Comment by wccrawford
2 months ago
The "magic" of why AI is trusted over humans is that so many humans are terrible at their jobs that people default to not trusting someone who is telling them something they don't want to hear.
The AI always tells them what they want to hear, and so they trust it. It's not magic.
> so many humans are terrible at their jobs
Is there any empirical evidence that librarians are terrible at their jobs?
The reason is not the supposed fallibility of humans but rather the supposed infallibility of technology. Nontechnical people don't know how the technology works, don't know how the sausage is made, and they mistakenly assume it can't go wrong, just like a calculator can't go wrong.
Also, people are not good at revising their beliefs. A lot depends on what they hear first, and they usually hear from the internet before they hear from an expert, because it's easier and faster to consult the former. It's embarrassing to admit to yourself that you were suckered into believing something false, so the emotional coping mechanism is to get angry at the person who contradicts your beliefs, which preserves your self-respect.