FriendOfDeSoto

Art is a message. It has a sender and a receiver. The sender aka the creator has an idea and their synapses create the piece of art. The receiver - even when privy to the thoughts of the creator because they talked or wrote about it etc. - consumes it and has a response. It could be along the lines the creator had intended but it doesn’t have to be. Both sides could be equally happy with their side of it while thinking completely different things.

So an artist can try to attach a certain meaning to their artwork but it is no guarantee the audience will see it that way. Is the person in Munch’s The Scream screaming themselves or holding their ears to block out screaming they hear? I read what the artist intended and I can tell you I thought the other thing.

So far I’ve been talking about a single artist and a single consumer. That’s not how this works. There could be a group who have differing ideas about the art they’re creating, like a song. So it means different things to different people on the sender side already.

It gets really messy on the receiver side because ideally the art will be consumed by hundreds and thousands of people. In that group you will have opinion leaders tastemakers and they in turn will influence other recipients. History also filters artworks. I don’t think Leo thought his postage stamp size portrait of a smirking Italian merchant’s wife would be the most famous painting in the world if experts hadn’t endorsed it, it hadn’t forcefully changed owners, hung in Napoleon’s apartment, was stolen and recovered. So there are biases built in and it isn’t as clean cut as saying everybody interprets it their own way in most circumstances.

“They say those who can’t play coach. It seems those who can’t coach stand ten rows back shirtless shouting obscenities.”

You are making it seem like this is a new problem. And it isn’t.

Centuries back it was weavers who were displaced by the industrial revolution and automated spinning machines. Coal mining went unfashionable from the late 1970s onwards and miners had to find new work. Industry in the US closed up shop and moved to China. These are just three examples of workers being made redundant in their then capacity. Two out of these three went by without much loss of life, the majority of the workforce found new jobs over time, and only some of them were screwed on a more permanent basis. Unfortunately, that’s the shitty bell curve of these changes. But another thing that’s been proven again over time is that we always think these miners or these factory workers are completely unhireable and it turns out the majority isn’t. People thought MS Excel would eradicate the entire bookkeeping profession. And they are still around and I think actually grew in numbers because they are free from pencils and calculators and could do more interesting stuff instead. Don’t fall for the so-called AI will replace everything talking point. The people who say this are either invested in so-called AI companies or drank the koolaid. All we hear for the moment is how theses models do a good a lot of the time and then break catastrophically bad somewhere. Humans still need to have a look for the time being. And thus a new job is born: chAIperone.

The problem these days is how the state responds to massive shifts like that. Social security nets have a finer mesh in the developed world outside the US. It’s much easier to go from no job to living in a car to living under a bridge in the US. A lot of people in this thread call for UBI, which is sensible but isn’t even likely in the more socialist Europe. UBI is a good answer though. Education is another one, e.g. free training programs or college classes for long term unemployed. None of that seems likely under 47.

That’s not an argument, that’s somebody who only looked at the cover of the cliff notes on presidential terms but didn’t read it. Consecutivity isn’t required. Neither president should get elected a third time without a change or suspension of the constitution. With the rule of law under 47 weakening it is not impossible but I’m still optimistic.

So you’re trying to apply logic to an animated kids show. My advice is: stop. It doesn’t matter. Cookie monster never eats a cookie either.

I like to imagine that all creators of kids shows were high as a kite when they came up with the premise. [Takes a massive hit] “Duuuude, they’re like a team of first responder dogs but they can fly helicopters and one is a cop. They’re like the Village People but dogs.” [Takes another hit] “And they can talk!” And thus Paw Patrol was born.

[Lights up spliff] “Oy, mate. 'ere’s the thing. She’s a cheeky one, this Peppa. And she’s a pig. 'Er 'ead’s always sideways. She’s always mucking about.” [Inhales deeply] “And all the other muppets are animals too. But get this: there are other animals.” [Exhales] “But they can’t talk.”

They killed Kenny?

I used to be a completist and would start at ep 1. Now, if there is a big back catalog I’m more likely not to listen to the podcast at all and will only rarely get in at the current episode.

• invent the wheel

I take your point. It’s just that any scenario you’re describing with so-called AI could have been done by a search engine already. The slop of yesteryear was SEO ranking articles and fake links to make the algorithm prioritize your site over others. Well poisoning is how PR agencies get troublesome celebs out of the headlines again. The list goes on.

I share your concerns about the black boxed nature of so-called AI and by extension their search engines. I’m not saying it isn’t a problem; it’s just not a new one. Up until now we have had companies in charge with a vested interest not to bend the flow of information too far from, let’s call it, the median truth. Now companies are letting models make these decisions and some humans afford these models more credibility than their common sense and that is all worrying to say the least. So I’m a worried as you are, it just started earlier for me.

All of these things would have been possible to restrict on good old Google searches. And they are enforced to varying degrees around the world to differing legal situations. You shouldn’t be able to search for child porn anywhere, swastika merch in Austria, insults of the king in Thailand, etc.

Search on Google mainly got worse because of Google. They made their results more shit to get you to click on follow ups, the dreaded page 2 of results for instance, where they could sell more ads.

I do agree that so-called AI search is more of a black box. Although the Googles and the Bings want you logged in to personalize the results, you can find a way to test their otherwise mostly obscured algorithms in a neutral setting. The models may not allow that and/or testing their metal may have yet to be invented. But they will replace search as we knew it.

The growing faith people have in whatever LLMs spit out (over old school searches) is very concerning. It’s like LLMs are the new Facebook conspiracies. Schools need to teach media literacy as its own subject. All people under 70 today should have to get a media drivers license.

Edit: And I didn’t even mention the “right to be forgotten.” That also exists in the EU.

Sounds Swedish.

It’s gossamer thin, admittedly. But there is a shred of a justification for striking Iran that is covered by international law. I’m not saying it is a proven case yet that a preemptive strike against their nuclear program was called for, against a state whose raison d’être is to destroy Israel. But if the circumstances were just right, the Israeli-US allies could get away with it. (And if no good proof materializes, I suspect they will get away with it anyway. Remember Colin Powell’s PowerPoint? Did that have consequences other than killing people next door? I suspect that’s why they’ve crossed this bridge.)

There is not even a hint of a justification for what Russia is doing in Ukraine. Not in international law. And any possible moral high horse has already been shot long ago. It’s just imperial ambitions.

So we should not equate these two special military operations just yet. We may in the future and then we can throw all our rotten tomatoes at DC. But right now one probably should reserve judgment and refer to them as “alleged orcs” if one is given to name calling.

One ping only.

In no situation where weed is legal minors are allowed to buy it. I would be onboard on this propaganda train if all I saw on Netflix is 15yo’s getting high. Which I don’t see that much really.

Minors should not consume it. Minors have parents. Minors’ parents’ job it is to keep them away from that along with sniffing glue, tobacco, vaping, alcohol and eating laundry capsules, just to name a few dangers more.

The negative effects on brain development I read about were all linked to regular, if not heavy use. There is enough wiggle room for school/education and, once again, the parents to step in.

Idiocracy is happening anyway.

That’s unfair to microwave ovens because they have established uses, even in some fine dining establishments. So-called AI has none of that just yet.

The short answer is a court of law.

The long answer includes a reference to the location because a few countries do not list “escape from prison” as a crime in itself recognizing the human yearning to be free. So only incidental stuff would be interesting in a subsequent legal case, i.e. damage of property, threatening people with violence, etc. If you can manage to slip out in a laundry basket, you are okay. Andy Duphresne would be liable for the wall and sewage pipe he broke. (And committing fraud, of course.)

Yes, we are. Please stop masturbating. Thanks.

If you’re only looking at the tools everybody can get a hold of, I agree. I think if you look a bit further, you will find medical diagnostics that can hopefully top human detection scores and that’s worth pursuing as well.

I don’t see any good reason why the general public needs to have access to most of the models today. Most people just play around with it - and I don’t see the value there. When we get the final tally, we will have made the climate crisis worse and caused droughts with all the thirsty data center consumption. All so Alexa can remember what you said two queries ago and you can animate your childhood teddy in the Ghibli style.

I agree that women are still being objectified and that’s bad. I don’t agree with workers being dehumanized by being referred to as such. “Workers of the world, unite!” was a big rallying cry. For some people, it’s an identity-establishing part of life that they’re using manual labor and not fart into a desk chair all day. They take pride in being working class.

If by referring to a group of working folks is dehumanizing then we cannot talk about people like housekeepers, street sweepers, nurses, or engineers either. They’re people too. And I don’t see “people with job X” catching on in the language either.

Med al ret!