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Comment by jstanley | Hacker News Reader

> Every time I hear from Amodei or Altman that I could lose my job, I don’t think “oh, ok, then allow me pay you $20/month so that I can adapt to these uncertain times that have fallen upon my destiny by chance.” I think: “you, for fuck’s sake, you are doing this.” And I consider myself a pretty levelheaded guy, so imagine what not-so-levelheaded people think.

Conversely, The Loudest Alarm Is Probably False[0]. If the idea that you are a pretty levelheaded guy pops up so frequently, consider that it might be wrong. Especially if you are motivated to write blog posts about violence in response to technology you don't like. Maybe you're just not as levelheaded as you think and that could explain the whole thing?

[0] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/B2CfMNfay2P8f2yyc/the-loudes...

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Related, I've been surprised that we haven't had more violence against corporations and/or their leadership in the vein of Luigi Mangione.

E.g., suppose that 1,000,000 persons believe that a corporation's evil acts destroyed their happiness [0]. I would have guessed that at least 1 person in that crowd would be so unhinged by the experience that they'd make a viable attempt at vengeance.

But I'm just not hearing of that happening, at least not nearly to the extent I would have guessed. I'm curious where my thinking is wrong.

[0] E.g., big tobacco, the Sacklers with Oxycontin, insurance companies delaying lifesaving treatment, or the Bhopal disaster.

Litigation—the hope or fantasy to make a buck—soaks up a lot of the million-man animus I’d guess.

If that’s accurate, Luigi Mangione would be the exception that proves the rule. The “unwashed masses” generally want money more than they want to effect change in the world.

A lot of people spend mental energy fantasizing about getting rich off lawsuits. Like, a lot.

Those unhinged people might be busy in social media bubbles, fighting endless pointless battles (or simply doom scrolling) until they're too exhausted to do anything.

I also find it so weird to play this on the person of Altman or Amodei. These are basically fungible public faces. If they die this very moment AI progress wouldn't halt. I don't think it would even be impacted. If anything you should be mad at governments not legislating if you are anti AI.

The ship is going where it is because of the captain. If they die this very moment, the ship will not go back.

And yet,

Especially considering Amodei and Altman will be little more than footnotes in 50 years time. They seem important now but they are just the people that happened to be in charge at the moment AI happened to happen. There is more going on than a couple of billionaires taking your job away.

Hah. Yes, and especially as “you, for fuck’s sake, you are doing this” should be, upon reflection, entirely and trivially false. You could remove those two figureheads from the equation and absolutely nothing would change. If violence were ever the answer, I think you'd need to go back in time like the Terminator and whack some academics and Google researchers.

Plural you.

As in, "all of you".

Including its users.

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