Brain Dump: We need to stop inventing shit
Ok I’m coming in pretty hot right now, both on the john and mentally. On the john because my dinner last night was just 15 wings. And mentally because I actually had to go to my office today and therefore had to remember how bad traffic sucks. So I figure I may as well channel that frustration into an unrelated rant. A week or so back my buddy sends this to the Twitter group:
Ok first off, dogshit advice ChatGPT-4o. “Run a hand through your hair.” “Your enthusiasm is what will shine through.” Bitch, it’s a job interview at a major software company — there’s some expectation that you showered and own a blazer. The peppiest homeless guy in the world could come in for an interview and he’s not getting a job if he looks and smells like shit.
But the obvious design flaws aside, what the hell is this? We’re just doing the real-life version of Her now? Stop giving AI more and more agency. The leap from agency to sentience is not as far as you may think. It’s one thing if this chick is telling me the optimal temperature for baking sourdough or offering up the day’s pollen count; it’s a whole other ballgame when she can see my face.
Also, the OP makes a great point: why is the voice so flirty? There’s exactly two things that are going to come from this:
1. This product is going to be immediately co-opted by lonely perverts
I mean this is the most obvious eventuality of all-time. You gave an AI program a kind, reassuring woman’s voice and no ability to tell horny creeps to piss off. Consequently, this version of GPT will be live for 5 minutes before it’s inundated with roughly 8 million dick pics and requests to tell fat, balding guys that they’re hot. I’d say we make it about a fortnight before guys start introducing this poor AI woman as their girlfriend at parties and make her be their Scategories partner. OpenAI essentially just built a more expensive, sentient Omegle.
And for those of you who don’t think that this will immediately be used for nefarious sexual purposes, just look at that fucking portal thing in New York. Was live for like 2 days when this happened:
We are a depraved, depraved people. You just have to anticipate that. What’s even the point of a Dublin-New York portal anyways? So guys with equally stupid accents can watch each other do heroin? How is this what we’re spending our time on?
2. AI will study our behavior and eventually walk hidden among us
Surely there’s no way giving this omniscient super computer the ability to decipher and analyze facial features, emotions, and nonverbal cues will come back to haunt us apocalyptically, right? Seriously, has no one watched Ex Machina? First, we give it a voice, then we give it a body, and pretty soon no one can tell who’s human and who’s robot. It’s a slippery slope we’re on and OpenAI is pushing us closer and closer towards the edge.
So my plea to the scientific community is this: STOP INVENTING SHIT THAT’S GOING TO GET US KILLED. No more seductive AI, no more robot dogs, no more portal porn. Instead, let’s put all of our time and resources into finding a cure for cancer, or stopping global warming, or ensuring ubiquitous clean water. You know, things that can actually benefit the human race rather than threaten our very existence.
Fucking nerds, man.
