There are a great many problems with LLM's and AI in general. The underlying problem is, LLMs break the social contract in about as many ways as a human can dream up. There is no useful beneficial purpose that doesn't also open the door to intractable destructive forces manifold over that benefit; its a modern day pandora's box, and its hubris to think otherwise.
This underlying societal problem has knock-on effects just like chilling effects on free speech, but these effects we talk about are much more pernicious.
To understand, you have to know something about volunteer work, and what charity is. Charity is intended to help others who are doing poorly, at little to no personal benefit to you, to improve their circumstances. Its gods work, there is very little expectation involved on the giver. Its not charity if you are forced to give.
When you give something to someone as charity, and then that someone, or an observing third-party related to that charity extorts you and attempts to coerce you for more. What do you think the natural inclination is going to be?
There is now additional coercive personal cost attached to that which was not given freely; what naturally happens. This is theft.
Volunteer psychology says, you stop giving when it starts costing you more than you were willing to give. Those costs may not be monetary, in many cases they are personal, and many people who give often vet those who they are giving to so as to help good people rather than enable evil people. LLM's make no distinction.
Less people give, but that is not all. Less people who are intelligent give anything. They withdraw their support. Where the average person in society was once pulled up to higher forms of thought by those with intelligence and a gift for conveying thought, that vanishes as communication vanishes. From that point forward, the average is pulled only to baser and baser forms of thought and the average people seem like the smartest people in the room though that feeling is flawed (because they aren't that intelligent).
The exchange for charity is often I'll help you here, and you are obligated to use it to get yourself into a better position so you can help both yourself and other people along the way. Paying it forward if you can. Charity is wasted on those that would use what is given to support destructive and evil acts.
There are types of people who will just take until no more can be given which is a type of evil, which is why you need to vet people beforehand but an LLM is simply a programmatic implementation of taking. The entire idea of a robot worker replacing low-mid level jobs during limits of growth is one that seems enticing from the short-sighted producer side except it ends up stalling economic activity. Economies run through an equal exchange between two groups. The moment there is no exchange because money isn't being provided for labor, products can't be bought. Shortages occur, unrest, usually slavery then death when production systems for food break down.
We are already seeing this disruption in jobs in the Tech sector that is 5 times the national unemployment during peak hiring (where offpeak has hiring freezes), in a single year. When you can't keep talent, that talent has options and goes elsewhere, either contributing within the economy or creating their own (black markets). ECP in non-market socialist systems (like what we are about to have in about 5 years), guarantees a lot of death or slavery.
People volunteer to help others, if someone then uses those conversations to create a humunculus that steals that knowledge and gives it to anyone that asks, even potentially terrorist or other evil actors, no one who worked for the expertise will support that.
Inevitably it also means someone will use that same thing to replace those expert jobs entry level portions with a machine that can't reason, and no new candidates can get the experience to become an expert. Its a slow descent into an age of ruin that ends in collapse.
You end up with cyclical chaotic spirals of economic stagnation, followed by shortage, followed by slavery or death from starvation; no AGI needed. All that's needed is imposing arbitrary additional cost on those least able to bear it. Interference in the job market, making it impossible to find work, gender relations (making it impossible to couple up and have babies), political relations (that drive greater government and control at the same time limiting any future). Its dystopian but its becoming a reality because of evil people in positions that allow front-of-line blocking to course correct continue their evil work; and they are characteristically wllfully blind to the destructive acts they perform and the consequences.
There are a lot of low pay jobs that will just vanish, people don't have enough money to raise children as it is; old crowds out the new until finally, a great dying occurs. That is the future if we don't stop it and resolve the changes that were made (as the bridges were burnt) by the current generation in political power. They should have peaked in power in 95, exited in 2005-2010. They still hold the majority and its 2024 (30 years after taking power). They'll die of old age soon, and because they were the only ones that knew all the changes that were made, new bridges will have to be built from scratch with less knowledge, resources, goodwill/trust, and people. They claimed they wanted a better world for their children, while creating a hellscape for them instead made of lies and deceit.
Very few people are taught specifically what the social contract entails. Its well past time people learn, lest they end up being the supporting cause of their own destruction.
Thomas Paine's Rights of Man has a lot of good points on this.
> There are types of people who will just take until no more can be given which is a type of evil, which is why you need to vet people beforehand but an LLM is simply a programmatic implementation of taking.
Your first argument largely rests on this, but isn't the fact that so many LLM-created answers get posted actually proof of the opposite? The LLM is, after all, "giving" here - and it's not like those answers are useless, just because they're made by an LLM. LLMs are perfectly capable of giving good answers to a large number of common tech support questions, and are therefore ("voluntarily") helping people.
> We are already seeing this disruption in jobs in the Tech sector that is 5 times the national unemployment during peak hiring (where offpeak has hiring freezes), in a single year. [...] Inevitably it also means someone will use that same thing to replace those expert jobs entry level portions with a machine that can't reason, and no new candidates can get the experience to become an expert. Its a slow descent into an age of ruin that ends in collapse.
This is your other argument, which is slightly more solid - I think that at least in the short term, we are going to see many of those effects. But overall, this dystopian "collapse" scenario is economically naive, for at least two reasons:
1. As it becomes harder to enter professions requiring high degrees of specializiation as the entry-level positions dry up, the demand for real specialists in these fields increases accordingly. At some point, it becomes viable for new talent to enter those sectors even in the face of a low number of "true" entry-level positions, as there is now an incentive to accept a much steeper upfront cost in terms of time invested on learning the specialization. If there are jobs that can at all be done and that pay 500,000$ per year, somebody is going to do them.
2. And I mean, besides, the entire "ECP in non-market socialist systems [...] guarantees a lot of death or slavery" argument is plain wrong. ("Pure ideology! *sniffs*"). We already live in a post-market capitalist society. Amazon controls enough market share in a large number of sectors that their operating model resembles Soviet-style demand planning when calculating how much produce to order (that is, order to manufacture). The Economic Calculation Problem, in the age of computers, is solved. We are not playing with abacuses anymore.
At least the USSR's ideology claimed to represent the worker's interest, and so once that stopped happening in practice, the system collapsed. (And they were already in the age of computers, trying to do some of the first cybernetics.)
If the latter were true, then we would have seen the demand increase for all those specialized fields from graduates, but we have seen its just like what it was, no jobs and more debt, Older people fulfilling roles, until they retire or die and positions that aren't getting filled despite advertising for months to years. My generation will be dead within that time period, you should see at least some replacement by now but if you look closely, there isn't much replacement going on at all because there's no money in it. Greybeards are the only minders left running many of these IT departments if they are left at all and not completely outsourced.
For the amount of responsibility to get things right, you now have jobs that have significantly less responsibilities or entry skills that are now competing with the same positions thanks to inflation. Who would bother signing up for that stress for no economic benefit when they can get any number of other jobs at 3/4 of the pay and none of the responsibility. This type of chaos is what you've discounted as not happening (ECP).
> The economic calculation problem ... is solved
Then why are we having chaotic disruptions, in growing frequency and amplitude, continually more concentrated business sectors based in Lenin's comments on attacking capitalism through debauching currency through inflation as he mentioned to Keynes (towards non-market socialism), and more importantly shortages that are starting to self-sustain at the individual level.
When common food goods are not getting replenished on a weekly basis, and they are 2-3x the normal price, there is an issue. When it hits 2-3 weeks it starts to compound as demand skyrockets for non-discretionary goods (and they can't keep up). Goods sell out almost immediately (as they have been more recently), and people start hoarding (which they are doing again with TP).
You don't seem to realize this is the problem in action. It is hardly solved, we aren't even to the non-market part yet and we are far enough along to see that chaos is increasing, distortions are increasing, and shortages are increasing and not being corrected within JIT shipping schedules.
Those three observations are cause for concern to stop and lookaround because chaos is a major characteristic of the ECP. Moving goods around doesn't perform economic calculation, and soviet-style demand planning failed historically once shortages occurred, the next things coming up in the near future is sustaining shortage and death from famine. India stopped exporting its food because they see this on the horizon and have a intimate history with famine.
The 1921 famine (bolshevik non-market) reduced national population by 4% YOY and dropped the birthrate negative; Mao killed off more than 33+ million during his non-market stint which caused famine. No accurate numbers to draw up a percentage YOY but it was significant.
Every single non-market socialist state has failed in the history of socialism, and that includes its derivatives. Its not appropriate to call it ideology when there is a historic record where not even a single non-market state exists today. The fact that they all had to have markets tied to capitalist states to get their prices shows the gravity of the issue, and now that the last capitalist state is falling to non-market socialism (through intentional design/sabotage), what do you suppose is going to happen to all those market-socialist countries that can no longer get their price data. Its already happening, and chaos is unpredictable; and inflation/deflation measures are limited in resolution (as a high hysteresis problem).
Non-market socialist states run into the slavery and death part, but you are not recognizing that, and discounting it because it hasn't happened to us yet (though its likely within 5 years for a point of no return), and it has happened to every non-market system.
The point of no return to non-market socialism is when debt growth exceeds GDP (outflows exceed inflows). This is structural of any ponzi scheme. Who decides, the producers. This is when rational producers abandon the market, and start shutting down because its no longer possible to make a profit in terms of purchasing power. From there its a short but inevitable jaunt to collapse.
Have you noticed that China's stimulus through printing isn't doing much? Every printing requires exponentially greater amounts, with diminishing returns.
I think you've sorely confused objective observation with ideology and discounted it without taking into account the factors rationally; these are factors showing a clear and present danger to all existing market-socialist states, as well as those capitalist bastions that will be pulled down in the near future from ongoing subversion.
Amazon doesn't produce, its a logistics company. Shortages self-sustain because producers are leaving the market, we saw this first with baby formula in 2020 when the last producer was closed, but what's coming will leave only state-run capacity for most sectors and industry.
Most knowledgeable people know these systems are brittle and parasitic and aren't capable of ECP for a myriad of already written and rational reasons by themselves.
Socialist production absent a market, doesn't work without slave labor. It doesn't even work longer-term either with slave labor because of inefficiencies at current population don't scale well with tech levels.
You might be fine claiming everything is fine now, despite a lot of evidence to the contrary that things are getting progressively worse, and will continue down that path because of these consequences, but what about in 5 years when you can't get food. Will it matter then, when you can't do anything about it, because the time to do something came and passed?
You think the Elites in China don't know this is going to happen? They are pushing so hard for the BRICS because they know this is going to happen, because they helped cause it in their dogmatic and blind fervor and orchestration.
Name one modern real non-market socialist state that exists today that has not failed, and I'll be willing to consider your last statement. As far as I know, none exist and that should frighten every single person today because that is where we are going whether we like it or not (as a function of system dynamics).
> Name one modern real non-market socialist state that exists today that has not failed, and I'll be willing to consider your last statement.
Your focus on the false dichotomy between state action and private action makes me want to go tongue-in-cheek and name France. Definitely a non-market socialist state.
And for the record, I do agree that everything will get progressively worse, for ideological and for material reasons. But in both cases for different reasons than you suggest. The unholy marriage of extreme concentrations of wealth and the reemergence of fascism has been blessed with many children, but the Musks, Murdochs, Kochs and Thiels of this world will have little recourse against an economic reality wrecked by climate change, the drying up of fossil fuels and the bitter demographic outlook.
While Frances debt to GDP as a single country has reached above that threshold, the driver of statism is the primary currency they use, and they pooled their primary currency with the eurozone (i.e. the euro), and the aggregated country debt ratio for the Euro is still only around 88% largely because they have tied it indirectly to the USD.
Still though, you see high concentration, loss of jobs, high unemployment, all classic signs often seen in socialist states right before major calamity or outright failure.
I'd say though the France won't have gotten to non-market socialism until their primary underlying currency hits those milestones, but they will see the chaos much sooner when the shoe does drop.
This underlying societal problem has knock-on effects just like chilling effects on free speech, but these effects we talk about are much more pernicious.
To understand, you have to know something about volunteer work, and what charity is. Charity is intended to help others who are doing poorly, at little to no personal benefit to you, to improve their circumstances. Its gods work, there is very little expectation involved on the giver. Its not charity if you are forced to give.
When you give something to someone as charity, and then that someone, or an observing third-party related to that charity extorts you and attempts to coerce you for more. What do you think the natural inclination is going to be?
There is now additional coercive personal cost attached to that which was not given freely; what naturally happens. This is theft.
Volunteer psychology says, you stop giving when it starts costing you more than you were willing to give. Those costs may not be monetary, in many cases they are personal, and many people who give often vet those who they are giving to so as to help good people rather than enable evil people. LLM's make no distinction.
Less people give, but that is not all. Less people who are intelligent give anything. They withdraw their support. Where the average person in society was once pulled up to higher forms of thought by those with intelligence and a gift for conveying thought, that vanishes as communication vanishes. From that point forward, the average is pulled only to baser and baser forms of thought and the average people seem like the smartest people in the room though that feeling is flawed (because they aren't that intelligent).
The exchange for charity is often I'll help you here, and you are obligated to use it to get yourself into a better position so you can help both yourself and other people along the way. Paying it forward if you can. Charity is wasted on those that would use what is given to support destructive and evil acts.
There are types of people who will just take until no more can be given which is a type of evil, which is why you need to vet people beforehand but an LLM is simply a programmatic implementation of taking. The entire idea of a robot worker replacing low-mid level jobs during limits of growth is one that seems enticing from the short-sighted producer side except it ends up stalling economic activity. Economies run through an equal exchange between two groups. The moment there is no exchange because money isn't being provided for labor, products can't be bought. Shortages occur, unrest, usually slavery then death when production systems for food break down.
We are already seeing this disruption in jobs in the Tech sector that is 5 times the national unemployment during peak hiring (where offpeak has hiring freezes), in a single year. When you can't keep talent, that talent has options and goes elsewhere, either contributing within the economy or creating their own (black markets). ECP in non-market socialist systems (like what we are about to have in about 5 years), guarantees a lot of death or slavery.
People volunteer to help others, if someone then uses those conversations to create a humunculus that steals that knowledge and gives it to anyone that asks, even potentially terrorist or other evil actors, no one who worked for the expertise will support that.
Inevitably it also means someone will use that same thing to replace those expert jobs entry level portions with a machine that can't reason, and no new candidates can get the experience to become an expert. Its a slow descent into an age of ruin that ends in collapse.
You end up with cyclical chaotic spirals of economic stagnation, followed by shortage, followed by slavery or death from starvation; no AGI needed. All that's needed is imposing arbitrary additional cost on those least able to bear it. Interference in the job market, making it impossible to find work, gender relations (making it impossible to couple up and have babies), political relations (that drive greater government and control at the same time limiting any future). Its dystopian but its becoming a reality because of evil people in positions that allow front-of-line blocking to course correct continue their evil work; and they are characteristically wllfully blind to the destructive acts they perform and the consequences.
There are a lot of low pay jobs that will just vanish, people don't have enough money to raise children as it is; old crowds out the new until finally, a great dying occurs. That is the future if we don't stop it and resolve the changes that were made (as the bridges were burnt) by the current generation in political power. They should have peaked in power in 95, exited in 2005-2010. They still hold the majority and its 2024 (30 years after taking power). They'll die of old age soon, and because they were the only ones that knew all the changes that were made, new bridges will have to be built from scratch with less knowledge, resources, goodwill/trust, and people. They claimed they wanted a better world for their children, while creating a hellscape for them instead made of lies and deceit.
Very few people are taught specifically what the social contract entails. Its well past time people learn, lest they end up being the supporting cause of their own destruction.
Thomas Paine's Rights of Man has a lot of good points on this.