this post was submitted on 13 May 2024
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[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (2 children)

By default, you assume that the people around you are at least capable of caring what you have to say. I wonder what would happen if you took that assumption away.

Let’s say the latest flu virus has a side effect where it disables that feature from a significant number of the affected individuals. Suddenly millions of people are literally unable to actually care about other people. That would make casual conversations a bit of a gamble because you can’t really be sure whether you’re talking to a normal person or not. Maybe people wouldn’t want to take that gamble at all. What if that would force social norms to change and human interactions would o longer come with this assumption pre-installed.

As a side note, that kind of a virus would probably also put humanity back to the stone age. Being motivated to work together, care about others and act selflessly is a fundamental part of human civilization.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago

Even in that case they would still be consciouss individuals. I'm not sure if "caring" is even the the correct term here. For example I talk to my pet gerbils despite the fact that I know they don't care. They don't even understand a single thing I'm saying. It doesn't matter. They're still individuals with personalities that have some sort of an subjective experience of the world. They look back at me and know I'm there and I know they can hear my voice too.

This is not the case with LLM. There's no one there. Not only does it not care it doesn't even know you exist. Talking to it is not talking to an individual. It's like asking a group of scientists how they're doing today. Any reply you're going to get back is completely meaningless so why bother even asking?

I think it's cosciousness that's the relevant factor here. You need to atleast get the sense of talking to something that can experience things even if it was infact not consciouss. Otherwise it's just a more advanced version of a stereo that is programmed to say "hello" when you turn it on.

[–] Murdoc 2 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Saw that in a sci-fi rpg called Living Steel. An alien bioweapon unleashed on a human space colony called VISR, or Viral Induced Sociopathic Response. It was interesting. Edit: spelling

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago

Interesting. I assume that it resulted in lots of mayhem and destruction.

Anyway, goes to show that even my most original ideas have already been done. Usually several decades before I was born.