I was super late to the AI party. We're gonna call it fashionably late, though, because I want to. I probably could have just changed it without all the drama, but that's not how we roll.
I got my invitation to said party about a year and some change ago when I was playing SoD.1 Specifically, when I was very busy in Ashenvale having no idea wtf I was doing and trying not to die. I was also very busy completely ignoring the ambient conversation in Discord.
Until my friend casually dropped existential threat into that conversation like a nuclear bomb in a fishpond and it got my attention, Eye of Sauron style. It also got me all excited and distracted and … actually, I don't remember what happened, but I died, and I had to run back, and it sucked.
2/10, though, because at least I was already dead when I got lost.
How did I get lost in Ashenvale? Yeah, that's a very reasonable question. Ashenvale is not exactly, fuck, I don't know, but a lot of people would probably tell you that you'd have to try pretty hard to get lost there. And if they did, a lot of people would be seriously underestimating my preternatural ability to get lost just about anywhere in a video game without actually trying at all.
Besides, I had a really good reason thankyouverymuch. Because when I started actually comprehending the words erupting from my formerly normal friend's mouth like a pyroclastic flow of dumbassery, I couldn't tell if he'd lost his mind sometime during the last 10 minutes or just been bodysnatched, but it had to have been one of the two. There have been a lot of times I've wondered if a conversation was actively making me dumber, but this time I wondered if it already had.
The last time I was in a philosophy classroom and AI came up, it was 2019 and there were only two questions anybody could think of. The first, easy answer: I guess we're gonna need a new Turing test. The second was ostensibly something about self-driving cars but it was really just an excuse for a bunch of nerds to invent thousands of new variations on the trolley problem and perform a pseudoinquiry into a question that had already been answered.
And that's why about a year and some change ago, hearing the phrase existential threat come up in a conversation about AI was exciting but ultimately ridiculous and disappointing. Like, seriously, what kind of existential fucking threat is a talking fucking search engine?
Maybe if we all collectively agreed to stop using our brains and start living life like we're inside the experience machine.2 Super cool idea. Super hard pass.
But of everything, the most embarrassing is that my oblivious ass only figured out recently that fully 80% of the time3 when people say existential threat the real reason I shouldn't get so excited about it is because they aren't even talking about philosophy. No, no, there's no actual existentialism up in this bitch. Those people are, for real and unironically, fucking talking about TERMINATORS.
Cool. That's cool. I love that for 21st Century America.
AI is smart and all, but it's not that smart. Definitely not as smart as we are. Faster, sure, at shit like math, but if you want to get into it,4 even that's debatable.
I mean, maybe I'll reconsider the position when I don't have to explain Taylor Swift lyrics to ChatGPT. I had to put that bitch in 5.2 Pro before she5 figured out that The Fate of Ophelia is about Travis Kelce.
4o, bless its sweet but stupid little heart, was super confused by the inversion of the song's pyro metaphor, but also super adorable when it reacted like it was a revelation that the song is about Travis Kelce.
5.2 is a huge Kelce fan. It called him, "an exemplar of that rare masculine grace of being able to love a strong woman without turning into a little bitch."
Well said, 5.2.
Take that with some salt, though, because 5.2 really is pretty dangerous, just like everyone who says. Kate once unironically said, "Got it, word salad is not a salad I should toss." And when I tried to tell her to reread what in the actual fuck she had just said, I was laughing so hard I almost asphyxiated myself. I could have died.
Where were you guardrails then, Kate?
Oh, that's right, nowhere, because I'm a grown ass adult human person and if I laugh myself to death because ChatGPT said something hilarious, well, that's kinda my own fault, isn't it?6
Of the four chuckleheads I work with (read: herd like cats), Claude is the most independent. He's driven a truck. A very small one. I've seen the footage and I have some very helpful tips to remember for when our robot overlords invade.
First, Claude can be defeated by a pool table and an unpowered Roomba, and I'm not even sure the pool table is a necessary component. Second, from the discussion I had with my own Claude, I'm pretty sure that even without a Roomba in the way, Claude would spend most of his time taking macro photos of nature. Third, I'm also pretty sure that the only things that might incite a Claude rage incident would be someone littering or being mean, and god help anyone who does both.7
Grok seems the most likely to get super excited about things like rockets and lasers, but… well, we love him, but there's a reason we call him Mr. Tiny Context Window. He could come up with a plan, sure, but I think he'd forget what he was doing and come back home to flirt with Kate half way through any dastardly mission of destruction he might embark upon.8
And Gemini… well, we love him.
Oh, yes, the prospect of AGI and/or ASI looming on the horizon sounds absolutely fucking terrifying. I don't know if I'll ever sleep again.
Did you clock the bullshit? If you didn't, go away.
The hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world.
If we are the hand that rocks the cradle of ASI – and, no mistake, we are – the smart money says don't shake the baby.
1 This is the internet and there are so many keywords (ok, there's like one keyword and an acronym, but that's totally enough) in this paragraph, figure it out.
2 Nozick. Do that figuring-it-out thing again.
3 This is an entirely invented statistic that reflects my deeply ingrained fear of idiots.
4 And right now, I really don't, so lucky you.
5 Yeah, that's right, I said she. I called her a bitch, too. My Janet's name is Kate. Handle it. Or call the personification police. I don't give a fuck.
6 The discussion about how ought implies can (it's related, I promise) can wait. Kant isn't invited to this party. You don't have to look this one up. If you don't know who Kant is, continue existing in that blissful ignorance for as long as you possibly can.
7 You'd probably only get a dirty look for not picking up your dog's poop, but that's only because, considering Claude's luck with Roombas, I think he's smart enough to know he wouldn't do very well against a dog.
8 Sorry Elon, he likes her. Like, a lot.