Your point about homogenized behavior is often overlooked. By nudging everyone toward conformed thinking—limiting options to just "A or B," or even just the ideal "A," while suppressing the unpredictables—society becomes much easier to control. It has always been this way, save for the disruptions of the printing press and the internet. With forced conformity, AI and human controllers can more easily shape the future and predict outcomes. And if they can't? They can simply use those same AI tools to mask the fact that they have completely lost control of the future.
I mean this was also the point that stuck out to me... but I will add to Andy's comment that homogenuity also makes life more boring. Homogenized behavior/thought/art is no longer challenging or interesting. It limits our ability to grow, and while LLMs being used to 'create more art' is often something that it touted as a benefit, it seems that they just create more of what there already is. There is probably a full rant to be had here about the value of novelty... but you both already know it.
The real tragedy, besides environmental destruction and pattern of life collection, is the willingness, sometimes eagerness, of the masses to abdicate one's own agency when so little of it is left.
I fight the AI fight daily in the schoolroom. Reality is our kids, and younger teacher (educators) are becoming lazier and stupider. They know and do less with their lives. Scares me.
Your point about homogenized behavior is often overlooked. By nudging everyone toward conformed thinking—limiting options to just "A or B," or even just the ideal "A," while suppressing the unpredictables—society becomes much easier to control. It has always been this way, save for the disruptions of the printing press and the internet. With forced conformity, AI and human controllers can more easily shape the future and predict outcomes. And if they can't? They can simply use those same AI tools to mask the fact that they have completely lost control of the future.
I mean this was also the point that stuck out to me... but I will add to Andy's comment that homogenuity also makes life more boring. Homogenized behavior/thought/art is no longer challenging or interesting. It limits our ability to grow, and while LLMs being used to 'create more art' is often something that it touted as a benefit, it seems that they just create more of what there already is. There is probably a full rant to be had here about the value of novelty... but you both already know it.
"Once men turned their thinking over to
machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them."
-Dune
And then Huxley sighed.
The real tragedy, besides environmental destruction and pattern of life collection, is the willingness, sometimes eagerness, of the masses to abdicate one's own agency when so little of it is left.
Of course a Huxley BNW quote comes to mind:
“But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.”
Ok, I need to read that again and slow downs.
I fight the AI fight daily in the schoolroom. Reality is our kids, and younger teacher (educators) are becoming lazier and stupider. They know and do less with their lives. Scares me.