This concludes "Gradient Dissent", the companion document to "Better Without AI". Thank you so much for listening! You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buying me a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mattarnold Original music by Kevin MacLeod. This podcast is under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial International 4.0 License.
Jan 19, 2025•5 min•Season 3Ep. 148
Current text generators, such as ChatGPT, are highly unreliable, difficult to use effectively, unable to do many things we might want them to, and extremely expensive to develop and run. These defects are inherent in their underlying technology. Quite different methods could plausibly remedy all these defects. Would that be good, or bad? https://betterwithout.ai/better-text-generators John McCarthy’s paper “Programs with common sense”: http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/mcc59/mcc59.html Harry Fr...
Jan 12, 2025•38 min•Season 3Ep. 147
Analysis of image classifiers demonstrates that it is possible to understand backprop networks at the task-relevant run-time algorithmic level. In these systems, at least, networks gain their power from deploying massive parallelism to check for the presence of a vast number of simple, shallow patterns. https://betterwithout.ai/images-surface-features This episode has a lot of links: David Chapman's earliest public mention, in February 2016, of image classifiers probably using color and texture ...
Jan 05, 2025•15 min•Season 3Ep. 146
Current AI practice is not engineering, even when it aims for practical applications, because it is not based on scientific understanding. Enforcing engineering norms on the field could lead to considerably safer systems. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-as-engineering This episode has a lot of links! Here they are. Michael Nielsen’s “The role of ‘explanation’ in AI”. https://michaelnotebook.com/ongoing/sporadica.html#role_of_explanation_in_AI Subbarao Kambhampati’s “Changing the Nature of AI Researc...
Dec 15, 2024•16 min•Season 3Ep. 145
Few AI experiments constitute meaningful tests of hypotheses. As a branch of machine learning research, AI science has concentrated on black box investigation of training time phenomena. The best of this work is has been scientifically excellent. However, the hypotheses tested are mainly irrelevant to user and societal concerns. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-as-science This chapter references Chapman's essay, "How should we evaluate progress in AI?" https://metarationality.com/artificial-intellige...
Oct 16, 2024•19 min•Season 3Ep. 144
Do AI As Science And Engineering Instead - We’ve seen that current AI practice leads to technologies that are expensive, difficult to apply in real-world situations, and inherently unsafe. Neglected scientific and engineering investigations can bring better understanding of the risks of current AI technology, and can lead to safer technologies. https://betterwithout.ai/science-engineering-vs-AI Run-Time Task-Relevant Algorithmic Understanding - The type of scientific and engineering understandin...
Sep 08, 2024•12 min•Season 3Ep. 143
Current AI results from experimental variation of mechanisms, unguided by theoretical principles. That has produced systems that can do amazing things. On the other hand, they are extremely error-prone and therefore unsafe. Backpropaganda, a collection of misleading ways of talking about “neural networks,” justifies continuing in this misguided direction. https://betterwithout.ai/backpropaganda You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patr...
Aug 25, 2024•30 min•Season 3Ep. 142
The conclusion of this chapter. So-called “neural networks” are extremely expensive, poorly understood, unfixably unreliable, deceptive, data hungry, and inherently limited in capabilities. In short: they are bad. https://betterwithout.ai/artificial-neurons-considered-harmful Sayash Kapoor and Arvind Narayanan’s "The bait and switch behind AI risk prediction tools": https://aisnakeoil.substack.com/p/the-bait-and-switch-behind-ai-risk A video titled "Latent Space Walk": https://www.youtube.com/wa...
Aug 11, 2024•28 min•Season 3Ep. 141
This begins "Gradient Dissent", the companion material to "Better Without AI". The neural network and GPT technologies that power current artificial intelligence are exceptionally error prone, deceptive, poorly understood, and dangerous. They are widely used without adequate safeguards in situations where they cause increasing harms. They are not inevitable, and we should replace them with better alternatives. https://betterwithout.ai/gradient-dissent Artificial Neurons Considered Harmful, Part ...
Jul 21, 2024•16 min•Season 3Ep. 140
The five short chapters in this episode are the conclusion of the main body of Better Without AI. Next, we'll begin the book's appendix, Gradient Dissent. Cozy Futurism - If we knew we’d never get flying cars, most people wouldn’t care. What do we care about? https://betterwithout.ai/cozy-futurism Meaningful Futurism - Likeable futures are meaningful, not just materially comfortable. Bringing one about requires imagining it. I invite you to do that! https://betterwithout.ai/meaningful-future The...
Jun 23, 2024•22 min•Season 3Ep. 139
A Future We Would Like - The most important questions are not about technology but about us. What sorts of future would we like? What role could AI play in getting us there, and also in that world? What is your own role in helping that happen? https://betterwithout.ai/a-future-we-would-like How AI Destroyed The Future -We are doing a terrible job of thinking about the most important question because unimaginably powerful evil artificial intelligences are controlling our brains. https://betterwit...
Jun 16, 2024•13 min•Season 3Ep. 144
Stop obstructing scientific progress! We already know how to dramatically accelerate science: by getting out of the way. https://betterwithout.ai/stop-obstructing-science How to science better. What do exceptional scientists do differently from mediocre ones? Can we train currently-mediocre ones to do better? https://betterwithout.ai/better-science-without-AI Scenius: upgrading science FTW. Empirically, breakthroughs that enable great progress depend on particular, uncommon social constellations...
May 26, 2024•20 min•Season 3Ep. 143
Progress requires experimentation. Suggested ways AI could speed progress by automating experiments appear mistaken. https://betterwithout.ai/limits-to-induction You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buying me a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mattarnold Original music by Kevin MacLeod. This podcast is under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial International 4...
Apr 21, 2024•12 min•Season 3Ep. 142
Forgive the sound quality on this episode; I recorded it live in front of an audience on a platform floating in a lake during the 2024 solar eclipse. This is a standalone essay by David Chapman on metarationaity.com. How scientific research is like cunnilingus: a phenomenology of epistemology. https://metarationality.com/going-down-on-the-phenomenon You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the s...
Apr 17, 2024•9 min•Season 3Ep. 141
What Is The Role Of Intelligence In Science? Actually, what are “science” and “intelligence”? Precise, explicit definitions aren’t necessary, but discussions of Transformative AI seem to depend implicitly on particular models of both. It matters if those models are wrong. https://betterwithout.ai/intelligence-in-science Katja Grace, “Counterarguments to the basic AI x-risk case”. https://aiimpacts.org/counterarguments-to-the-basic-ai-x-risk-case/ What Do Unusually Intelligent People Do? If we wa...
Apr 07, 2024•15 min•Season 3Ep. 140
Radical Progress Without Scary AI: Technological progress, in medicine for example, provides an altruistic motivation for developing more powerful AIs. I suggest that AI may be unnecessary, or even irrelevant, for that. We may be able to get the benefits without the risks. https://betterwithout.ai/radical-progress-without-AI What kind of AI might accelerate technological progress?: “Narrow” AI systems, specialized for particular technical tasks, are probably feasible, useful, and safe. Let’s bui...
Mar 10, 2024•15 min•Season 3Ep. 139
Recognize that AI is probably net harmful: Actually-existing and near-future AIs are net harmful—never mind their longer-term risks. We should shut them down, not pussyfoot around hoping they can somehow be made safe. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-is-harmful Create a negative public image for AI: Most funding for AI research comes from the advertising industry. Their primary motivation may be to create a positive corporate image, to offset their obvious harms. Creating bad publicity for AI would e...
Feb 18, 2024•22 min•Season 3Ep. 138
“Apocalypse now” identified the corrosive influence of new viral ideologies, created unintentionally by recommender systems, as a major AI risk. These may cause social collapse if not tackled head-on. You can resist. https://betterwithout.ai/spurn-artificial-ideology Announcement tweet for the Opening Awareness, Opening Rationality discussion group starting on February 1: https://twitter.com/openingBklyn/status/1751314312415567956 Document with more details: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Y...
Feb 04, 2024•16 min•Season 3Ep. 137
Current AI practices produce technologies that are expensive, difficult to apply in real-world situations, and inherently unsafe. Neglected scientific and engineering investigations can bring better understanding of specific risks of current AI technology, and can lead to safer technologies. https://betterwithout.ai/fight-unsafe-AI You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buyi...
Jan 14, 2024•12 min•Season 3Ep. 136
The technologies underlying current AI systems are inherently, unfixably unreliable. They should be deprecated, avoided, regulated, and replaced. https://betterwithout.ai/mistrust-machine-learning You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buying me a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mattarnold Music is by Kevin MacLeod. This podcast is under a Creative Commons Attribution N...
Dec 31, 2023•16 min•Season 3Ep. 135
Gaining unauthorized access to computer systems is a key source of power in many AI doom scenarios. That is easy now, because there are scant incentives for serious cybersecurity; so nearly all systems are radically insecure. Technical and political initiatives must mitigate this problem. https://betterwithout.ai/cybersecurity-vs-AI You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buy...
Dec 17, 2023•13 min•Season 3Ep. 134
Practical Actions You Can Take Against AI Risks: We can and should protect against current and likely future harmful AI effects. This chapter recommends practical, near-term risk reduction measures. I suggest actions for the general public, computer professionals, AI ethics and safety organizations, funders, and governments. https://betterwithout.ai/pragmatic-AI-safety End Digital Surveillance: Databases of personal information collected via internet surveillance are a main resource for harmful ...
Dec 10, 2023•17 min•Season 3Ep. 133
This concludes the "Apocalypse Now" section of Better Without AI. AI systems may cause near-term disasters through their proven ability to shatter societies and cultures. These might potentially cause human extinction, but are more likely to scale up to the level of the twentieth century dictatorships, genocides, and world wars. It would be wise to anticipate possible harms in as much detail as possible. https://betterwithout.ai/incoherent-AI-apocalypses You can support the podcast and get episo...
Dec 03, 2023•29 min•Season 3Ep. 132
Who is in control of AI? - It may already be too late to shut down the existing AI systems that could destroy civilization. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-is-out-of-control What an AI apocalypse may look like - Scenarios in which artificial intelligence systems degrade critical institutions to the point of collapse seem to me not just likely, but well under way. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-safety-failure This episode mentions the short story "Sort By Controversial" by Scott Alexander. Here is the a...
Nov 12, 2023•17 min•Season 3Ep. 131
"In this audiobook... A LARGE BOLD FONT IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS SOUNDS LIKE THIS." Apocalypse now - Current AI systems are already harmful. They pose apocalyptic risks even without further technology development. This chapter explains why; explores a possible path for near-term human extinction via AI; and sketches several disaster scenarios. https://betterwithout.ai/apocalypse-now At war with the machines - The AI apocalypse is now. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-already-at-war This interview with ...
Nov 06, 2023•37 min•Season 3Ep. 130
Superintelligence should scare us only insofar as it grants superpowers. Protecting against specific harms of specific plausible powers may be our best strategy for preventing catastrophes. https://betterwithout.ai/fear-AI-power For much of the AI safety community, the central question has been “when will it happen?!” That is futile: we don’t have a coherent description of what “it” is, much less how “it” would come about. Fortunately, a prediction wouldn’t be useful anyway. An AI apocalypse is ...
Oct 22, 2023•18 min•Season 3Ep. 129
Many people call the future threat “artificial general intelligence,” but all three words there are misleading when trying to understand risks. https://betterwithout.ai/artificial-general-intelligence AI may radically accelerate technology development. That might be extremely good or extremely bad. There are currently no good explanations for how either would happen, so it’s hard to predict which, or when, or whether. The understanding necessary to guide the future to a good outcome may depend m...
Oct 15, 2023•10 min•Season 3Ep. 128
Thanks for your patience while I ran Fluidity Forum. We now resume "Better Without AI" by David Chapman. Speculations about autonomous AI assume simplistic theories of motivation. They also mistakenly confuse those with ethical theories. Building AI systems on these ideas would produce monsters. https://betterwithout.ai/AI-motivation Coherent Extrapolated Volition https://betterwithout.ai/AI-motivation#fn_Turchin:~:text=%E2%80%9C-,Coherent%20Extrapolated%20Volition,-%E2%80%9D%20at%20LessWrong%2C...
Oct 08, 2023•17 min•Season 3Ep. 127
It’s a mistake to think that human-like agency is the only dangerous kind. That risks overlooking AIs causing agent-like harms in inhuman ways. https://betterwithout.ai/diverse-agency#fn_meme_critics You can support the podcast and get episodes a week early, by supporting the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/m/fluidityaudiobooks If you like the show, consider buying me a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mattarnold Original music by Kevin MacLeod. This podcast is under a Creative Commons Attr...
Sep 18, 2023•14 min•Season 3Ep. 126
Most apocalyptic scenarios involve an AI acting as an autonomous agent, pursuing goals that conflict with human ones. Many people reject AI risk, saying that machines can’t have real goals or intentions. However, agency seems nebulous; and subtracting “real” agency from the scenario doesn’t seem to remove the risk. https://betterwithout.ai/agency A video in which white blood cells look as if they have agency: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KrCmBNiJRI The US National Security Commission on Arti...
Sep 10, 2023•9 min•Season 3Ep. 125
