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Jah I think it's likely that AI is hitting some underlying deep and recurring anxiety in us of being replaced.
One point though to sharpen things -- in my experience young people are the most AI-averse of all. My teenage daughters at least, hate everything AI with passion.
some underlying deep and recurring anxiety in us of being replaced
I think this anxiety comes from ignorance. Anyone who actually uses AI understands that it only works well when a human drives it.
Or it comes from a scarcity mindset -- there is a fixed amount of work to do. Those with abundance mindset know that work expands to one's capability.
Or it comes from ego -- I'm too special to compete alongside a machine
in my experience young people are the most AI-averse of all
A steep technological curve can break the 0-15-30 year-old heuristic. But on a long enough timeline, it plays out the same. Those born today will never know a world without AI, they will build a new mental frame of reality. And the next major technolocal break-thru will likely break their minds as well.
Sure I agree -- right now AI only truly works for meaningful tasks like coding, art creation, etc when a human drives. Have you ever listened to Shell Game podcast? It's a funny reality check on the state of the art.
On the other hand, I think most of the anxiety comes from people imagining where that is no longer the case.
Also, re: being too special to compete alongside a machine. Honestly I think what is going on is the opposite. People automatically concede to the computer. I believe there are studies out there that demonstrate this.
Re: eventual adoption of AI as an inevitability. Yeah I think so too but we'll see I guess.
It's a sci-fi world out there. TBD
That is a nice cherry-picked collection of cases where concerns turned out to be considered unfounded eventually.
How about the cases that weren't unfounded? Will we give those examples a name other than "techno-anxiety"?
Your choice of that term alone makes me believe your position is to dismiss concerns with a lazy wave of the hand as unfounded when it comes to something you consider the natural path of progress.
To be clear, I don't have issues or major concerns with the use of AI. But I do have issues with low effort assertions that opposing something is simply a case of techno-anxiety.
That is a nice cherry-picked collection of cases where concerns turned out to be considered unfounded eventually.
Its actually not a collection of cases. It's a collection of categories of technology.
Technology is neutral. Only applications of the tech can have positive/negative outcomes.
Plastic bags, leaded gasoline, lead based paint, DDT, CFC, asbestos.
The "technology" behind lead-containitng products is "mixing"
Mixing, as a technology, is neutral. You can make good mixtures and bad ones. Those specific mixtures of lead and paint or lead and gasoline are examples of a bad mix.
Plastic bags are a bad (arguable) application of plastics technology (neutral).
DDT, CFC, asbestos are products of chemical process (neutral technologies).
I can also imagine an evil/bad AI or photograph, or novel, or book, or written text. But it does not make the underlying tech bad.
can you name any of the cases where concerns about technology were valid?
nuclear bombs seems like an easy one, and yet mostly people don't think about it anymore.
i'd say that all of those are fully embraced, people just changed some of the ingredients.
the analogy here would be that we embrace AI slop, just with different weights.
what i meant was that the world largely uses gasoline even though it stopped putting lead in it.
my question has to do with humans deciding to give up on a technology, not necessarily finding ways to still use it just without so many bad side effects.
if humans figure out a way to produce ai slop without it being quite so noxious (the equivalent of not putting lead in paint), it is still ai slop.
my intent is not to dismiss the changes that are occurring all around us, but I do want to figure out why I have this curious experience of discovering i dislike something that I didn't necessarily dislike before I knew it was AI generated.
Here's another example, if watch a movie and enjoy it but then later discover something vile about the director (maybe he hates bitcoin or thinks Craig Wright is Satoshi or something) it changes how I feel about the movie I previously liked. I almost can't help it. That may just be human nature or may just be my own flawed character -- is what is happening to me with my feelings about AI generated art the same? or is there really something less good about an AI generated picture even if I like it?
It happens every generation: techno-anxiety
Writing itself (4th century BCE): Socrates thought written language was going to destroy human memory
The printing press (1492): The monk Johannes Trithemius wrote an entire treatise, In Praise of Scribes, defending hand-copying manuscripts against Gutenberg's invention. He argued that books were a fad and would physically decay because parchment paper was more durable.
The fiction novel (18th–19th century): Reading fiction, especially by women, was treated as a public health crisis. Critics called it "moral poison". Before this, written language was strictly for education, passing on traditional stories, and religious texts.
Photography (1859) : Baudelaire called photographs "deceptive, nothing more than a phony simulacrum of reality", and famously branded the whole industry as art's "most mortal enemy."
Recorded music (1906): John Philip Sousa, the march composer, wrote a magazine essay called "The Menace of Mechanical Music," warning that phonographs and player pianos were a mechanical substitute "for human skill, intelligence, and soul."
If you're under 15 years old, new tech isn't interesting, it's always been this way, right?
If you're 15-30 years old, the new tech is punk rock, you're probably trying to get a job with it.
If you're over 30 years old, the new tech is destroying the Earth and humanity is doomed
The point is that your view on new tech has more to do with the plasticity of your brain and your willingness to adapt than anything intrinsic to the tech itself.