I just can’t even begin to reckon that view. I know he pulled back on it (see his quote I posted elsewhere), but aside from a child’s inability to consent, there’s a gigantic power disparity between an adult and a child. I just don’t get the logic on its very face. There’s no child out there that has the world experience to understand what is happening in that sort of situation.

If anything it’s just a gross oversimplification akin to a spherical cow in a vacuum (ie Assume a child with an adult brain, with world experience of an adult, and has the same relationship power as the adult. Also assume the adult that that is perfectly altruistic, has no alternative motives, and truly cares for the child on the same level as an adult relationship). It’s just so far beyond any real world scenario that I struggle to see how you could even logically come to the conclusion that it’s okay.

Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it," Stallman wrote. "Through personal conversations in recent years, I’ve learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per [sic] psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/03/richard-stallman-returns-to-fsf-18-months-after-controversial-rape-comments/

Took me a bit to find, but also he talks about how the Minsky scandal was a-okay in that same article. So maybe I should say he mildly changed course instead of pulling a 180. Still a strange opinion to hold.

Didn’t he kind of pull a 180 on those VERY questionable views? Not even trying to refute that he is not right about everything, as that’s just silly, but I’m pretty sure he pulled back on that particular extremely dumb opinion.

Yeah totally that’s why I said they were basically morally corrupt and used them as an example of smart people doing bad things… Maybe your judgement is a bit clouded?

I can just imagine you sitting there with a little astronaut helmet on, eating astronaut ice cream, and drinking Tang while watching the Challenger go up. Just slowly taking off your helmet, pouring out your tang, and chunking the astronaut ice cream in the dumpster. Then little InternetUser2012 just kind of saying to themself, “Yeah I don’t know what I was thinking. That shit is WAY more dangerous than I thought!”

In fairness, just reading about the Challenger also made me do about the same thing when I was a kid. I thought going to space was about the coolest thing I could think of to do. Then when I was in the like the 3rd or 4th grade I read about the Challenger and was like, “On second thought, I don’t think I want to go to space after all.”

Gates is insanely intelligent, like demonstratably so. Musk and Bezos are also very highly intelligent people. Do they have terrible, awful, even downright despicable views? Absolutely. But don’t be fooled, all three of those people are incredibly smart with actual high IQs (not in the braggart, “I have a very high IQ.” sense either).

Intelligence doesn’t translate to empathy or wisdom. Some of the least book smart people I’ve met have been profoundly wise at times, and some of those same people were incredibly empathetic. Unfortunately, I think all three of those people (Musk, Bezos, and Gates) are lacking in those traits, but saying they aren’t in fact measurably intelligent is only fooling yourself.

I say this as someone who was raised by a measurably very highly intelligent person who could be, and was, a complete monster at times, and had some really twisted views on the world/other people. Lucky for me I didn’t inherit that innate Intelligence I guess!

For a real answer here’s the Zscaler blog write up: https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/technical-analysis-anatsa-campaigns-android-banking-malware-active-google

It looks like they are doing it after app install with a malicious patch. This patch asks for SMS and accessibility access to gain privileges necessary to get into the banking apps. I haven’t thoroughly read it but just looking at the attack chain that’s what I gleaned.

Why reach for a fictional example when so many real world examples exist? Just curious because I think of Bezos, Musk, and to a lesser degree Gates as examples of smart people doing bad things. I mean there’s several very smart people that have done good things as well but those are harder to come by. Even people like Alfred Nobel created something he thought would save the lives of miners only for his invention to be used for war. Einstein also did a lot for the advancement of theoretical physics and his work was subsequently used as the foundation of the atomic bomb. It’s actually way harder to come up with a Tony Stark type smart “good guy” in the real world for me because reality is often far more grey.

That’s a completely different argument…

This is such weird logic. The Foo Fighters are millionaires that have a ton of leeway with what shows they do because they don’t really need more money to survive. The guy that frames houses probably isn’t working for a morally great company but that dude starves without the job.

Bands who break through walls with speakers

Not just try to sell you sneakers

You want bands who wanna sell you things

Or bands who wanna tell you things?

• Jeffery Lewis and the Rain, WWPRD

One of the last punk dudes still making a statement instead of doing shows for 50 year old execs.

Anyone aware if they are also getting data from their slack for government offering? I was looking at the govslack site and I can’t tell one way or the other. While they claim to meet most of the big compliance regs I don’t see anything about training AI being included/excluded.

I know that stealing trade secrets is a concern but seems like stealing state secrets might have some other implications. I know you’re not supposed to talk on slack about any classified info, but that doesn’t mean that sensitive info isn’t shared which also has some rather profound implications as well.

It’s escapism I think. At least that’s part of it. Having a machine that won’t judge you, will serve as a perfect echo chamber, and will immediately tell you AN answer can be very appealing to some. I don’t have any data, or any study to back it up, just my experience from seeing it happen.

I have a friend who I feel like I kind of lost to chatgpt. I think he’s a bit unhappy with where he is in life. He got the good paying job, the house in the suburbs, wife, and 2.5 kids, but didn’t ever think about what was next. Now he’s just a bit lost I think, and somehow convinced himself that people weren’t as good as chatting with a bot.

It’s weird now. He spends long nights and weekends talking to a machine. He’s constructed elaborate fictional worlds within his chatgpt history. I’ve grown increasingly concerned about him, and his wife clearly is struggling with it. He’s obviously depressed but instead of seeking help or attempting to figure himself out, he turned to a non-feeling, non-judgmental, emotionless tool for answers.

It’s a struggle to talk to him now. It’s like talking to a cryptobro at peak btc mania. The only thing that he wants to talk about is LLMs. Trying to bring up that maybe spending all your time talking to a machine is a bit unhealthy invokes his ire and he’ll avoid you for several days. Like a herion addict struggling with addiction, even pointing out the obvious flaws in what he’s doing makes him distance himself more from you.

I’m not young, not old exactly either, but I’ve known him for 25 years in my adult life. We met in college and have been friends ever since. I know many won’t quite understand but knowing someone that long, and remaining close, talk every few days, friends is quite rare. At this point he is my longest held friendship and I feel like I’m losing him to a robot. I’ve lost other friends to addiction in my life and to say that it’s been similar is under stating it. I don’t know what to do for him. I don’t know if there’s really anything I CAN do for him. How do you help someone that doesn’t even think they have a problem?

I guess my point is, if you find someone who is just depressed enough, just stuck enough, with a particular proclivity towards computers/the internet then you have a perfect canidate for falling down the LLM rabbit hole. It offers them an out to feeling like they’re being judged. They feel like the insanity it spits out is more sane than how they feel now. They think they’re getting somewhere, or at least escaping their current situation. Escapism is very appealing when everything else seems pointless and sort of gray I think. So that’s at least one type of person that can fall down the chapgpt/LLM rabbit hole. I’m sure there’s others out there too with there own unique motivations and reason’s for latching onto LLMs.