Comment by besterman23
8 hours ago
Unhinged conspiracy, if you take the implicit goals of AI research orgs at face value (I.e., replacing all knowledge work) and assume it possible; why would they drag a few thousand knowledge workers along to the promised land when they can just shed them after their usefulness has worn out?
What does adding a few more suckers to the pile of tens of millions of other suckers do to those that get the real benefits? It’s not like after they achieve their goals, the people who helped them would have the ramp or resources to recreate the process.
That then begs the question of whether there's any promised land at all after all knowledge work is replaced.
If you've made tens of millions of people unemployed over the timeline of a few years, then you no longer have nearly the market to sell goods and services - including your AI - to.
Assuming these guys answer that with "let's make UBI" - which is a huge assumption given the way SV fetishizes those who "create value" and looks down upon those who don't - you now basically have tech feudalism. The remaining upper crust "generously" pays the rest of the population enough to not starve until they die.
You'll basically have an entire society in stasis, with no hope of improving their lot, being given the bare minimum to keep humans alive, if that. Well, no hope of peacefully improving their lot.
It won't be a promised land at that point.
From my read this line of thought was alluded to by GP's ironic "promised land". A promised land for whom? Not for the vast majority of humankind.
Comparisons to feudalism kind of sell the direness of the AGI vision short: in feudalism, the lord still depended on the peasants. The lord would be inconvenienced if he had them all killed. Not so with AGI! He won't even notice their gone.
Exactly why I’m confused with the “techno-feudalism” point as well. What are the serfs for if they’re useless (sans some physical labor maybe?). The AGI dream is for the smallest amount of humans needed to keep the system running, and if AI can do everything feasible, then that group is basically those that “own” the AI. Techno-feudalism, if even necessary, would be a fleeting blip in the end.
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