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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34512 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 6, 2023

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It is my belief that after the AI takeover, there will be increasingly less human-to-human interaction. This is partially because interacting with AI will be much preferable in every way, but it is also because safetyism will become ever more powerful. Any time two humans interact, there is the potential for someone to be harmed, at least emotionally. With no economic woes and nothing to do, moral busybodies will spend their time interfering with how other people spend their time, until the point where interacting with another human is so morally fraught and alienating that there is no point. Think about it, who would you rather spend time with: an AI who will do whatever you want and be whatever you want, anytime, or a grumpy human on her own schedule who wants to complain about someone who said "hi" to her without her consent? The choice seems obvious to me.

I appreciate the argument that AIs can be a super stimuli, but the need for social validation is enormously important for most people and I'm doubtful AI can meaningfully give that.

(Also most people are way more pleasant than your example)

(Also most people are way more pleasant than your example)

Not in America, at least never to me. (Okay maybe that's not entirely true, but as feminists have taught me, you have to exaggerate social harms for other people to take them seriously.)

I've thought a lot about this, and the need for social validation is a problem if the person refuses to accept the AI as 'real'. Some people will simply decide that AIs are real enough, but others will still seek validation from humans. This second group is where the moral busybodies live, and that community will evaporatively cool until it is such a toxic cesspit that no real validation is possible. Some people will still compulsively seek it, but most people will just find some way to convince themselves that the validation from the AI is legitimate.

Part of my point with this line of argument is to try to wake up the moral busybodies to how they are destroying society. These people are the ones who don't want a world where everyone is isolated into their own bubbles, but that is exactly what they are creating with their efforts.

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