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There Is No Antimemetics Division (2018)

(qntm.org)
728 points squircle | 1 comments | 12 Aug 24 13:37 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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herculity275 ◴[12 Aug 24 14:31 UTC] No.41224826[source]▶
The author has also written a short horror story about simulated intelligence which I highly recommend: https://qntm.org/mmacevedo
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vessenes ◴[12 Aug 24 14:43 UTC] No.41224958[source]▶
Yess, that's a good one. It made me rethink my "sure I'd get scanned" plans, and put me in the "never allow my children to do that" camp. Extremely creepy.
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LeifCarrotson ◴[12 Aug 24 16:14 UTC] No.41226135[source]▶
I'm sure you realize it is fiction - one possible dystopian future among an infinite ocean of other futures.

You can just as easily write a sci-fi where the protagonist upload is the Siri/Alexa/Google equivalent personal assistant to most of humanity: More than just telling the smartphone to set a reminder for a wedding reception, it could literally share in their joy, experiencing the whole event distributed among every device in the audience, or more than just a voice trigger from some astronaut to take a picture, it could gaze in awe at the view, selectively melding back their experiences to the rest of the collective so there's no loss when an instance becomes damaged. The protagonist in such a story could have the richest, most complex life imaginable.

It is impactful, for sure, and worthy of consideration, but I don't think you should make decisions based on one scary story.

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1. mitthrowaway2 ◴[13 Aug 24 04:30 UTC] No.41232255[source]▶
Fiction can point out real possibilities that the reader had never considered before. When I imagined simulated brains, I only ever thought of those simulations as running for the benefit of the people being simulated, enjoying a video game world. It never occurred to me to consider the possibility of emulated laborers and "red motivation".

Now I have to weigh that possibility.