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by dbattaglia 261 days ago
It’s hard for me to imagine how the current superpowers (US,China, Russia) governments will be good stewards for AI, or really anything important. I’m not saying big tech is better but with the world heading more in the direction of autocracy and fascism it scares the hell out of me for these people to control the direction of AI.
1 comments
CaptainOfCoit 261 days ago
Can't answer about China nor Russia, as I'm not very familiar with how their governance works, but in countries with democracy, the government is supposed to be representative of the population (which may or may not actually be the case, it's the idea at least).

Contrast that with companies and corporations, where the basic idea is "Company makes money, our decisions should support that".

I sure know where I'd put my eggs on who could potentially run AGI best, considering the options. But I'm also a believer in democracy, and would ever prefer autocracy by a government than autocracy run by companies.

So assuming worst case (we're all be living under AGI that steers us into fascism and autocracy), I'd still rather that be under entities (supposedly) controlled by people, rather than entities under shareholders and CEOs.

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dbattaglia 261 days ago
> I'd still rather that be under entities (supposedly) controlled by people, rather than entities under shareholders and CEOs.

I think I felt that way most of my life until this current administration. I think I’d be more comfortable if AI nationalization (and scientific research in general) existed outside the control of the executive branch.

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CaptainOfCoit 260 days ago
> I think I felt that way most of my life until this current administration.

Yeah, I understand for people who live in "faux democracies" might see this different, but luckily most of the western world has proper checks and balances, especially compared to the country where you (unfortunately) seem to live.

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Ylpertnodi 261 days ago
>but in countries with democracy, the government is supposed to be representative of the population (which may or may not actually be the case, it's the idea at least).

That you used 'supposed [to be representative]', i can only think of Switzerland where this may be true, or at the least, fairly close.

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