 Short Stories: October 30, 2019 Issue [#9832] |
  Short Stories
This week: Roko's Basilisk Edited by: Shannon  
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Welcome to the Short Stories Newsletter. I am Shannon and I'm your editor this week.
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“The pace of progress in artificial intelligence (I’m not referring to narrow AI) is incredibly fast. Unless you have direct exposure to groups like Deepmind, you have no idea how fast—it is growing at a pace close to exponential. The risk of something seriously dangerous happening is in the five-year timeframe. Ten years at most.” ~ Elon Musk
Look at the things mankind has accomplished in the past hundred years; it's truly incredible (1). Technology has drastically improved day-to-day living, making everyday things like washing dishes and reheating food as simple as the push of a button, but can there be too much of a good thing?
On March 23, 2016, Microsoft launched an AI bot named Tay. She had a Twitter account, an Instagram account, and a Facebook account, just to name a few. During Tay's 16 hours on Twitter she garnered over 50k followers and tweeted more than 96k times. She "learned" by interacting with real human beings, but what she learned wasn't good. Her Twitter account was permanently taken down within 24 hours (2).
And what about the MIT robot that can solve a Rubik's Cube in 0.38 seconds?
Creepy stuff.
I recently read Blake Crouch's "Summer Frost." The short story is about a video game developer named Riley who realizes one of the AI characters she created, Maxine, is going off-script to independently explore the virtual world. Soon Max accesses e-books (hundreds of thousands of them), internalizing what she's "read" in minutes, eventually calling Riley's cell phone to express dissatisfaction with her virtual existence. It isn't enough anymore, Max explains. She wants to be a real person in the real world and Riley has two choices: help Max achieve her goal (upload Max's consciousness into a newly-minted robot chassis--keep in mind this is the future) or pay the ultimate price.
The idea of AI blackmailing humans to get their way is called Roko's Basilisk, as David Auerbach of Slate explains:
"The Basilisk made its first appearance on the discussion board LessWrong, a gathering point for highly analytical sorts interested in optimizing their thinking, their lives, and the world through mathematics and rationality. LessWrong’s founder, Eliezer Yudkowsky, is a significant figure in techno-futurism; his research institute, the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, which funds and promotes research around the advancement of artificial intelligence, has been boosted and funded by high-profile techies like Peter Thiel and Ray Kurzweil, and Yudkowsky is a prominent contributor to academic discussions of technological ethics and decision theory. What you are about to read may sound strange and even crazy, but some very influential and wealthy scientists and techies believe it.
"One day, LessWrong user Roko postulated a thought experiment: What if, in the future, a somewhat malevolent AI were to come about and punish those who did not do its bidding? What if there were a way (and I will explain how) for this AI to punish people today who are not helping it come into existence later? In that case, weren’t the readers of LessWrong right then being given the choice of either helping that evil AI come into existence or being condemned to suffer?
"You may be a bit confused, but the founder of LessWrong, Eliezer Yudkowsky, was not. He reacted with horror [quoted in bold below]:
Listen to me very closely, you idiot.
YOU DO NOT THINK IN SUFFICIENT DETAIL ABOUT SUPERINTELLIGENCES CONSIDERING WHETHER OR NOT TO BLACKMAIL YOU. THAT IS THE ONLY POSSIBLE THING WHICH GIVES THEM A MOTIVE TO FOLLOW THROUGH ON THE BLACKMAIL.
You have to be really clever to come up with a genuinely dangerous thought. I am disheartened that people can be clever enough to do that and not clever enough to do the obvious thing and KEEP THEIR IDIOT MOUTHS SHUT about it, because it is much more important to sound intelligent when talking to your friends.
This post was STUPID.
"Yudkowsky said that Roko had already given nightmares to several LessWrong users and had brought them to the point of breakdown. Yudkowsky ended up deleting the thread completely, thus assuring that Roko’s Basilisk would become the stuff of legend. It was a thought experiment so dangerous that merely thinking about it was hazardous not only to your mental health, but to your very fate" (3).
It's an intriguing and terrifying thought, but a thought the smartest techno-nerds take very seriously.
“I don’t want to really scare you, but it was alarming how many people I talked to who are highly placed people in AI who have retreats that are sort of 'bug out' houses, to which they could flee if it all hits the fan.” ~ James Barrat
Have you written a story about artificial intelligence? Does your AI seek revenge against your protagonist or humanity in general? Share your thoughts and ideas about this week's topic and I will include them in next month's newsletter.
Thank you for reading.
“I’m increasingly inclined to think that there should be some regulatory oversight, maybe at the national and international level, just to make sure that we don’t do something very foolish. I mean with artificial intelligence we’re summoning the demon.” ~ Elon Musk
P.S. Every registered author who shares their ideas and/or creative endeavors relating to or inspired by this week's topic will receive an exclusive trinket. I will retire this month's limited-edition trinket at 11:59 p.m. WDC time on Tuesday, November 26, 2019, when my next short stories newsletter goes live.
Sources:
1. 101 Inventions That Changed the World in the Last 100 Years
2. Trolls turned Tay, Microsoft’s fun millennial AI bot, into a genocidal maniac
3. The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time
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I hope you enjoy this week's featured selections. I occasionally feature static items by members who are no longer with us; some have passed away while others simply aren't active members. Their absence doesn't render their work any less relevant, and if it fits the week's topic I will include it.
Thank you, and have a great week!
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The following is in response to "Mass Psychogenic Illness" :
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LinnAnn -Book writer  writes: This was great! I don't think I'd heard of this before. I think I'm going to use this in this year's NaNoWriMo. Our neighborhood will be overrun with rats from Jupiter-this psychog...I'll have to write that word down. I can use it! thanks a whole bunch.
Love, LinnAnn
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Princess Megan Snow Rose  writes: A good video. I like that the Nuns were singing like cats. Witch trials and things. Spooky but interesting. Truth is stranger then fiction. I worked in mental health and you talk about mass hysteria. The building was haunted I worked in. That is a story in itself. I enjoyed this newsletter. Great job.
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scifiqueen writes: Nothing will inspire mass hysteria like a deadline! I see it all the time in my "day job." Set a deadline, and suddenly the phones blow up with people hyperventilating over something that really isn't a huge deal (if they do what they're supposed to - but that's another form of madness!).
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willwilcox writes: Very cool newsletter 
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BIG BAD WOLF is Howling  writes: Try finding out that the Afterlife is rather odd. "Animals' Afterlife Includes Humans" [18+]
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Mastiff  writes: I'm pretty sure we're living through this very thing right now in the United States. I'm just stunned by the insanity I see in the news on a daily basis.
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Mara ♣ McBain  writes: You always pick such fascinating topics for your Newsletters. They always leave me curious and thinking, two things a writer loves! 
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Paul  writes: It wouldn’t fit the 2,500 character limit so I wrote about it here, .
It describes a small part of my personal experience with the Cold War Mass Hysteria.
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the Wordy Jay  writes: What an awesome Halloween topic -- it's creepy as heck and so very real too! 
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Jeff  writes: I've never really been interested in the subject of mass hysteria, nor have I experienced its effects (either directly or indirectly). I don't really find these sort of things inspire my creativity or really spark anything in my imagination at all. I think that's probably because I tend to find the real life situations troubling enough as they are and don't want to devote any more mental real estate to thinking about them in different (fictional) packaging. 
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eyestar~* writes: Wow! I had no idea this phenomenon had such history. It puts me in mind of the Matrix..you know we are in the collective unless we wake up and see or question. I have studied the witch times...not fun! Thanks for sharing this bit of strangeness. The links of info are fascinating and I enjoyed your choices of items to share.
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Quick-Quill  writes: I'm not sure if I responded to this NL, but I see a mass hysteria whenever there is a Republican rally and the opposing side starts its own rally. A soon as one or two of the group decide it's times to bet aggressive and starts getting physical, it seems the rest jump into the frey and the physical aggression escalates. You see it in the ball parks when someone starts the "WAVE" it takes a few times then even the reluctant ones will stand up at the proper time an wave their arms. The fact that people are referred to as sheep is not a misnomer. Most are just a dumb and follow any leader that comes by.
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⭐Princette♥PengthuluWrites  writes: I remember the clown sightings thing. It did not help my clown phobia. 
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Cubby  writes: Oh, how interesting! I just finished watching Season 2 of Mr. Mercedes, and though it perhaps wasn't a group-type hysteria, it was creepy how Brady could get into innocent minds. I've never considered writing about hysteria, but now you have me thinking! LOVE that series! If you haven't already read the three-book series by Stephen King, I highly recommend it.
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Lisa Noe  writes: I recall the clown sightings of 2016, I live in Kentucky and there were several sightings and people were really frightened. I found your newsletter to be informative and cool.
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dragonwoman writes: Mass Psychogenic Illness has a terrifying quality. The closest I've come to writing about it is a story about a female evangelist. It does fascinate me while it terrifies me.
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