To me it seems you are the one who seems to have a black and white view of the world. Tool is used for bad= tool is bad in your world view. That’s never the case. Tools are tools, they are neither good nor bad. The moral agency lies in the wielder of the tool. Hence my argument is that because technologies cannot be uninvented, and all technologies have potentially beneficial uses, then we need to focus and shape policy so that Ai is used for those beneficial purposes. For example nukes are deterrents as much as they are destroyers, is it better that they would have never been invented? Sure, but they were invented, they exist and once the tech exists you need it in order to maintain yourself competitive. Meaning not being invaded Willy nilly by a nuclear power like Ukraine is right now, which would have not happened if they had been a nuclear power themselves.

Were they developed and pushed for that explicit reason? No. LLMs are. The only reason that they receive as much funding as they do is that billionaires want to keep everything for themselves, end any democratic rule, and indirectly (and sometimes directly) cause near extinction-level deaths, so that there are fewer people to resist the new feudalism that they want. It sounds insane but it is literally what a number of tech billionaires have stated.

They have not stated it in those terms, that’s your interpretation of it. I am aware of Curtis Yarvin, Thiel et al. But they are hardly the only ones in control of the tech. But that’s not even the point. The tech exists, even if that was the express intention it doesn’t matter because China will keep pursuing the tech. Which means that we will keep pursuing it because otherwise they could get an advantage that could become an existential threat for us. And even if we did stop pursuing it for whatever reason (which would be illogical) the tech would not stop existing in the world as with nukes, except now all the billionaires will hire their AI workers from China instead of the US. Hardly an appealing proposition.

Not this time. As many at the Church of Accelerationism fail to see, we’re at a point where there are practically no social safety nets left (at least in the US), which has not been the case in over a century, and people are actively dying because of anthropogenic climate, which is something that has never happened in recorded history. When people lost jobs before, they could at least get training or some other path that would allow them to make a living.

So your solution is ban the tech instead of changing policies? Jesus Christ my guy. Arguments need to be logical you understand that right? This entire worldview and rhetoric is so detached from reality that it is downright absurd.

The problem with the environment for example is not that AI exists, but rather that we do not have enough energy produced from renewables. Why would the logical solution be to uninvent AI (or ban it entirely, which is essentially the same) instead of changing policy so that energy production comes from renewables. Which fyi is what is happening at a faster rate than ever.

I understand the moral imperative and the lack of patience, but the way the world works is that one thing leads to the other, we cannot reach a goal without going through the necessary process to reach it.