels like that fight has already been lost. This upsets me in a myriad of ways.
Do you have any ideas about how to cope with that? I mean, I could fight more, but that will not make me happier. And also, I doubt we could win that fight 😔.
You're not wrong, but the ethical concerns are their own quagmire and it's helpful to be able to conversationally skip over them to get to the part where "AI" is also basically a party trick that doesn't actually do anything useful in the real world.
I mean, the implication of the phrase is that the other person is a sociopath, and that seems plausible to me at least some of the time.
@suetanvil but see, you don't need to skip them: ethics is what should guide us in using these tools. if they can't be ethically used, that should be enough.
@janl Yes, I'm probably messing the pitch by unnecessarily widening the points. In normal speech we use Moral and Ethical interchangeably. We implicitly judge corporations by our own personal moral code. On that basis we can criticise corporates for deliberately refusing to address moral concerns. They should not be allowed to get away with this. But from their POV, they are still following their own system of Business Ethics.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_ethics
@janl The corporate is explicitly saying "the end justifies the means" because in their view it will lead to a greater good. The problem is that it's a greater good for them and not necessarily for us.
As individuals and politicians we should not allow corporates to get away with this.
@jbond ah yes, business ethics. the thing that allowed ford to make the exploding pinto, that let coca cola to use death squads to kill union leaders in colombia, that had nestlé killing babies to sell formula in developing nations, union carbide in bhopal, citi in haiti, pacific island company in nauru, and so forth. thanks for that contribution to the discussion. it is important to be reminded that the profit motive is the making of monsters. great chat. let's move on.
@janl
The argument that nobody may consider or work on any of a multitude of topics until they have solved a single problem which they are not expert in and the arguer, presumably is, is common, flawed, uneconomic of effort, and usually directed from someone who is not currently god-emperor of the universe at people who regard themselves as autonomous.
A more explicit phrasing ...
...
might be "ethical problems exist but for the moment I shall leave them for others and focus on one other point I understand particularly" but that is uneconomic of limited space, and most of us understand that's what the phrase used implies.
And one ends up double-tooting.
@janl This is a fantastic point, and it goes so much deeper, culturally, than AI. For about 20 years or so, some writers have openly prized amoral business behaviour. The cringey days of idiots going on about 'wow, sociopath CEOs are so cool' and quoting Walter White and Tywin Lannister are hopefully gone, but the attitude is still there.
'Ethical concerns aside' have been code for 'shove that ethics shit, check out this cool new grift!' ever since the CharismaonCommand types grew up.
@CartyBoston @janl
Of course not that would be unethical, what did I just say.
Unrelated, I have a rolled up carpet at the office I need to dispose of. It's surprisingly heavy so I'll need a couple of uncurious people to help.
@janl
Its a classic sign of a Business Idiot...
Fair warning: this is the longest thing I've written on this newsletter. I do apologize. Soundtrack: EL-P - $4 Vic Listen to my podcast Better Offline. We have merch. Last week, Bloomberg profiled Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, revealing that he's either a liar or a specific kind of idiot. The
@janl @ErikJonker eating human children?
I mean, ok, I'm not saying it isn't a logical extension to the argument, but it's a bit of a sudden escalation imho, and would be unlikely to win over any omnivores. (Not that it's what you're attempting to do here, I'm just leading into the following.)
I think there's a limit to what one can expect inherently flawed humans to do in terms of ethical purity. I'm exhausted by what I often interpret as disparagement of those who might not fully behave as one prefers at the expense of opportunities to make things better overall. All I ask is that people at least *try* to be ethical and, when confronted with challenges to their thoughts or behavior, to be open to learning how to more fully prioritize ethical behavior and consider honestly why alternative behaviors might be more ethically aligned.
I feel that just slowing down the obviously deliberate efforts to further reward and facilitate unethical behavior while allowing ongoing efforts to encourage more ethical behavior would be a massive win if it were to happen in my lifetime. [Looks around at the current State of things] Unfortunately, it is something that I fully expect to never see.
@janl so labor ethically especially in foreign countries where labor practices can be seen as abuses
Ethical conditions regarding the environment and how the impact to environment yields health outcomes that are negative take xAI in Memphis Tennessee they didn’t follow laws for clean air act and you have black particulates in the air and increase in illnesses around respiratory issues
Ethical in the data scrapping in that consent in not given
The use of AI to target marginalized communities
The use of AI in warfare
The use of AI to further consumption consumer model of capitalism and in turn full white supremacy and the systems that allow it to propagate
These are human ethical considerations that should be understood and converse about because if we don’t speak about the negative impacts and choose to continue them without addressing the root causes we are doomed as a species
I can image lot people disagree with me and that’s fine but conversation on consent in tech, ethical and humane practices in building and sourcing raw materials, and the systems that allow exploitation is what this reply is for
Now you can start
THIS is why I say I don’t hate #AI per se, but I DO hate AI *companies* and investors, because *their* ethics are *nonexistent*.
And that imho should disqualify them from working on and selling AI systems to the world. I want no part of their goods or services because those people cannot be trusted.
@brianstorms @janl i think the practical reality is that AI as tooling and the AI companies leading the AI arms race are so completely intertwined at this point (and also with fascists no less), that the whole AI well (even stuff like classifiers and such, the old school stuff from a decade or so ago aren’t really trustworthy given that they’ve certainly also benefitted from the LLM boom) has been poisoned.
People who legitimately care about ethics i suspect are probably going to be better off brushing up on prob-stats and drawing conclusions and connecting dots the old fashioned way, from when AI didn’t function as a serious tool.
@janl this is exactly like “removing dei” - say what you mean, you want specific skin tones and sexual preferences only in positions of power and potential wealth.
People are terrible.
ThunderFist!!!
Jan Lehnardt 
Ozzelot 
Lena
Chris [list of emoji]
flere-imsaho 🇺🇦
fedithom
Seb
Final Round Player 😷🇪🇺🍸
Mitsunee | 光音
the gripe ibis
Kagan MacTane (he/him)
Maxilo Overit
𝘋𝘪𝘳𝘬
realist
StarkRG
Toni Aittoniemi
Meowbotage! >:3c
Abstract_Bit
arestelle
Tom Morris
Sharp Leaves
Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫
CartyBoston
Jargoggles
Dr Andrew A. Adams #FBPE 🔶
arrbee
Erik Jonker
Kevin Cheek
Sebastian Zdrojewski
Frank J
Brian Dear
Epic_Null
amarioguy
blaue_Fledermaus
André
kimu
Fénix
Robin Barton
Timo Ewalds
Rex Hollis
Guillotine Jones, Flâneur
Hey Gus