[matt_kantor]

Yeah, don't let pesky discussions about ethics get in the way of building cool stuff.

I'm working on paving over the Amazon rainforest so I can build the world's largest roller coaster, but for some reason people keep trying to talk me out of it. Good thing I have this bucket of sand to put my head in so I can tune them out.

[hparadiz]

You assume that I think using language models is unethical. I do not agree that it is. Now what?

[matt_kantor]

The argument that you're ignoring is about whether they're ethical or not. Your priors may land you on either side of that argument, but ideally you're willing to have your mind changed if the other side makes a strong enough case.

But intentionally blinding yourself to the debate and plowing ahead anyway (which is how I interpreted your parent comment) sounds like willful ignorance.

[hparadiz]

I'm not ignoring anything. I've already moved on and I don't owe you further debate. No one does. If you don't like it we have a very thorough legal process you can follow.

[matt_kantor]

In case this part wasn't clear, I read "you guys have fun arguing" as "I'm ignoring the argument". I apologize if that wasn't what you meant.

[matt_kantor]

> I don't owe you further debate

You most definitely don't have to reply. I wasn't really expecting you to.

> I've already moved on

Imagine there's a certain kind of candy that you enjoy. Now imagine you learn that candy is manufactured by literal child slaves, its ingredients include the ground-up bones of an endangered species (which happens to be carcinogenic), and the company which makes it donates all of their profits to political causes that you strongly disagree with. Would you reconsider buying said candy in the future?

Are there any facts or perspectives that you could become aware of which might change your mind about the ethics surrounding large language models? Or is it an entirely closed case for you?

I personally try to keep an open mind about pretty much everything. It's not that I don't have opinions, but they're always subject to change.

To put my cards on the table regarding my current opinions of the current subject: I've historically been pretty anti-copyright; I believe that information wants to be free. However, I'm unsettled by the uneven application of existing intellectual property laws (if these laws are going to exist they should be enforced consistently). I'm undecided as to whether I think LLMs themselves should be considered derivative works of their training material, but I definitely think they're often used to produce derivative works (sometimes unintentionally/unknowingly). None of that means they aren't useful for building cool stuff or that the technology behind them isn't amazing.

[malfist]

"No u" isn't a valid counter argument. Arguer made no assumption about your view of the ethics of LLMs.

[jayd16]

That's what the sand bucket was about.

[nonethewiser]

That's fucking sick. How big is it going to be?

[matt_kantor]

Well the rainforest is about 6 million km² so that's what I have to work with. Assuming I can finish my other project of turning the Grand Canyon into a giant iron mine to produce enough steel, I want to use as much of that space as I can (but I'll need to set aside at least a million km² for parking lots, bathrooms, concessions, etc). I'll probably keep the main channel of the Amazon River in place for sewage and other waste disposal, but I can bridge the coaster over it so that's not a problem.