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#91

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by The Minsky Moment - November 25, 2025, 11:57:08 PM

Yeah I don't doubt you could in theory create an "Einstein LLM" or a "Hawking LLM" or something similar.  Train it on everything that Einstein ever said or wrote, or what was said or wrote by him, or what was said or written by people most similar to them.  And sure it may create a reasonable facsimile of what the historical Einstein would actually say in response to various prompts.  But what it can't do is replicate what Einstein would say or do if he were reincarnated at birth in the 21st century and lived a full life.  Because that Einstein would probably think or do novel and unexpected things now just like the real Einstein did in 1900s and 1910s.  But the LLM wouldn't be able to do that because it's not in its data set.

#92

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by Admiral Yi - November 25, 2025, 11:45:34 PM

How would you program curiosity?  Invention?

[If]

#93

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by DGuller - November 25, 2025, 11:44:22 PM

I didn't mean to imply self-evolution, or Darwinian evolution, or anything of the kind.    I meant evolved as in "developed".

I'm not sure I'm following your argument correctly here, but it seems like you're saying that "it's theoretically possible that LLM models could be developed to a point where their output 'emulates intelligent communication', and that if it does then it can essentially be considered cognizant whatever is 'under the hood" purely on strength on the apparent intelligence of the output".

Is that right? Or have I missed some nuance?

I'm a little hesitant to agree, because I may be agreeing to something that I understand differently from you.  I mean, I couldn't have imagined how "evolved" could be interpreted here...

Let me try to concisely restate your restatement:  "If LLMs are developed to the point where they can consistently emulate intelligent communication, then they're functionally equivalent to being intelligent.  If you can have an "Einstein LLM" that would say everything flesh and bones Einstein would say, even to novel contexts, then it doesn't matter whether the algorithm is classified as cognizant or not;  functionally it is as intelligent as flesh and bones Einstein was.

#94

Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...

Last post by HisMajestyBOB - November 25, 2025, 11:41:38 PM

Though on the other hand, at this point it's clear that JD Vance would be far worse for Ukraine than Trump is.

#95

Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...

Last post by HisMajestyBOB - November 25, 2025, 11:40:26 PM

The world is catering to Trump's ego because he sits at the top of the world's most powerful military, and the world's biggest economy.

If there was any type of cosmic justice someone as morally repugnant as Trump would not be in that position, but the US finds itself in a situation where its levers of powers have been captured by the corrupt, the self-serving, and the straight up evil.

I am talking about the US doing this. I know why the rest of the world plays along. But we are actively allowing him to just fuck up our foreign policy for no other higher goal than satisfying his ego.

Even for a President that is ridiculous.

And we did because our country is full of evil people. Nobody should ever trust us again.

Why not? Every other part of society seems to be folding to Trump faster than Superman on laundry day. Universities, law firms, media (those few networks that aren't actually cheering him on), even the supposed opposition. Might as well throw foreign policy on the pile.

#96

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by The Minsky Moment - November 25, 2025, 11:22:16 PM

The question seems to hang on how one defines "functionally analogous to intelligence."  Contemporary LLMs are capable of generating output that is equivalent to output that would be generated by intelligent human beings for certain kinds of defined tasks.  Contemporary LLMs are capable of generating communicative output that passes the Turing Test.  If one defines those capabilities as intelligence that definitionally the statement is true.  It's not what I understand as "general intelligence" though.

#97

Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...

Last post by Zanza - November 25, 2025, 11:18:32 PM

Treason

#98

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Sheilbh - November 25, 2025, 11:03:46 PM

So there was some initial reporting that the government was intending to follow Sir Brian Leveson's report which reduced some jury trials and was part of a wider package.

It sounds like the government are going vastly further than that. Basically the only jury trials will be murder, rape or manslaughter (by default) with some other jury trials if that is deemed to be in the "public interest". The line from the MoJ to the rest of government is that there is "no right" to jury trial.

I'm very opposed to this - I thought Leveson's recommendations (from what I'd read) seemed very sensible but this is massive overreach. In particular a lot will depend on how broad "public interest" is and my suspicion is that it'll be narrow and an easy route for future governments to further restrict trial by jury.

I'd note that in relation to protest and speech crimes that juries are very often a genuine shield - they are very, very reluctant to convict people. We have seen in recent years juries fairly consistently acquit people of protest and speech crimes much to the displeasure of (and despite the influence of) the judge - judges are basically willing to throw the book on those offences - and despite the political and press interest in those cases.

I rather prefer David Lammy's ideas from 2020 on this ("these are my principles! And if you don't like them - I have others!"):

David Lammy
@DavidLammy
Jun 20, 2020
Jury trials are a fundamental part of our democratic settlement. Criminal trials without juries are a bad idea.

The Government need to pull their finger out and acquire empty public buildings across the country to make sure these can happen in a way that is safe.

We will work with the government on sensible proposals to deal with the backlog - which started long before Covid-19 because of underfunding.

You don't fix the backlog with trials that are widely perceived as unfair.

Also something absolutely insane about recommendations reforming planning rules on whether it was really necessary to spend £700 million on fish preservation technology around a nuclear power plant, only for this to be stymied because of concerns about international and human rights law while the governments attitude to denuding the right to a jury trial appears to be "YOLO"

#99

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by Jacob - November 25, 2025, 11:03:35 PM

I didn't mean to imply self-evolution, or Darwinian evolution, or anything of the kind.    I meant evolved as in "developed".

I'm not sure I'm following your argument correctly here, but it seems like you're saying that "it's theoretically possible that LLM models could be developed to a point where their output 'emulates intelligent communication', and that if it does then it can essentially be considered cognizant whatever is 'under the hood" purely on strength on the apparent intelligence of the output".

Is that right? Or have I missed some nuance?

You're not arguing that AGI is around the corner, but that a sufficiently refined LLM could achieve a partial success but that's sufficient to call it cognizant? Or are you saying that you think that there's a good chance that LLMs can become virtually indistinguishable from AGI in output, and if they do then they can be considered AGI regardless of what goes on "under the hood". That is, LLMs still have significant potential to reach AGI levels in the short term?

#100

Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...

Last post by Jacob - November 25, 2025, 10:51:25 PM

Utter moral rot