Big Joel

@bigjoel.bsky.social

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youtube.com/bigjoel

Comment: Other note: you keep using the word "children." That's a word that I don't hear much of. I volunteer for science olympiad and the local math tournament. I have a little brother who's in middle school. I hear "kids" a lot. Rarely "children." Except occasionally ironically. That word just like feels vaguely distasteful. I don't know why. Maybe a little infantilizing.
tweet: sorry you’ll never convince me that the “lateness is a moral failing” isn’t rooted in colonization and capitalism, it’s CONTROL!!! and I get we live in a society blah blah blah but if it’s ur friends you know is always late tell them an earlier time or whatever but acting like it’s a moral failing is so puritanical and silly sometimes you just got to accept people as they are
But "the thing that is most disturbing" about Tuesday's results, he said, is that they suggested to candidates that "if you declare genocide in Gaza, despite a distinct lack of experience compared to people that you're running against, it can win you an election."
a tweet: People are completely missing Richard’s point here. I’d like to think it’s because they read only until the paywall. He is not saying that LLMs are conscious. Instead he’s saying: 1. LLMs are deeply capable (this is true) 2. If LLMs are not conscious (they almost certainly aren’t) then they are ‘mindless zombies’ that approach/surpass humans in capability. Based on this, he asks: If capability can be mindless or conscious, why did the most intelligent creatures on this planet evolve consciousness, even though it’s not strictly necessary? It must have some inherent value, like the ability to feel pain. This is a pretty sound argument, and I’ll agree that consciousness adds value. The unsaid follow-up question is: Will machines at some point be conscious? Is that the next step in their evolution which will make them yet more capable and valuable? Will they at one point be able to perceive pain, the movement of time, and other elements we currently associate with consciousness? They can’t now, but if we look 10-100 years in the future it would not be ludicrous to believe that machines will be not only capable, but also conscious.
Beneath this is an important principle: Conversation is not a reward to be bestowed on those with whom we agree; it’s a necessary habit in a democracy. The point is not to find agreement so much as to deepen understanding. To talk with others is to believe in the possibility of change — theirs and your own. Whether you like everything that someone has said should be severed from the question of whether that person is worth talking to.