Break it all down
For several years now, I’ve been fielding calls from people who want to help make AI go well for humanity. Sometimes these folks are based outside the U.S., and often they ask me: With most of the labs concentrated in a few places (the U.S., China, and DeepMind in the U.K.), what are the rest … Read more
Not so un-Noahble after all Noahpinion wrote a post about AI; by the confluence of AI doom discourse and terrible pun, I have been summoned and I answer. First, points of agreement. Noah is worried about AI-driven bioterrorism. Hard agree. Novel pathogens are scary, and we’ve already seen that global readiness for even ordinary pandemics … Read more
Yesterday, due to a clerical error, Amanda and I came within a week of losing our house. I.From our perspective, it began with a letter in mid-November. TAX SALE NOTICE, the letter said. It was from our local municipality, and it said we owed $400 for “Utility”. If we didn’t pay it, they’d sell our … Read more
I seem to be unusually resilient to heartbreak. I once had the following conversation with someone I seriously considered marrying (paraphrased, but as honestly as memory allows): Her: I don’t think this is going to work out. I think we need to break up. I’m sorry.Me: That sucks. But if you really think so, thanks … Read more
A senior Pentagon official was quoted yesterday saying “We’re going to invest in autonomous killer robots.” That is, perhaps, an alarming sentence to hear. The real threat is not the robots, however, but the autonomy. Quote in full: This administration cares about weapon systems and business systems and not ‘technologies.’ We’re not going to be … Read more
Richard Hanania wrote an excellent post today covering the fear that AI will take human jobs. I found it intriguing enough that it prompted me to write up my own thoughts. This post, however…is not about jobs. In a way, neither was Hanania’s. I like his section headings, though, so I’m just going to keep … Read more
Last year, I joined the communications team at the Machine Intelligence Research Institute. Before this, I spent several hundred hours introducing lay audiences to the basic science of modern artificial intelligence. Below, I’ll share what I’ve been working on and thinking about these past few years, and why I think it matters to all of … Read more
In a recent bonus episode of the Bayesian Conspiracy podcast, Eneasz Brodski shared a thought experiment that caused no small amount of anguish. In the hypothetical, some eccentric but trustworthy entity is offering to give you an escalating amount of money for your fingers, starting at $10,000 for the first one and increasing 10x per … Read more
Recently someone asked me: “If you build a automaton, and it goes out and kills someone by following your preloaded inputs, is it put on trial for murder, or are you?” Good question. Disclaimer: In all the EXTREMELY FICTIONAL cases below, the judge is following Joe’s ethical framework rather than any actual legal precedent. Any … Read more
I dreamed a stupid story, so now I’m inflicting it on you. One became two. Two became one. One became two again. The Lightning Brothers had arrived at Castle Grey. They bore the fabled weapons, and they were here to slay a legend. The Dread Nor’thuulbarax the Second, Lord of Darkness, Eldritch Necromancer, and Lord … Read more