Since ChatGPT is only 3 years old, it feels like we are living the start of the hype. Currently we are slowly starting to understand the downsides of this technology: internet filled with AI slop, study on cognitive decline, increasing polarisation on social media, users reporting terrible behaviors like encouraging self-harm, etc.
Cocaine and radium have disappeared from consumer grade goods thanks to legislation. It's hard to imagine how much damage they would have caused if they were still in use nowadays but no wonder it would be huge.
I think AI is here to stay but maybe we should hurry in regulating it before it damages society too much. What do you guys think about this?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_cocaine#Popularization
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_fad
schnitzelstoat•4mo ago
If you don't want to use it, don't use it. If you don't want to watch 'AI slop' then leave the social media platforms that are saturated from it.
I left almost all of them already, not because of AI but just because I was fed up of the low-quality content.
I think regulation is going to do a lot more damage to both technological progress and economic competitiveness.
hamburgererror•4mo ago
Of course one can just ignore social media and llms, but that doesn't make them disappear and their impact on the world is real. Polarization of public opinion is paving the way for extremist political parties, this is already a reality in many countries.
> I think regulation is going to do a lot more damage to both technological progress and economic competitiveness.
If technological progress is about feeding us with garbage tik tok videos then I think we should ask ourselves if it's really worth pursuing it.
davydm•4mo ago
It's your "average joe" users who are turning to "ai companions" when they feel depressed and want to kill themselves, because they are under the impression that it's an understanding, sentient entity. If people all thought of LLMs as "bags of words" (ie, understand that they're just token predictors with ZERO understanding of anything), perhaps that would change.
But we can't rely on the grifters to be honest - they'd lose all that yummy yummy cash! - so I guess we need regulation, just like we do for driving cars or taking medications, or any other item from a myriad I could choose from.
schnitzelstoat•4mo ago
It seems the real problem is with social media.
JohnFen•4mo ago