Unanticipated consequences
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20-something Hubris
A young prodigy in AI development named Alexandr Wang got a sack of cash from world-class sociopath Zuckerberg to build Facebook’s new AI program “Muse.” Now [Twitter-link warning:] he’s attempted to justify his work, in the most hubristic, egotistical way imaginable. Of course he did so on Twitter. Katie Notopoulos saw through it immediately as… Continue reading
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You can’t be a leader without followers
We pay far too much attention to “leaders.” Partly because we’re very susceptible to a halo effect where we reflexively ascribe general authority to someone who has achieved some sort of success (for any reason) in one specific pursuit. Elon Musk, for example, is very successful at accumulating wealth. That doesn’t mean he knows anything… Continue reading
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Thought Experiment
Let’s say you’ve come up with a genuinely clever new gizmo that can do lots of things fairly well, and sparks people’s imaginations because it looks a lot like the imaginary gizmos from super-popular movies and TV shows, especially scary ones. You and your friends start companies and manage to raise insane amounts of money… Continue reading
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Can any good come of any of it?
Today is a somber date; twenty-five years since the 9/11…tragedy? Atrocity? Disaster? It’s hard to find the right word, and maybe there isn’t one. It was one of those events that will be marked in history for a very long time. With the perspective of those years since, did anybody learn anything? Was it nothing… Continue reading
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What is it about Florida?
The latest irritating, disappointing, and astonishing story coming out of Florida is about Vinita Prabhakar and Fred Hawkins. And others. Prabhakar is a professor of literature who has taught for years at “small, private liberal arts schools in Upstate New York.” By all reports, she’s quite good at it. She moved to Florida to be… Continue reading
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The corporate overlords and the long despair
Hello. Thank you for calling our support line. Please be aware our options have changed. Press one to continue in English. Pulse dos para español. tlhInganvaD Tap wej. If you know your party’s extension, enter it now. If you don’t know your party’s extension, please say or enter “I have no friends.” If you would… Continue reading
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How much is that doggie in the window?
How Much is That Doggie in the Window? was a hit song back in 1953. It was partly about window shopping, which was a thing back in the days of “departments stores” located on city streets. They typically had large plate-glass windows with elaborate displays of all their most desirable goods. Macys in New York… Continue reading
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Sometimes it’s not an improvement
Digital technology, and indeed technology in general, seems like it moves in cycles of usability and utility. I’m not sure whether the cycles apply equally to every user, or if it depends on the features you, as a specific user, find most helpful. Printers connected to personal computers are one example. Long ago it could… Continue reading
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But all my friends say I should…
Nikhil Suresh wrote a thought-provoking essay that introduced a term to me (I don’t think it’s a brand-new term) that really resonates: AI mania. Suresh is a director at a software engineering consulting firm. I think they’re pretty well connected, such that he’s often in conversation with top executives and directors at major companies we’ve… Continue reading
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It’s a (the) process
Sigmund Freud observed that humanity has suffered three great “humiliations.” Galileo found that we are not the center of the universe, Darwin found that we are not the culmination of nature, and he himself (Freud) found that we are not in control of our own minds. Ayad Akhtar recently made the point in The Yale… Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer (among other things) located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. No surprise, she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my newsletter, Artisanal Scribbles, where I’m grappling with writing, authentic human authorship, integrity, and the craft of beauty in the AI age. You can also find some of my old software projects at GitHub. Nothing very impressive. I mostly wrote tiny utilities in Python and shell scripts. I’m mostly retired from coding nowadays.
I find myself suddenly de-corporatized (their choice, not mine). To help keep the lights on, buy me a coffee!
Recent Posts
- I’d rather have a taco
- 20-something Hubris
- You can’t be a leader without followers
- Candy Trees and Handkerchiefs
- Reliability: just a movie plot now?
Categories
Artificial Intelligence
Chocolatiana
Essays
History, sort of
Immorality
Incompetence
Quotations
Resistance
Stories
Tales from the Forest
Technicalities
Tragedy
Unanticipated Consequences