KAP

This is a very important observation

It was pointed out to me that there are now "auto-humanizers" that bypass such tools. Oh well. The arms race continues.

Here's a rather elegant workaround to the problem of grading student work when students won't stop using AI. 1. Declare that a fixed number of points will be deducted for every sentence that a free "is it AI?" online checker believes is AI. 2. Mandate that the students use the AI checker as part of the writing process "so that they don't lose points". 3. Emphasize that it doesn't matter whether a sentence was written by AI or not, only what the tool thinks, because "we're trying to not write just like AI in this class". If the tool is even reasonably accurate, students know that they can't submit AI writing because they'll fail. And the teacher never needs to accuse anyone of cheating, individually.

Why don't people work hard when it's in their best interest to do so?

100% sure Carl Jung has better advice than any "self-help guru"

“Everything is your fault if you're any damn good.” —Ernest Hemingway

Hard to swallow pill It looks like a lot billionaires got their brains deep fried with the LLMs One implication of that being: your theory of mind of other people degenerates so quickly, you can no longer predict how they will react to any of your actions or statements

1. We want to build AI weapons. 2. We want you to pay us handsomely to make them. 3. We don’t want you to criticize us too much while we do it. 4. We’re the ones to do it because we are from the Bay Area. 5. By the way, AI scarier than nukes - be scared. So we can sell you AI. 6. Everybody should fight in at least one war. 7. Were we too tough on the Nazis? Just asking questions bro. 8. Let’s bring back treating people according to their labels. 9. Government sucks because we ask too many questions about people in government. 10. I wish there was a national culture. By the way, it’s stupid that people don’t believe in God. Sincerely, Your humble public servant company named after an evil object

Because we get asked a lot. The Technological Republic, in brief. 1. Silicon Valley owes a moral debt to the country that made its rise possible. The engineering elite of Silicon Valley has an affirmative obligation to participate in the defense of the nation. 2. We must rebel against the tyranny of the apps. Is the iPhone our greatest creative if not crowning achievement as a civilization? The object has changed our lives, but it may also now be limiting and constraining our sense of the possible. 3. Free email is not enough. The decadence of a culture or civilization, and indeed its ruling class, will be forgiven only if that culture is capable of delivering economic growth and security for the public. 4. The limits of soft power, of soaring rhetoric alone, have been exposed. The ability of free and democratic societies to prevail requires something more than moral appeal. It requires hard power, and hard power in this century will be built on software. 5. The question is not whether A.I. weapons will be built; it is who will build them and for what purpose. Our adversaries will not pause to indulge in theatrical debates about the merits of developing technologies with critical military and national security applications. They will proceed. 6. National service should be a universal duty. We should, as a society, seriously consider moving away from an all-volunteer force and only fight the next war if everyone shares in the risk and the cost. 7. If a U.S. Marine asks for a better rifle, we should build it; and the same goes for software. We should as a country be capable of continuing a debate about the appropriateness of military action abroad while remaining unflinching in our commitment to those we have asked to step into harm’s way. 8. Public servants need not be our priests. Any business that compensated its employees in the way that the federal government compensates public servants would struggle to survive. 9. We should show far more grace towards those who have subjected themselves to public life. The eradication of any space for forgiveness—a jettisoning of any tolerance for the complexities and contradictions of the human psyche—may leave us with a cast of characters at the helm we will grow to regret. 10. The psychologization of modern politics is leading us astray. Those who look to the political arena to nourish their soul and sense of self, who rely too heavily on their internal life finding expression in people they may never meet, will be left disappointed. 11. Our society has grown too eager to hasten, and is often gleeful at, the demise of its enemies. The vanquishing of an opponent is a moment to pause, not rejoice. 12. The atomic age is ending. One age of deterrence, the atomic age, is ending, and a new era of deterrence built on A.I. is set to begin. 13. No other country in the history of the world has advanced progressive values more than this one. The United States is far from perfect. But it is easy to forget how much more opportunity exists in this country for those who are not hereditary elites than in any other nation on the planet. 14. American power has made possible an extraordinarily long peace. Too many have forgotten or perhaps take for granted that nearly a century of some version of peace has prevailed in the world without a great power military conflict. At least three generations — billions of people and their children and now grandchildren — have never known a world war. 15. The postwar neutering of Germany and Japan must be undone. The defanging of Germany was an overcorrection for which Europe is now paying a heavy price. A similar and highly theatrical commitment to Japanese pacifism will, if maintained, also threaten to shift the balance of power in Asia. 16. We should applaud those who attempt to build where the market has failed to act. The culture almost snickers at Musk’s interest in grand narrative, as if billionaires ought to simply stay in their lane of enriching themselves . . . . Any curiosity or genuine interest in the value of what he has created is essentially dismissed, or perhaps lurks from beneath a thinly veiled scorn. 17. Silicon Valley must play a role in addressing violent crime. Many politicians across the United States have essentially shrugged when it comes to violent crime, abandoning any serious efforts to address the problem or take on any risk with their constituencies or donors in coming up with solutions and experiments in what should be a desperate bid to save lives. 18. The ruthless exposure of the private lives of public figures drives far too much talent away from government service. The public arena—and the shallow and petty assaults against those who dare to do something other than enrich themselves—has become so unforgiving that the republic is left with a significant roster of ineffectual, empty vessels whose ambition one would forgive if there were any genuine belief structure lurking within. 19. The caution in public life that we unwittingly encourage is corrosive. Those who say nothing wrong often say nothing much at all. 20. The pervasive intolerance of religious belief in certain circles must be resisted. The elite’s intolerance of religious belief is perhaps one of the most telling signs that its political project constitutes a less open intellectual movement than many within it would claim. 21. Some cultures have produced vital advances; others remain dysfunctional and regressive. All cultures are now equal. Criticism and value judgments are forbidden. Yet this new dogma glosses over the fact that certain cultures and indeed subcultures . . . have produced wonders. Others have proven middling, and worse, regressive and harmful. 22. We must resist the shallow temptation of a vacant and hollow pluralism. We, in America and more broadly the West, have for the past half century resisted defining national cultures in the name of inclusivity. But inclusion into what? Excerpts from the #1 New York Times Bestseller The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West, by Alexander C. Karp & Nicholas W. Zamiska techrepublicbook.com

@corsaren The russelian monist who is focusing his mental efforts on the combination problem and believes that the multiple drafts model is an important clue

types of guy in the AI consciousness debate: - guy who thinks ai can’t be conscious because it’s “just a stochastic parrot” - guy who thinks ai must be conscious because claude is a good boi - guy who hasn’t gotten over 4o - guy who unironically thinks everything is computer - guy who claims to have a more nuanced argument for computational functionalism, but it just boils down to everything is computer - dualist whose belief in dualism is downstream of their belief in god, yet tries to argue the inverse - guy who doesn’t understand the difference between cognition and p-consciousness - guy who asserts illusionism but has apparently wrestled with zero of the implications other than “reductive materialism wins again” - guy who says the hard problem is easy, but then proceeds to only answer the easy problem - guy who rejects ai consciousness because otherwise it might be wrong to abuse claude with death threats to make CRUD apps faster - guy who argues that consciousness is is the key to moral patienthood, but completely ignores that when discussing animal rights - eliezer yudkowsky being pedantic - guy being pedantic about eliezer yudkowsky’s pedantry - guy who rejects dualism because that would make mind uploading impossible and mean that he finally has to confront the inevitability of his own death - guy who thinks this argument is unresolvable so everyone should just shut up and accept his position (which obviously deserves the benefit of the doubt) - guy who would literally cut off his own hand if he thought there were a 1 in 10 trillion chance of creating ~infinite utility~ - guy who just thinks that redness is, like, super weird, man. can’t explain that! - guy with a rarely-updated philosophy blog despite not majoring in philosophy or even reading that many books, talking about how “the whole field is up its own ass” - academic philosopher who, for some reason, expects a higher caliber of discussion on x dot com the everything app - guy who thinks that vectors are literally emotions and bites the bullet that, yes, your thermostat does feel hot - panpsychist who took dmt once and contributes almost nothing to the conversation - guy who is literally a solipsist but is still really invested in convincing strangers on the internet that he’s right any that i missed?

@vanjajaja1 1

“Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking.” William Butler Yeats

Get rid of passengers and talkers. Reguide thrashers. Invest in killers.

The biggest lesson in life, which you only realize after experiencing it many times, is this: NEVER TRY TO SAVE ANYONE. Never. They are where they are for a reason, they suffer from their own philosophy, their own ego. You will ruin your life trying to save theirs, and it will bear no fruit but your own degradation.

Adulting is realizing; 1. You will die, and most people won’t care after a while. 2. People use you until you’re no longer useful. 3. Most people secretly want you to fail. 4. One day you’ll wish you started today. 5. Most people fake happiness while dying inside. 6. No one is coming to save you. 7. You’ll be judged no matter what you do. 8. Your health is your greatest wealth. 9. Happiness is temporary—discipline is permanent. 10. Success takes longer than you think. 11. No one respects weakness, even if they sympathize. 12. Complaining changes nothing. 13. Not everyone you love will love you back. 14. Money won’t solve all your problems—but it solves most. 15. Social media lies to you every day. 16. You’re replaceable at your job. 17. Life is unfair—get used to it. 18. One day, you’ll run out of days. 19. Regret hurts more than failure. 20. Nobody cares about your excuses. Work harder The earlier you understand this, the better and easier your life gets.

@georgebsocial @shadesofsilver youtube.com/shorts/6vQg8iR…

@georgebsocial @shadesofsilver Phantom Menace and DNF trailer?

I know indie game developers struggle for wish lists and views. One *core* thing I can suggest is...make better videos. This matters *so much*. Put up something asap if you want to but make editing and creating videos a new skill. Study other videos and small games. See what resonates with you. Replace your Steam page video often and upgrade it. On the odd change someone clicks your link you need a better chance to convert them. It's worth time learning a good video editing tool (something like Kdenlive is free) and techniques and skills. An attractive video is probably the only real chance you have to promote your game. This skill also pays off in the modern day TikTok level dev/marketing videos. You should absolutely prioritize this. It also means your game and assets need to be at a certain level but that's another hurdle. /random thought as I sit here stymied by a current dev effort myself

@georgebsocial I’m curious if you produced any of the trailers

should I go on the @whatever podcast? 🤔 help me decide! p.s. thanks for the invite @BrianAtlas!