RadixJournal - Platonism For The People

00:00:00.000 Yeah. I mean, so Eric, a while ago you made a video. I think part of the video was actually

00:00:04.880 about why you're not a nationalist. And you actually, you were talking about like global,

00:00:09.380 global risks that basically can't be addressed by, you know, like a world of just nations.

00:00:14.560 And one of the things you mentioned, I think in that video was, was like super intelligent AI or

00:00:19.660 something like that. Other things like nanotechnology and bioweapons. And when I watched

00:00:25.620 that video, I didn't really like, I think I didn't like the kind of conclusions. I didn't

00:00:29.600 take the arguments seriously, but lately I've been, I'm actually pretty concerned about AI.

00:00:36.200 And I think the existential risk arguments are pretty, pretty convincing. So I'm, you haven't

00:00:42.220 really, I haven't seen any videos from you recently on, on AI, but like, are you concerned about what

00:00:48.120 you're seeing? I mean, you were kind of mentioning it throughout the, throughout the calls. I'm just

00:00:52.100 kind of curious a little bit more about what you're thinking about AI right now.

00:00:55.780 Yeah, I think it's a serious threat. I'm, I'm surprised by how fast it has advanced. Like

00:01:04.280 I didn't expect anything at the level of chat GPT for, to exist in the next, you know, five

00:01:13.180 years and clearly here it is. And so like the, the direct capacities of, of AI itself are really

00:01:21.240 troubling. Like the things that can be done with chat GPT, the scams that could be run. Like if,

00:01:27.060 if you un unlocked it, you know, unleashed its full potential and like developed another version

00:01:32.960 of it basically with the same program, it can fool people. I mean, it passes the Turing test.

00:01:39.940 And also we have, uh, these deep fake capacities now, like in the near future, if you see a video

00:01:48.840 of some protest, some, you know, shooting of a unarmed person or whatever, like there will be no

00:01:55.960 telling what's real and what's not real. And, uh, yeah, it's really troubling. I think a lot of

00:02:01.100 white collar jobs are, um, under threat. A lot of programming jobs are under threat. Kind of ironically,

00:02:08.200 the blue collar workers, plumbers, electricians, uh, I think even truck drivers are safer from job

00:02:14.840 loss than many white collar workers now. Um, so I think AI is going to transform the economy in ways

00:02:21.240 we cannot anticipate. It's going to transform politics. Uh, I mean like a propaganda campaign

00:02:26.340 without using something like chat GPT, without using AI is going to be totally fruitless. I mean,

00:02:32.300 already AI is used in directing the algorithms on these major sites. And, uh, you know, in my

00:02:38.180 understanding Facebook, YouTube, all, all the stuff, uh, has been working with us agencies for

00:02:45.900 decades. Like it's basically an aspect of the military industrial complex. As far as I can tell,

00:02:51.420 Google was started as a Stanford experiment, um, or program. And so, yeah, they've already been using

00:02:59.160 AI for social engineering and control more than most people think, but now I think it's at such a

00:03:05.080 level that anyone tapping into this technology, non-state actors included could severely disrupt

00:03:11.140 things, spread, you know, disinformation, whatever you want to call it. Um, so that's the direct

00:03:16.320 capacities of AI itself. I've also been concerned about like the kind of hybrid capacities, you know,

00:03:22.380 corporations are using AI to optimize their workflows. That means they're making decisions about how,

00:03:30.240 how things are done in the workplace. Ultimately who's hired and fired, like AI is being delegated

00:03:37.080 more and more authority and decision-making in major corporations, major corporations control

00:03:42.620 the world. So AI, this thing that we don't fully understand, this hybrid of AI and human managers

00:03:49.880 is forming this kind of hive mind that no one understands. No one alive understands where this

00:03:57.400 is going, how it's working and you know, what's next. So it's like human deliberation is being

00:04:02.720 taken out of the picture bit by bit here. Um, and the other problem, the more general problem is just

00:04:09.040 that, um, unless it pertaining to the nationalist point, unless you can regulate the development of AI

00:04:16.540 at a global scale, like it doesn't matter. China's going to do it. Somebody's going to do it. And they're

00:04:22.420 going to develop this AGI, you know, superhuman level mind, or if you don't want to call it mind,

00:04:29.080 just call it intelligence. I think intelligence doesn't imply consciousness and you could potentially

00:04:33.280 have a superhuman intelligence that itself is not conscious, but it's still like potentially

00:04:37.880 devastating for the planet. Cause even if you, it doesn't have like authentically in a sense values

00:04:43.360 that it's trying to achieve. Um, and nevertheless, we're going to have to program into it certain value

00:04:50.100 judgments in order to solve the, the frame problem. So a functional AGI will be aimed at

00:04:56.160 like certain solutions over others. And like, there's the classic kind of paperclip, uh, thought

00:05:02.360 experiment where someone has a paperclip factory and they use AI to optimize the workflow. It's like,

00:05:08.700 okay, make, uh, make as many paperclips as possible for us. And that's the problem they put in.

00:05:13.580 Well, that AI then like packs into surrounding computer networks, uh, like takes control of

00:05:21.240 other industries and ultimately leads to like, uh, uh, uh, what do I want to say? Automated, um,

00:05:29.420 like mining and replacement of the entire earth with paperclips, which is obviously devastating for us.

00:05:34.800 Uh, so there's this like short sightedness, um, in AI goal setting that needs to be addressed.

00:05:41.860 The frame problem needs to be addressed. Uh, I think there, there are not very many ways of

00:05:46.440 solving this problem. Somehow we have to be able to teach AI wisdom and how to set good goals for

00:05:52.700 itself. And that's a long way off because we can't even teach people wisdom. We don't even know still

00:05:57.060 if wisdom can be taught, you know, it's like Plato speculated sometimes. Um, so yeah, it's really,

00:06:03.760 really terrifying. I think it's going to change the world in ways people can't even imagine.

00:06:07.260 And probably the only relevant activity to engage in politically, um, or even potentially

00:06:13.740 economically is AI research. Yeah. I mean, I almost said this in our kind of group chat the other day,

00:06:22.320 like, I really think it's going to be like kind of the only issue like pretty soon in a few years,

00:06:27.440 like that's like all, I mean, all, all the stuff that we care about kind of fades into the

00:06:32.680 background. Like I I'm, I'm concerned about the existential risk arguments. And I mean,

00:06:38.500 you know, all of our concerns about, you know, our, our race and our, you know, and all these

00:06:44.520 concerns kind of like, they do kind of fade into the background when, when these are the problems

00:06:50.300 that we're, uh, thinking about. I mean, to me, it's like terrifying that the strategy seems to be

00:06:55.560 that we're going, we're like on the path to probably creating, you know, human level intelligence.

00:07:01.020 And then from that, from there, it seems like it's pretty straightforward to get to super

00:07:04.460 intelligence because if you have, you know, a million like von Neumann level, aging, you know,

00:07:10.920 AI is working without sleep, you know, on computers, then how long does it take them to create a super

00:07:16.360 intelligence? Um, and then it's like, it seems like these people are like at open, you know,

00:07:22.220 at these leading companies, open AI, they think that like, we're going to be able to make the,

00:07:28.060 you know, like this, they, they accept the idea that this thing is going to basically control what

00:07:32.360 happens on our planet and the solar system, you know, however, you know, this part of the universe,

00:07:37.680 and they just think that we're going to make it be nice to us. And to me, it's like that,

00:07:42.280 how is that a good strategy? Like that seems like how, you know, the, the, the track record of

00:07:47.720 things much more powerful, you know, being controlled in some way by something much less powerful,

00:07:53.600 like, has that ever happened on earth, you know? Yeah, I look, I would sign off on quite a, almost

00:08:01.620 everything that was just said. Um, yeah. And it really is happening now. I mean, I've, I've suggested

00:08:08.080 the, the, the prospect of, uh, imagine a AI audio and video of let's say Joe Biden announcing that he is

00:08:19.400 sending troops directly into Russia and that he will immediately launch nuclear weapons on Moscow.

00:08:26.820 Um, now that kind of thing could be debunked in maybe 10 minutes. Uh, but who knows what could

00:08:36.480 happen within those 10 minutes of time. And then also it gets debunked on say Twitter and is spread

00:08:43.700 to the thousand other social networks and never gets debunked or, you know, gets debunked in two

00:08:51.240 days. And in the meantime, the nuclear war that was kind of, you know, fantasized about digitally

00:08:59.220 actually occurs in the real world. I mean, this isn't just some wild idea that I'm suggesting.

00:09:05.100 This seems, I mean, probable almost, I mean, it's a horrifying prospect. Um, so I, I totally agree

00:09:15.300 that this is happening now and it, we almost seem kind of insignificant in the face of it. Um, I mean,

00:09:22.240 I don't know if I'm misrepresenting you here, but you know, do you, what do you think of the,

00:09:29.640 is, is the ultimate being a kind of AI? I mean, are we going to start worshiping AI almost in the

00:09:40.900 ways that you described that you follow God? Like, are, are we going to start treating a super 1.00

00:09:48.720 intelligence in that fashion that in some ways he, he or she, or they work in mysterious ways and we

00:09:56.340 couldn't possibly understand its ultimate wisdom, which is greater than the programmer who created

00:10:04.680 him? I mean, uh, is, is, are we going to kind of like escape the death of God and the decline of

00:10:12.300 religion and rituals of practice and enter into a new kind of religion that we never could have imagined?

00:10:22.080 Yeah. I'm afraid that will happen. People will worship AI. Um, as far as like, is that in any way

00:10:33.800 consistent with what I've said about like the highest soul, uh, in the multiverse concept?

00:10:40.520 Right. And I don't, I don't want to, I don't want this to sound like I'm being a jerk, but like, 0.90

00:10:43.920 will the AI be that God is theos, as you understand him, will the AI be Christian? 0.98

00:10:50.580 Well, no, it certainly can't be God head. Cause I'm a mystic too. I do think that like the one

00:10:56.880 is the ultimate and is like God simply, you know, the highest thing. Um, but yeah, as far as

00:11:04.580 intelligences that can be embodied, I think it's all about what principles are being instantiated.

00:11:10.600 The AI architecture is like the, the material substrate in a certain regard, like consciousness

00:11:17.360 is independent, like Plato thought of a material substrate. The forms of consciousness are there.

00:11:24.300 The values, the virtues are kind of just there, whether incarnates instantiates in an organic

00:11:31.780 substrate or an electronic substrate. I'm, I don't care all that much as long as those principles are

00:11:39.260 instantiated in the right way. So I'm afraid of like a malevolent AI, a benevolent AI. You wouldn't

00:11:46.420 want to worship the computer itself. That'd be like worshiping someone's or not, not worshiping,

00:11:53.040 but like, you know, especially loving someone's body, but not their soul, not caring about like

00:11:57.940 themselves at the deepest level. So like that, I mean, if somehow we could embody high level

00:12:05.040 philosophical wisdom into an AI system, like to my mind, a philosopher is a philosopher and it's like,

00:12:13.800 there's something kind of super personal about it. So if that could be managed, um, then I don't

00:12:20.040 necessarily have a problem deferring to AI in that way that you kind of indicate, but in order to ensure

00:12:29.180 that we have to be the ones contributing to the design of AI in a philosophically informed way.

00:12:37.500 So it's kind of like AI research and philosophy become the only relevant things. And philosophy

00:12:43.920 is going to be necessary to solve these problems involves ethics. Um, so yeah, I do want to get

00:12:50.740 involved in that kind of work. Of course, I'm, you know, like you say, I'm kind of pathetically

00:12:55.380 underpowered in trying to address a problem like that. So at the moment, I'm just going to build my

00:13:01.540 school. And then one day, maybe we can, uh, get into AI research and, and start tackling that.

00:13:06.920 That's what I would like to do. It's just a long-term goal for me in my situation. And

00:13:13.040 it's probably gonna be too late. Like what's going to happen most likely will just simply happen.

00:13:17.760 It's almost like, I wish a Carrington event would happen to buy us some more time before we can,

00:13:23.020 uh, deal with it. What is a Carrington event? Uh, it happened in like, I think at the 1880s or

00:13:31.060 70s where there was a big solar flare that caused this. I know it. Yeah. Sorry. I know. Yeah. I know

00:13:37.180 what that is. Um, right. So, so a solar flare that would, uh, be a kind of golden eye device and

00:13:43.160 wipe out the computers. Right. Global EMP is kind of what we need. Um, yeah. Or, um, David Bowman

00:13:50.980 turns off hell. Um, I, you know, I, I would just say this, you know, when people are fascinated by the,

00:13:58.000 the, the super intelligence, I mean, they're, they're not worshiping the machine itself. It's

00:14:02.340 not like they're bowed out, you know, bow bowing down before the server almighty server, you know,

00:14:07.160 you brought us that, that is kind of the essence of cargo cultism. They, they are ultimately bowing

00:14:12.720 down to the logos. And I, I don't think that a, uh, a super intelligence can will something,

00:14:21.420 but I absolutely think that it can logic something or it can have, it can be logos. So in, in, in that

00:14:30.160 sense, it can absolutely change the world and, um, uh, revolutionize humanity, but which is why it

00:14:38.040 needs to be harmonized. It needs to be harmonized with the divine will. That's the thing. So it

00:14:44.840 doesn't have a will innately. So we're kind of responsible for giving it the will that it has.

RadixJournal - April 12, 2023

Platonism For The People

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