World news and politics.

[Football us life]

Shove it with your both siderism

Imagine equating the 2!

No one equated their scale or long-term impact.

Climate change is a massive, multi-decade global problem. The Ceuta crossing was a sudden, concrete border event with immediate deaths, a diplomatic fight, some populist political consequences.

Pointing that out isn’t “both-siderism.” It’s refusing to treat one real issue as a reason to ignore another.

You can care about the climate without dismissing every short-term crisis as a distraction....

Silly...

 

[Son of Sam]

No one equated their scale or long-term impact.

Climate change is a massive, multi-decade global problem. The Ceuta crossing was a sudden, concrete border event with immediate deaths, a diplomatic fight, some populist political consequences.

Pointing that out isn’t “both-siderism.” It’s refusing to treat one real issue as a reason to ignore another.

You can care about the climate without dismissing every short-term crisis as a distraction....

Silly...

But do you notice Climate Change is NEVER mentioned here? When I do, the same idiots actually have the nerve to not only deny it, but ridicule the whole thing!!

How anyone can have a serious conversation with those people is beyond me.

I have in fact blocked them .... they deserve to be shunned by all of normal people.

 

[Football us life]

But do you notice Climate Change is NEVER mentioned here? When I do, the same idiots actually have the nerve to not only deny it, but ridicule the whole thing!!

How anyone can have a serious conversation with those people is beyond me.

I have in fact blocked them .... they deserve to be shunned by all of normal people.

Climate change is huge and probably the biggest single issue humanity faces over the next 50 years.

It deserves its own dedicated thread on here rather than being forced into a mere news thread....

It’s probably bigger than the topics entirety of the forum — and a subject that should hotly debated!

 

[tsf]

The funniest is how the billionaires have everyone arguing about migrants when they’re literally trying to create a new species through ai that not only will take all our jobs but likely end us (and they’re actually game planned extinction as a possibly a best case scenario)

 

[Football us life]

While advanced AI carries real risks like job displacement, concentration of power, and long-term control problems that serious people (including some of the same billionaires) openly discuss.

But treating human extinction as a “best-case scenario” is probably fringe, rather than mainstream planning.....

I mean, if human extinction were the goal, their wealth, status, and power would become worthless overnight.....

And I'd hazard a bet most of the serious AI-risk discussion among billionaires and their AI researchers is about avoiding extinction or loss of control, not welcoming it. The “extinction as best-case” claim is just hyperbole, not really an actual plan.

Come on now....I know most of the billionaire class are badies but really....

 

[tsf]

While advanced AI carries real risks like job displacement, concentration of power, and long-term control problems that serious people (including some of the same billionaires) openly discuss.

But treating human extinction as a “best-case scenario” is probably fringe, rather than mainstream planning.....

I mean, if human extinction were the goal, their wealth, status, and power would become worthless overnight.....

And I'd hazard a bet most of the serious AI-risk discussion among billionaires and their AI researchers is about avoiding extinction or loss of control, not welcoming it. The “extinction as best-case” claim is just hyperbole, not really an actual plan.

Come on now....I know most of the billionaire class are badies but really....

It;s not hyper-bole.

It's not a plan either, well, besides the part where they are just looking after their shareholder's interests and would likley do anything to achieve that

But extintion as best case it's a real possibility that's been looked at

Pretty much every CEO/Board members have at a minimum said it's very dangerous, some have publically said that it is most likley our downfall

This is just a youtube video but has solid sources on the discussion

 

[Football us life]

There's definitely serious, even existential risks in all this AI stuff....yes.

But “extinction as a best-case scenario” is still a distortion. I'll bet almost no one in those circles frames human extinction as desirable or acceptable. They talk about it as a catastrophic outcome to avoid, not a preferred result. Looking after shareholder interests is normal corporate behaviour but jumping from that to “they’d accept wiping out humanity” is a hell of a leap.

And I didn’t watch the YouTube video that sort of thing can turn into rabbit-hole territory pretty fast.....

 

[tsf]

There's definitely serious, even existential risks in all this AI stuff....yes.

But “extinction as a best-case scenario” is still a distortion. I'll bet almost no one in those circles frames human extinction as desirable or acceptable. They talk about it as a catastrophic outcome to avoid, not a preferred result. Looking after shareholder interests is normal corporate behaviour but jumping from that to “they’d accept wiping out humanity” is a hell of a leap.

And I didn’t watch the YouTube video that sort of thing can turn into rabbit-hole territory pretty fast.....

That video is not very conpsiracy or hyperbolic, and they explain a few ideas behind why some scientists and AI experts have said about what could be worse than extinction.

Google CEO said about extinction: "the underlying risk is actually pretty high."' and followed up by saying he is confident humanity will rally together to prevent it https://lexfridman.com/sundar-pichai/

So, basically, he is saying he is developing tools that will likely wipe us out, but he's hopeful we can stop his product from killing us

 

[Football us life]

That video is not very conpsiracy or hyperbolic, and they explain a few ideas behind why some scientists and AI experts have said about what could be worse than extinction.

Google CEO said about extinction: "the underlying risk is actually pretty high."' and followed up by saying he is confident humanity will rally together to prevent it https://lexfridman.com/sundar-pichai/

So, basically, he is saying he is developing tools that will likely wipe us out, but he's hopeful we can stop his product from killing us

That’s not the same as saying “I’m building something that will likely wipe us out and just hoping we can stop it.” He frames the risk as serious and the solution as collective action once the threat is widely recognised. Mind you, it’s still quite a striking admission from the CEO of one of the companies racing to build the technology....

But....Acknowledging a serious risk isn’t the same as planning for extinction or treating it as a best-case outcome. Pichai said the underlying risk is high and that he expects humanity to rally against it – not that he’s fine with the product killing everyone. There’s a difference between “this could go very badly and we need to take it seriously” and “the billionaires are engineering our end.” One is a legitimate concern. The other is a well let's call it a conspiracy leap.

 

[Monoethnic Social Club]

That’s not the same as saying “I’m building something that will likely wipe us out and just hoping we can stop it.” He frames the risk as serious and the solution as collective action once the threat is widely recognised. Mind you, it’s still quite a striking admission from the CEO of one of the companies racing to build the technology....

But....Acknowledging a serious risk isn’t the same as planning for extinction or treating it as a best-case outcome. Pichai said the underlying risk is high and that he expects humanity to rally against it – not that he’s fine with the product killing everyone. There’s a difference between “this could go very badly and we need to take it seriously” and “the billionaires are engineering our end.” One is a legitimate concern. The other is a well let's call it a conspiracy leap.

I suspect that, just like many other points in our shared history, the pursuit of profits and the race to market will override any caution. They may not wish to be wiped out but there is a certain degree of nihalism in the endless pursuit of capital.

The first whalers knew that one day the right whales will die out if they kept on hunting the way they did and rushed to kill as many as they could until the demand ran out, just like the OPEC guys frantically pump out barrel after barrel and "damn the torpedoes" and Son of Sam's fragile global ecosystem. ROI Uber Allez.

 

[Football us life]

I suspect that, just like many other points in our shared history, the pursuit of profits and the race to market will override any caution. They may not wish to be wiped out but there is a certain degree of nihalism in the endless pursuit of capital.

The first whalers knew that one day the right whales will die out if they kept on hunting the way they did and rushed to kill as many as they could until the demand ran out, just like the OPEC guys frantically pump out barrel after barrel and "damn the torpedoes" and Son of Sam's fragile global ecosystem. ROI Uber Allez.

Well your point about incentives is the strongest part of the argument.....


The race-to-market dynamic is real. These big tech companies and investors are under intense pressure to ship faster, capture market share, and show returns.

That pressure can (and often does) push safety and long-term risk down the priority list. History is full of examples where short-term profit overrode known limits — commercial whaling is a fair comparison in that sense.

Where it gets weaker is the leap to nihilism or active indifference to extinction. Most of the people building frontier AI are not betting on human extinction as an acceptable outcome. They’re betting they can stay ahead of the risks, or that the benefits will justify the gamble, or that regulation and collective action will eventually catch up. That can still be reckless. It doesn’t require assuming they secretly want the species gone.

The core tension is real of course....

A powerful technology + competitive incentives + incomplete understanding of the downside. That’s worth taking seriously. But I still think that dressing it up as deliberate "extinction planning" or maybe pure "nihilism" just makes the argument easier to dismiss.

The whaling and oil analogies do work really well for over-exploitation of a known resource.

They work less well for a technology whose catastrophic failure modes are still debated, poorly understood, and not yet proven. Treating every aggressive commercial push as evidence of nihilistic intent turns a serious governance and incentives problem into a morality play. That’s why a lot of people like me really don’t buy it.

 

[Monoethnic Social Club]

Well your point about incentives is the strongest part of the argument.....


The race-to-market dynamic is real. These big tech companies and investors are under intense pressure to ship faster, capture market share, and show returns.

That pressure can (and often does) push safety and long-term risk down the priority list. History is full of examples where short-term profit overrode known limits — commercial whaling is a fair comparison in that sense.

Where it gets weaker is the leap to nihilism or active indifference to extinction. Most of the people building frontier AI are not betting on human extinction as an acceptable outcome. They’re betting they can stay ahead of the risks, or that the benefits will justify the gamble, or that regulation and collective action will eventually catch up. That can still be reckless. It doesn’t require assuming they secretly want the species gone.

The core tension is real of course....

A powerful technology + competitive incentives + incomplete understanding of the downside. That’s worth taking seriously. But I still think that dressing it up as deliberate "extinction planning" or maybe pure "nihilism" just makes the argument easier to dismiss.

The whaling and oil analogies do work really well for over-exploitation of a known resource.

They work less well for a technology whose catastrophic failure modes are still debated, poorly understood, and not yet proven. Treating every aggressive commercial push as evidence of nihilistic intent turns a serious governance and incentives problem into a morality play. That’s why a lot of people like me really don’t buy it.

I certainly pray you are right, for the sake of my children's future children if nothing else.

 

[Football us life]

I certainly pray you are right, for the sake of my children's future children if nothing else.

That’s a fair and human response. Hoping the more cautious reading is the correct one is the right instinct when the stakes are this high.

 

[Monoethnic Social Club]

That’s a fair and human response. Hoping the more cautious reading is the correct one is the right instinct when the stakes are this high.

Oh, Im not generally an " the sky is falling" sort of person, nor do I believe that corporate greed = some sort of primordial inherent EVIL. I too like the finer things in life and a little nest egg for the future... we aren't savages.

Something about the concept that "a great person plants trees in whose shade he knows he will never sit" always resonated with me. I just feel like with the endless bounds and leaps of tech chasing profit, chasing tech, chasing profit, we are, as a species, forgetting to plant anything and hoping that an umbrella we bought off Amazon is going to save us.

 

[Football us life]

Oh, Im not generally an " the sky is falling" sort of person, nor do I believe that corporate greed = some sort of primordial inherent EVIL. I too like the finer things in life and a little nest egg for the future... we aren't savages.

Something about the concept that "a great person plants trees in whose shade he knows he will never sit" always resonated with me. I just feel like with the endless bounds and leaps of tech chasing profit, chasing tech, chasing profit, we are, as a species, forgetting to plant anything and hoping that an umbrella we bought off Amazon is going to save us.

I sometimes think that pinning every problem on billionaires is a straw-man approach to life. It turns complicated incentive and technology problems into a simple morality play where a handful of rich people are the root of all evil.

That feels satisfying, but it doesn’t actually explain much and it usually distracts from the harder work of looking at systems, trade-offs, and real trade-offs.

About 25 years ago there was a book published called 'Two Hundred Pharaohs, Five Billion Slaves'....

It's was a neo-Marxist critique of modern capitalism. The central idea was that the global economy functions like a vast set of unstable pyramid schemes that mainly benefit a tiny handful of “pharaohs” (the ultra-wealthy) while the rest of humanity effectively lives as “slaves” in a system of endless work, consumption, and wasted technological potential. It mixes analysis of class, leisure, shopping culture and urban life with a post-utopian attempt to sketch what a more egalitarian society could and should look like.

Written long before the Tech- Bro's came along but it’s very much in the tradition of blaming systemic problems on a small elite at the top.

As a book it did contain a handful of genuine insights but buried among considerable exaggeration and ideological excess.

Although I was a rusted on "lefty"in those days so i hung off it's every word!!

When you’re deep in an ideology, books, articles and YouTube "vidz" that confirm the worldview can feel revelatory. Distance usually makes the overreach more obvious.

 

[Monoethnic Social Club]

I sometimes think that pinning every problem on billionaires is a straw-man approach to life. It turns complicated incentive and technology problems into a simple morality play where a handful of rich people are the root of all evil.

That feels satisfying, but it doesn’t actually explain much and it usually distracts from the harder work of looking at systems, trade-offs, and real trade-offs.

About 25 years ago there was a book published called 'Two Hundred Pharaohs, Five Billion Slaves'....

It's was a neo-Marxist critique of modern capitalism. The central idea was that the global economy functions like a vast set of unstable pyramid schemes that mainly benefit a tiny handful of “pharaohs” (the ultra-wealthy) while the rest of humanity effectively lives as “slaves” in a system of endless work, consumption, and wasted technological potential. It mixes analysis of class, leisure, shopping culture and urban life with a post-utopian attempt to sketch what a more egalitarian society could and should look like.

Written long before the Tech- Bro's came along but it’s very much in the tradition of blaming systemic problems on a small elite at the top.

As a book it did contain a handful of genuine insights but buried among considerable exaggeration and ideological excess.

Although I was a rusted on "lefty"in those days so i hung off it's every word!!

When you’re deep in an ideology, books, articles and YouTube "vidz" that confirm the worldview can feel revelatory. Distance usually makes the overreach more obvious.

Or as the kiddies say... "touch grass" gottcha hahahahahha

 

[Football us life]

Or as the kiddies say... "touch grass" gottcha hahahahahha

Haha, classic. Sometimes the simplest advice is the best one....

 

[tsf]

I certainly pray you are right, for the sake of my children's future children if nothing else.

That’s all we have. Because they are building something that will most likely destroy us.

The good news is the return on shares is going to be awesome in the next five years. But cash out before we all die.

 

[Monoethnic Social Club]

That’s all we have. Because they are building something that will most likely destroy us.

The good news is the return on shares is going to be awesome in the next five years. But cash out before we all die.

As long as I see Hellas win the Australia Cup first, so let it be written, so let it be done....

 

[tsf]

It’s funny that we are putting our faith in people that recognise that it’s a distinct possibility they will kill us all.

None of them have at all tried to reign it in or made any promises about safety. In fact, they are fighting for less regulation.

What’s the movie ‘don’t look up’. Yep.