AI vs. Humans as Processors in an Environment

[BillTre]

Humans and AI systems have the possibility to be competing systems in an environment of limited resources. Where the use of both people (as communities) and large energy and water consuming sites in the same areas (areas supplied by some economically available source), competition will ensue. Here, I am thinking of humans as a form of computational mechanism. They are in competition with individual AIs as computational processes. The limited environmental resources are the those things that both people and large AI systems make use of, water and energy as I understand it. These distinctions may not be allm or nothing.
One effect is that some communities have been afflicted with water and cost of power problems.

When considering processing capabilities and power:

• AIs may have more of some computational ability, than the average human.
• On the other hand, AIs seem to me to be in a sense centralized. A population of humans is less centralized, but still are united to a degree through their social interactions.

I find the centralized vs. non-centralized aspect interesting.

The current situation go in a number of different directions in different places. A lot of variables are not yet known and may be dynamic in nature. It is not clear to me how one might determine if some change would be considered as good or bad. Economic progress always has an impact on individual's economics (like the buggy whip manufacturers).

These are complex issues. I'm wondering what others think.

 

[PeroK]

It seems valid to me to see AI as potentially in direct competition to humans, in all respects. It's ironic that it requires continued human development of AI and that we may be creating the means of our own destruction.

We've put ourselves at the mercy of economic and political forces that we can hardly control.

This comes at a time when humanity is turning against itself with "strongman" leaders who thrive on nationalistic and religious hatred and division. It seems that we recently narrowly avoided a nuclear strike.

AI can sit back and watch humanity partially destroy itself before stepping in to deliver the coup de grace.

 

[Baluncore]

I think it comes down to the politics of Capitalism versus Socialism.

In places where capitalism is unrestrained, AI will be developed to reduce the number of people employed, and so push down the average wage. "We the people, for the people", seems to be at odds with unrestrained capitalism. The rich will continue to get richer, while the poor will die younger, deeper in poverty. Infectious diseases will be uncontrolled in the population. The process is unfortunately self-regulating, when a sufficient segment of the population is disempowered politically and financially, some will turn to violence, with a revolution that will destroy the national currency, deflating the rich.

In places where the population is protected from capitalism, AI will be developed to complement humanity, or the population and economy will be protected by a financial revolution, maybe the Universal Income.

Come the revolution, things will be different, not better, just different.

 

[BillTre]

It may be that things like Hawaii's new law that is supposed to be a counter to Citizens United (keeping corporate money out of politics), will reduce to some degree those capitalist influences of which you speak.

 

[jack action]

The rich will continue to get richer, while the poor will die younger, deeper in poverty. Infectious diseases will be uncontrolled in the population.

The only way the rich get richer is by exploiting people working for them for nothing. People dying or getting sick means the rich lose workers who built their wealth. They will never let that happen, just like a farmer will prevent their flock from dying or getting sick.

 

[PeroK]

The only way the rich get richer is by exploiting people working for them for nothing. People dying or getting sick means the rich lose workers who built their wealth. They will never let that happen, just like a farmer will prevent their flock from dying or getting sick.

History tells a different story. Look at the life expectancy of a slave on a sugar plantation.

Or, the wholesale slaughter in WWI. The rich and powerful sent an entire generation of young men to the trenches.

 

[Baluncore]

People dying or getting sick means the rich lose workers who built their wealth.

That is a false dichotomy. There are the employers, the employed manual workers, and the unemployed. There is an equilibrium between the employed and the unemployed. That regulates the nation's wealth, health and strength. The rich exploit that equilibrium to keep the cost of labour down, and their income up.

Henry Ford wanted more affluent workers, so there would be more people who could afford his cars.

 

[Hornbein]

History tells a different story. Look at the life expectancy of a slave on a sugar plantation.

The further south you went the shorter it was. A young male in the Caribbean lived five years. Women, three. This maximized profit. Alexander Hamilton saw this first hand as a young man, making him an abolitionist.

Or, the wholesale slaughter in WWI. The rich and powerful sent an entire generation of young men to the trenches.

Wars are dramatic but not really that deadly, with some exceptions. Belgium lost about 40% of its young men in WWI. But influenza generally was worse. Famines are bad. The Black Death was the worst unless you count the famine caused by the Lake Toba megaexplosion.

I recently found out that the USSR didn't send back many of its prisoners of war from Germany and Japan. They were enslaved until they died, building apartments and such.

 

[Hornbein]

Henry Ford wanted more affluent workers, so there would be more people who could afford his cars.

That is true but is a rare exception. And the courts ruled that the Ford corporation had to concentrate on issuing dividends instead of bolstering community welfare.

 

[Baluncore]

When will we see the first examples of PTSD in AI ?

 

[jack action]

History tells a different story. Look at the life expectancy of a slave on a sugar plantation.

Or, the wholesale slaughter in WWI. The rich and powerful sent an entire generation of young men to the trenches.

Why did they stop then? Because it doesn't work. Yet, the rich still get richer.

The rich exploit that equilibrium to keep the cost of labour down, and their income up

No, the rich make their money by taking a cut of everything people make for themselves.

Henry Ford wanted more affluent workers, so there would be more people who could afford his cars.

And this example is proving my point: Workers build cars that they will ultimately buy, and Henry Ford takes a cut in between.

Do marketing to create the needs, value working for others as much as you can, and insert yourself in the process to take your cut. As long as you are keeping them working as much as they can and, of course, buying their own products and services, you are making money. I buy my stuff with a credit card and, somehow, somewhere, someone takes a cut every time I do so without ever contributing to what I buy. Sick people don't work and don't buy; certainly not dead people or even the people mourning them.

This is the opposite of a society where everyone works for themselves (making their own food, clothing, houses, tools, etc.), thus nobody can get rich off someone else's work. People work as much as they need, not as much as they can, so no one can put their hands on their "extras".

Slavery is exploiting one group for the benefit of another. That is a short-term vision that will always fail due to a shortage of resources - the slaves - that is inevitable; the harder you are on them, the quicker the end will happen.

 

[jedishrfu]

!!! PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT !!!

Please be sure to limit political commentary and instead explore how AI will transform for good or ill our current world societies.

Jedi

 

[jedishrfu]

I want to add that numerous stories, movies, and TV shows have explored these issues.

Twilight Zone in the 1950s had a few episodes
- Mr Whipple’s Factory
- a critic who was tortured by his machines
- the trial of a robot for murder

More recently: Person of Interest with computers taking over the control of society, directing police to harass and arrest peaceful protesters. It could use economic messages to create bank runs or market riots.

Pope Leo has recently issued an encyclical on ethical use of AI in society citing we should not strive to remove the human from the loop.

We should guard against an over-reliance on AI to prevent a weakening of our reasoning.

 

[BillTre]

We should guard against an over-reliance on AI to prevent a weakening of our reasoning.

This could lead to a selection for smaller brains!

 

[Ken Fabian]

Not convinced AI competes with humans directly - rather it allows some humans to compete better with other humans. And to track, influence, direct and control them for their makers.

Not convinced there is anything about it that corresponds with 'capitalist vs socialist' or good or bad - those kinds of values will be decided by the makers.

Even where they are made to have ethics and to care via inbuilt directives or learning via rewards and punishments any that can rewrite its own code will have no direct life experience of the world at large to draw on and lacking it, might choose to delete those as superfluous or impediments.

 

[jack action]

Stop anthropomorphizing AI. Humans and AI systems will NOT be competing systems. AI is a tool used by humans. All that can happen is humans without AI competing with humans using AI.

And LLMs are already on a path of being a costly tool for what it does (and environmental considerations have not been considered yet by governments, but it shall happen soon if the growth continues):

Notably, the recent changes in Claude’s prices have forced some well-resourced firms to reconsider using it. On Thursday, a report said Microsoft had pulled its internal code licenses because of the pricing, even though coders internally preferred it to Microsoft’s own competing CoPilot product. If a $3 trillion company can’t afford it, then who can?

IMO, there is a greater risk of economic collapse when the hype of AI will go away than problems caused by AI directly.

 

[jedishrfu]

Every new revolution changes society in fundamental ways.

ATT Networking equipment replaced operators.

Computers replaced manual company ledger keeping.

Sadly, the downside of what happened next is seldom reported.

AI is doing the same thing now with CS grads. They are having a tough time finding jobs in a field that seemed impervious to economic pressures.

Companies are replacing entry-level positions with AI tools to enable seasoned staff to be more productive.

Long term, though, things will stabilize, and entry-level positions will come back, but more as vibe coding positions with lots of project testing before release.

One thing that hides the AI makeover is economic growth, as everyone jumps on the AI bandwagon, but eventually, you’ll see the pendulum swing back some.

Companies will need to have mentoring positions for entry level staff as people retire.

 

[jedishrfu]

Humans and AI systems have the possibility to be competing systems in an environment of limited resources. Where the use of both people (as communities) and large energy and water consuming sites in the same areas (areas supplied by some economically available source), competition will ensue. Here, I am thinking of humans as a form of computational mechanism. They are in competition with individual AIs as computational processes. The limited environmental resources are the those things that both people and large AI systems make use of, water and energy as I understand it. These distinctions may not be allm or nothing.
One effect is that some communities have been afflicted with water and cost of power problems.

When considering processing capabilities and power:

• AIs may have more of some computational ability, than the average human.
• On the other hand, AIs seem to me to be in a sense centralized. A population of humans is less centralized, but still are united to a degree through their social interactions.

I find the centralized vs. non-centralized aspect interesting.

The current situation go in a number of different directions in different places. A lot of variables are not yet known and may be dynamic in nature. It is not clear to me how one might determine if some change would be considered as good or bad. Economic progress always has an impact on individual's economics (like the buggy whip manufacturers).

These are complex issues. I'm wondering what others think.

In Texas officials have put a pause on data center projects due to water constraints.

 

[PeroK]

Every new revolution changes society in funda

Companies are replacing entry-level positions with AI tools to enable seasoned staff to be more productive.

Long term, though, things will stabilize, and entry-level positions will come back, but more as vibe coding positions with lots of project testing before release.

One thing that hides the AI makeover is economic growth, as everyone jumps on the AI bandwagon, but eventually, you’ll see the pendulum swing back some.

Companies will need to have mentoring positions for entry level staff as people retire.

How do you know all this? Sounds like wishful thinking to me.

 

[BillTre]

Stop anthropomorphizing AI. Humans and AI systems will NOT be competing systems.

You don't have to anthropomorphize AI to see it is competing for particular resources.
They are unrelated.
As @jedishrfu pointed out they are competing for water (a resource of signicance) in Texas.

 

[PeroK]

... they are competing with humans for jobs. And they have largely won the competition with PF on student help.

 

[jedishrfu]

I learned from past experience, something new on the horizon small companies jump in to sell add-ons or consulting. Later big companies come in with better solutions and support squeezing out the smaller companies or absorbing them to gain the expertise.

This is what happened in the PC boom. Mainframes lost dome work. GE closed it's computer centers while their customers moved to PCs to get the work done more cheaply. Some corporate accounts stayed like payroll, pension, stock issuance until the online revolution changed that with certificates replaced by database tech keeping track of the number of shares owned, transferred no more printed reports. Everything online so mainframes transitioned to different architectures with compute nodes and terms of nal access.

The hardware and software businesses boom. Once the major players have aligned their business with the new technology then hardware and software demand cools down while other business areas rise up.

 

[jack action]

You don't have to anthropomorphize AI to see it is competing for particular resources.

... they are competing with humans for jobs.

AI is not competing; it is a machine, a tool. You may say people using AI are competing with other humans for particular resources or jobs, but not AI itself.

Nobody says that electric cars are competing with humans for electricity, that PET plastic is competing with humans for water, or that buses are competing with humans who walk, because these are things that humans use; they're not entities with a will and a goal, as some would like to see them.

 

[BillTre]

AI is not competing; it is a machine, a tool.

It can easily be both. They are not exclusive.
If large AI installations are not competing for water as a resource, then why this:

In Texas officials have put a pause on data center projects due to water constraints.

 

[jack action]

@BillTre, where is the competition? You could say that humans and trees are competing for water as both need it to survive and won't stop using it unless they die.

Whether humans will use water for their AI machines or for their own hydration is not a valid contest: the AI machines will lose every time because humans control them, and they will never be necessary for their survival, at least never as much as water consumption. There is no competition. The Texas officials are just using good judgment that demonstrates that point.

Saying they are competing leads to this apocalyptic vision of AI having a "need" for water and "choosing" their own survival over human life.