Max Leibman
Bogdan Buduroiu@maxleibman Not to start a fight, but the community went on a week-long witch hunt against Cory Doctorow because he dared to use AI
@budududuroiu That’s not why people were mad at Cory Doctorow. They were mad because in the same piece he called anti-AI sentiment “purity culture,” framing it as reflexive, unthinking moralizing.
If not for that element, it barely would have been a ripple. Witness that feature article a few months ago about how Ed Zitron, one of the leading critics of AI, also represented AI companies in his marketing firm. That was way more salacious and barely got any play here at all.
@maxleibman really not here to fight, so please don't take as such, but...
> Using LLMs isn’t always popular with the cool crowd, Cory knows that. And he wants to defend his (quite modest) use, which I understand:
> Nobody likes their problematic behavior being pointed out to them. But as outlined: Life’s complicated.
Why would using an LLM be "problematic", unless there was a purity culture at play?
I digress, Mastodon is a great platform that allows one to curate their own feed to their liking, sometimes there's cross interactions between bubbles of Mastodon, so far, anecdotally, the cross interaction that bled into the ML/AI research space has been pretty negative, for no reason. Some people think that negativity is good, and that the ML/AI research space does not belong here. I guess that's where defederation comes in.
Acting ethically in an imperfect world
Life is complicated. Regardless of what your beliefs or politics or ethics are, the way that we set up our society and economy will often force you to act against them: You might not want to fly somewhere but your employer will not accept another mode of transportation, you want to eat vegan but are […]
ChloChloacaMastodon has a lot of queer people on it. Many LLM's are actively being trained to perpetuate disinformation against queer people and are assisting in the trans genocide. They're teaching a generation of people that trans people are bad and dangerous.
"Purity culture" has also become a buzzword that's used against feminists and other forms of progressives.
We're resistant to LLM's because they're actively making our lives worse, more dangerous, harder, etc.
@CordiallyChloe @maxleibman understood, and I think it's commendable that people want to protect their communities from those biases and negative aspects.
Maybe my view is too cynical, but most people will use LLMs, and will engage with those biases, I just think it's less bad that biases favourable to the groups I support rather than unfavourable. That requires participation into the research sphere, which, would be nice to happen on the fediverse rather than just Twitter and Substack
None Hitwonder@budududuroiu @CordiallyChloe @maxleibman but also, have you seen what happens to dissenting voices in the research sphere, especially when they come from marginalized people? Timnit Gebru leaps immediately to mind, for example.
@nonehitwonder @budududuroiu @maxleibman
Yeah, trans voices are especially pushed out. People already don't take us seriously and constantly talk over us. Now they have an entire product that does the ignoring/talking over for them.
@budududuroiu @CordiallyChloe @maxleibman
ALSO: Twitter, the White Supremacy App, has echoes literally being enforced and boosted by an LLM, and Substack, if I recall correctly, quite famously also has a Nazi Problem, so why exactly are these being held up as definitive bellweathers for LLM discourse overall? 🤔🤔🤔
@nonehitwonder @budududuroiu @maxleibman
Yeah, Grok was infamously reprogrammed to say trans people are deranged or whatever. And the site bans people for using the word "cis." And now Grok is being integrated into a bunch of banks.
It's bad. Why would I act like it's not bad?
@CordiallyChloe @budududuroiu @maxleibman LLMs are aggressively popular with one of the most uncool crowds in recorded human history, so yeah, the platform full of some of the most marginalized and technically literate people on earth probably aren't going to think too highly of those who choose to support it despite the widely available facts of their abusive and exploitative nature.
@nonehitwonder @budududuroiu @maxleibman
I guess I should also mention that the federal govt has said trans people aren't real and humans can only exist and be acknowledged by our "biological sex." And the feds are contracting for LLM companies for the govt and require those companies to follow their terms. Anthropic was originally their target for that but idk where that sits now.
So whichever LLM the government chooses will be going the same direction as Grok, if it hasn't already.
@budududuroiu hell, even your pinned post is dismissive and insulting to dissenting voices; you are literally establishing on your mastodon page that you are hostile to anyone who dares suggest that LLMs are anything less than the greatest invention of our lifetimes.
@budududuroiu, to address you directly, I think you are not being cynical ENOUGH.
LLMs could be leveraged to do some terribly useful things; so could asbestos.