Mastodawn

Cassandrich Mar 16

Saw some article about "quitting LLMs for climate" and.. uhg. Can we please drop the "personal responsibility" bs? Your choice, as an individual, to use or not use this shit has no effect on the climate.

Where your individual use of LLMs *does* have harm is rotting your brain, destroying your credibility, exposing you and your contacts' private conversations and photos to parties who wish us harm, wasting your peers' time, exposing people who use the things you made to legal risk, etm etm etm.

Edit: To be clear, I'm perfectly happy with people refraining from using LLMs for whatever reason works for them! This post was more about media/mass-communication narratives and how they risk implying that there's value in "AI" and that refraining from using it is a sacrifice rather than being self-care and community care.

Cat 🐈🥗 (D.Burch)

@dalias Next you're going to tell me that not buying fast fashion has no effect on how much is wasted! 🙃

via @breadandcircuses

https://climatejustice.social/@breadandcircuses/112524382847749783

Bread and Circuses (@[email protected])

Attached: 1 image I did a post about this from a different source back in January. And the problem is not going away. In fact, it’s only getting worse as capitalist industry and advertising continues to cram 'fast fashion' down our throats. _______________________________ The Atacama Desert in Chile has attained a distinction as one of the world’s fastest growing dumps of discarded clothes, thanks to the rapid mass production of inexpensive attire known as fast fashion. The phenomenon has created so much waste that the UN calls it “an environmental and social emergency.” The numbers tell the tale. Between 2000 and 2014, clothing production doubled and consumers began buying 60% more clothes and wearing them for half as long as they once did. Three-fifths of all clothing is estimated to end up in landfills or incinerators within a year of production. That can translate to a truckload of used clothing dumped or burned every second. In northern Chile, colossal piles of discarded clothes, with labels from all over the world, stretch as far as the eye can see. In one ravine on the outskirts of Alto Hospicio, a pile of jeans and suit jackets, bleached by the harsh sun, rises above a mound of fake-fur coats and dress shirts, some still bearing price tags. _______________________________ FULL STORY -- https://archive.ph/1z2Zf #Environment #Climate #Capitalism #BusinessAsUsual

Climate Justice Social

@catsalad @dalias @breadandcircuses I have many thoughts about pushing personal responsibility at people for things like climate change.

However -- I don't think it's wrong to make personal choices based on such things. Especially with LLMs because people's choice to use them is entirely optional and they do have negative external effects. If more people choose not to use them, eventually the big tech push to use them is going to fail. If more people choose to use them, we're stuck with them. It does boil down to personal choice here in a lot of ways.

Also - they're choosing not to use LLMs, so ... it's a win. Take the W.

Cassandrich Mar 16

@jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses My problem isn't with them making a personal choice that reflects values and makes a statement. It's with framing it as a *sacrifice* for the planet. Which implies the thing they're "giving up" is good, is something that would give them an advantage if they took it, and that they're doing something noble putting themselves at a disadvantage by not doing so.

Neal Gompa (ニール・ゴンパ)

@dalias @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses And what if that is *exactly* how they believe it is? That may indeed be their personal viewpoint.

Cassandrich Mar 16

@neal @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses Then it's a narrative that's actually promoting "AI".

GrandTheftUrkel Mar 16

@dalias @neal @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses To me, this framing is intended to meet everyday people where they are. LLMs are fun to poke and get slop out of, for a while. It's indistinguishable from magic to a non-techie!

So by saying, "Hey, look, I know ChatGPT is fun, but the planet is more important," one may be giving a hollow compliment to the tech, but they immediately quash it with a reality check. This is getting one's foot in the door by being relatable, not LLM-aggrandizement.

Neal Gompa (ニール・ゴンパ)

@GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses Also, as a general rule, your approach of bashing everyone for this *isn't working*. It doesn't help, it doesn't make anyone reconsider *anything*, and you are just pushing people to reinforce their position regardless of what it is.

You need to get them to care for your position, and your approach makes them do the exact opposite.

Cat 🐈🥗 (D.Burch)

@neal @GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @jzb @breadandcircuses So instead of bash, use zsh⁠?

ermo | Rune Morling Mar 16

@catsalad Zshushing people is a different way of bashing people, so it would likely result in the same outcome that @neal warns about?

Now, if the discussion could be gently turned in the direction of teaching people to fish...

@neal @GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @jzb @breadandcircuses

Joe Brockmeier Mar 16

@neal @GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @catsalad @breadandcircuses One of the things I've been thinking about with regards to LLMs is the similarity with Free Software.

That is: Free Software approaches software as an ethical thing. I agree. *But* it's a non-starter if people don't have an ethical framework in their thinking about software. And most people don't -- so for the Free Software arguments to work, the first step is convincing people that there is an ethical dimension to software *at all* before persuading them to follow a specific ethical framework.

Likewise: ethical arguments around LLMs only work if people have an ethical framework that those arguments resonate in.

Backing up, if people feel that they're being noble and making a sacrifice by not adopting/pushing LLMs... I'm not going to argue with them on that point.

I'd rather be successful than right but unsuccessful. 🙂

Outfrost Mar 16

@neal @GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses did we do that when we made racism and homophobia socially uncool?

Neal Gompa (ニール・ゴンパ)

@outfrost @GrandTheftUrkel @dalias @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses Yes. Connecting it to principles they do care about and making the incongruity aware makes it much easier to persuade and convince people.

GrandTheftUrkel Mar 16

@outfrost @neal @dalias @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses This is a false equivalence lol. But I agree with Neal's point; if you want to change hearts and minds, you have to meet people where they are. To get someone to leave their comfort zone, you must sometimes leave yours. And you don't need to agree with a position to empathize with it.

Expecting someone to magically snap to your way of thinking, simply by being outwardly disgusted enough by their position, is an exercise in masturbation.

Outfrost Mar 17

@GrandTheftUrkel if you're trying to change my mind then this reads pretty ironic

so, for the "hearts and minds" thing to work, the recipient must already care about either you personally, or keeping their views consistent. a pretty tiny number of people qualifies, unless you're a celeb. the rest don't really care about your opinion until there are direct consequences to ignoring it.

the political climate has changed dramatically in the last 10-15 years.

Cassandrich Mar 16

@GrandTheftUrkel @neal @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses I guess it's a matter of whether you see it like "quitting smoking" (something that's also beneficial to your own health) or "giving up [something] for lent". But a lot of the takes I've seen feel like the latter.

A lot of people see value in it. "Here's the bad things you also agree are bad" is a much better argument than "but you're wrong though".

Tbh i think you're more focused on being right than on changing people's minds. Imo, being right is irrelevant if people ignore you.

@neal @jzb @catsalad @breadandcircuses