another_poster

But if Amazon were harmed, wouldn’t they sue their customers first because they perpetrated the purported crime? This seems like going after the gun manufacturer for the claimed wrong that was actually committed by their customers.

There actually were religions founded around the philosophers. The mathematikoi were a cult of followers of Pythagoras that believed everything was Number, and they believed they could purify their souls by learning theorems. And the Neoplatonists founded a religious school based on the works of Plato (with significant elaboration by Plotinus). Christianity ultimately incorporated many Neoplatonic beliefs, along with Stoic beliefs that stemmed from Heraclitus, who argued everything was Logos, which has one translation as Word, which is an opening statement in the Bible’s book of John. Aristotle’s works also went on to have a transformative impact on Judaism, Christianity, and Islam through Maimonides, Aquinas, and Averroes, who all interpreted his works.

I agree it’s still interesting that major religions were not founded at the time of the early philosophers — maybe it’s because religion as we conceive of it today depends on a type of bureaucracy that wasn’t achievable in the classical era?

Is the opposite ever true — do some people publicly support truth, wisdom, and virtue to signify group membership?

I used to have similar concerns as you — how can anyone truly know what other people are like? Unless we’re doing research with the scientific method, we can only speculate unscientifically, right? Without science, what we say is just our belief, not established fact.

But how do you explain people who intuitively understand things? Mathematicians, for example, intuitively understand math. Psychologists and experienced authors intuitively understand people. We gain intuition through education and experience, which in turn improve our understanding and sensitivity towards the truth. Expert mathematicians, for example, _can_ have a good sense of whether a theorem is true before they prove it. And in general, people who possess scientific knowledge can intuitively know things.

I do agree with your intent, though — we need to possess humility about the accuracy of our beliefs. The author can’t factually know what other people feel and think without asking them.

But we also owe some deference to wisdom. Being wise is like being an expert darts players: you’re better able to throw darts into the bulls-eye than most people. If we develop a wisdom worth trusting, we should trust it.

SoftBank sounds familiar… weren’t they a major investor in WeWork? With such poor investing acumen, why haven’t they gone bankrupt yet? Perhaps the $40 billion raised by OpenAI can only be spent on services from SoftBank’s other investments? Do investors ever restrict how their investments are spent?

Is “multimodal reasoning” as big a deal as it sounds? Does this technique mean LLMs can generate chains of thought that map to other modalities, such as sound and images?

Fair point. There’s a real difference in attitude between speculation and saving. Most people buy stocks to save for retirement, not to speculate that they’ll have enough money for retirement.

But most people aren’t investors, either. Typical people buy stock for their returns, not for their productive capacity. My point is that’s speculation.

Most people have a speculator’s mindset. They would be happy to make a windfall on the market. For example, who wouldn’t be happy to own a plot in downtown Detroit before an economic boom raised land prices? Or stock in a startup before an established company announced they would acquire it?

Although someone who puts money in the stock market for retirement may intend to save money, since a 401k seems like just any another asset, but it’s quite different from other assets: Bank accounts fund lending to companies for productive investments. Homes provide a residence. Bonds provide money to countries and companies for investment. But when individuals put money in the stock market, it’s because they hope the asset will appreciate.

Most people have a gambler’s mindset about the stock market:

> […G]ambling in financial markets often goes undetected […] because individuals confuse their actions [i.e., speculating] with investing.

The typical person speculates on the market — buying low during their working years, and hopefully selling high during their retired years.

To play devil’s advocate, the US seems to have given up leadership in key areas, so it seems natural for China to play a bigger role in the world.

(1) Industry. Why did the US government aggressively pursue a “post-industrial” economy? China was essentially given the keys to the world’s industries by US leaders in politics and businesses. It’s natural for China, as an industrial leader, to have a bigger role in the world.

(2) Key technologies. Why did the US pursue a laissez-faire approach to high-value technologies, such as solar and battery-powered vehicles? “Let things happen” is an unrealistic economic policy for areas of the market that are winner-takes-all. It’s natural for China, as a leader in key technologies, to have a bigger world stage.

(3) Public education. Why has the US allowed high-quality, regional newspapers to implode? The public is being whipped up to ever greater frenzies by increasingly poor media, which has led to increasingly low-quality leaders, for example, in the Republican Party. It’s natural for countries with more well-informed governments, such as China, to have a larger role in the world.

Interesting, could a physical system exploit differences in the rate of expansion?

What happens to an object as it moves from a high rate-of-expansion region to a low rate-of-expansion region?

Trust involves multiple factors, e.g.,

• Character. Is the public trusting? Are they anxious?

• Framing. Is the institution described compassionately, for example, as a national champion or underdog? Or is it described as a villain?

• Sectarianism. Are there motivated partisans who want to disparage the institution?

• Evidence. What particular evidence exists for unethical behavior?

• Ethics. What unethical behaviors have the institution done?

I am skeptical that institutions have become less ethical today compared to the past (e.g., today we would be appalled if a European country waged war against another state to sell narcotics, but Britain literally did that 150 years ago), so I have a hunch that other factors are the primary drivers for declining trust.

You’re right—both directions are true. But my point is that only the forward (or reverse) direction of a fact may be worth knowing.

We frequently only posses recall for one direction of a fact. Why? One direction may be important (what is Tom Cruise’s favorite color?), but the other direction may not (whose favorite color is green?).

So if we inquire into whether LLMs actually possess intelligence, their asymmetric knowledge seems similar to human knowledge and hence seems consistent with intelligence, rather than problematic.

The author is drawing the wrong the conclusion-knowledge relationships can be asymmetric.

The forward relationship of a fact (What is Tom Cruise’s favorite color? Green) may be worth knowing, but the reverse relationship (Who’s favorite color is green? A billion people, including Tom Cruise) may not be worth knowing.

A good analogy is ice. We all use “freezer-grown crystalline water,” but prior to the invention of refrigeration, we harvested natural ice from frozen lakes and stored them in ice houses for use throughout the summer.

Sure, there’s some romance from hand-harvested ice, but you can’t beat the price and purity of ice from a freezer.