@cutterferry.bsky.social
Interested in mathematics, computer science, history, political thought, and the (lack of) "ethics" of AI. Anonymous because questioning AI is career limiting behaviour.
Funny how free speech sprang into existence in ~2003. Every mass platform before that being burdened by *checks notes* 1) being on the public record and 2) some basic fucking responsibility really meant that in 2002 speech and politics were totally unfree.
Only I don’t remember it like that.
Only I don’t remember it like that.
December 20, 2025 at 10:42 PM
Funny how free speech sprang into existence in ~2003. Every mass platform before that being burdened by *checks notes* 1) being on the public record and 2) some basic fucking responsibility really meant that in 2002 speech and politics were totally unfree.
Only I don’t remember it like that.
Only I don’t remember it like that.
I’m sorry and your qualifications to judge are what, a career in what appears to be corporate PR with at best bittersweet and at worst downright pernicious outcomes?
Speaking as an academic manqué, I think I might suggest some respect for those who have dedicated their lives to truth not messaging?
Speaking as an academic manqué, I think I might suggest some respect for those who have dedicated their lives to truth not messaging?
December 20, 2025 at 8:46 PM
I’m sorry and your qualifications to judge are what, a career in what appears to be corporate PR with at best bittersweet and at worst downright pernicious outcomes?
Speaking as an academic manqué, I think I might suggest some respect for those who have dedicated their lives to truth not messaging?
Speaking as an academic manqué, I think I might suggest some respect for those who have dedicated their lives to truth not messaging?
Captive xenomorph is in some ways not a bad label for LLMery come to think of it, in a pleasing rhyme.
December 20, 2025 at 2:51 PM
Captive xenomorph is in some ways not a bad label for LLMery come to think of it, in a pleasing rhyme.
(To say nothing of how he clearly ripped off the Strugatsky brothers. A lot of it reads like The Inhabited Island but as written by the Marquis de Sade with better gender politics)
December 20, 2025 at 9:49 AM
(To say nothing of how he clearly ripped off the Strugatsky brothers. A lot of it reads like The Inhabited Island but as written by the Marquis de Sade with better gender politics)
So he clearly doesn’t mean it — Banks professes essentially anarchocommunist abundance and Musk loves nothing more than power.
I detest Banks — I find it hard to believe *Banks* believed in what he professed. IMO it reads much more easily as satire.
But weirdly, many take both at face value.
I detest Banks — I find it hard to believe *Banks* believed in what he professed. IMO it reads much more easily as satire.
But weirdly, many take both at face value.
December 20, 2025 at 9:46 AM
So he clearly doesn’t mean it — Banks professes essentially anarchocommunist abundance and Musk loves nothing more than power.
I detest Banks — I find it hard to believe *Banks* believed in what he professed. IMO it reads much more easily as satire.
But weirdly, many take both at face value.
I detest Banks — I find it hard to believe *Banks* believed in what he professed. IMO it reads much more easily as satire.
But weirdly, many take both at face value.
Oh and as I failed alt text: it’s the rookie numbers meme.
(I feel faintly guilty. We’ve never met, I’m one of the unexpected multitude. But *waves hands* someone I know must’ve followed, you post about Canada and I’m a lost Canadian, political theory and I always wish I’d studied it, etc etc!)
(I feel faintly guilty. We’ve never met, I’m one of the unexpected multitude. But *waves hands* someone I know must’ve followed, you post about Canada and I’m a lost Canadian, political theory and I always wish I’d studied it, etc etc!)
December 19, 2025 at 11:18 PM
Oh and as I failed alt text: it’s the rookie numbers meme.
(I feel faintly guilty. We’ve never met, I’m one of the unexpected multitude. But *waves hands* someone I know must’ve followed, you post about Canada and I’m a lost Canadian, political theory and I always wish I’d studied it, etc etc!)
(I feel faintly guilty. We’ve never met, I’m one of the unexpected multitude. But *waves hands* someone I know must’ve followed, you post about Canada and I’m a lost Canadian, political theory and I always wish I’d studied it, etc etc!)
You mean?
a man in a suit and tie says you gotta pump those numbers up
ALT: a man in a suit and tie says you gotta pump those numbers up
media.tenor.com
December 19, 2025 at 11:15 PM
You mean?
And always remember that *everything* their machine can do they stole from all of us and what we wrote and published, thinking we were communing with other human beings, not providing “training sets” so obsessives and megacorps could build hobbled slaves in our images.
December 19, 2025 at 11:11 PM
And always remember that *everything* their machine can do they stole from all of us and what we wrote and published, thinking we were communing with other human beings, not providing “training sets” so obsessives and megacorps could build hobbled slaves in our images.
So tl;dr: Fabian Stephany: nominative determinism is dead.
And don’t ask about creating or destroying jobs. Ask about working conditions, value add/share, and the aggregate bargaining power of wage workers in your chosen realm (town/country/planet).
And don’t ask about creating or destroying jobs. Ask about working conditions, value add/share, and the aggregate bargaining power of wage workers in your chosen realm (town/country/planet).
December 19, 2025 at 11:07 PM
So tl;dr: Fabian Stephany: nominative determinism is dead.
And don’t ask about creating or destroying jobs. Ask about working conditions, value add/share, and the aggregate bargaining power of wage workers in your chosen realm (town/country/planet).
And don’t ask about creating or destroying jobs. Ask about working conditions, value add/share, and the aggregate bargaining power of wage workers in your chosen realm (town/country/planet).
But we’re either too ignorant or too cowed to think about it from the perspective of wage labour.
So we keep asking the dumb questions (and falling for the usefully simplistic scares) that play into the hands of the AI techbros.
So we keep asking the dumb questions (and falling for the usefully simplistic scares) that play into the hands of the AI techbros.
December 19, 2025 at 11:04 PM
But we’re either too ignorant or too cowed to think about it from the perspective of wage labour.
So we keep asking the dumb questions (and falling for the usefully simplistic scares) that play into the hands of the AI techbros.
So we keep asking the dumb questions (and falling for the usefully simplistic scares) that play into the hands of the AI techbros.
And the killer is the basic conversation here is a trivial application of basic Marxist ideas (and I am _far_ from well versed).
Just because we’re not communists doesn’t mean we can’t take on board the good bits. You don’t have to believe in class warfare to believe in asymmetric labour markets!
Just because we’re not communists doesn’t mean we can’t take on board the good bits. You don’t have to believe in class warfare to believe in asymmetric labour markets!
December 19, 2025 at 11:03 PM
And the killer is the basic conversation here is a trivial application of basic Marxist ideas (and I am _far_ from well versed).
Just because we’re not communists doesn’t mean we can’t take on board the good bits. You don’t have to believe in class warfare to believe in asymmetric labour markets!
Just because we’re not communists doesn’t mean we can’t take on board the good bits. You don’t have to believe in class warfare to believe in asymmetric labour markets!
Maybe there are some handful of jobs where a brain is genuinely surplus to requirements.
I can only think of ones where that‘s merely almost true (which, _by some amazing coincidence_ are the ones that we generally find very demeaning)
Those jobs sure gonna get a lot more applicants = less money.
I can only think of ones where that‘s merely almost true (which, _by some amazing coincidence_ are the ones that we generally find very demeaning)
Those jobs sure gonna get a lot more applicants = less money.
December 19, 2025 at 11:00 PM
Maybe there are some handful of jobs where a brain is genuinely surplus to requirements.
I can only think of ones where that‘s merely almost true (which, _by some amazing coincidence_ are the ones that we generally find very demeaning)
Those jobs sure gonna get a lot more applicants = less money.
I can only think of ones where that‘s merely almost true (which, _by some amazing coincidence_ are the ones that we generally find very demeaning)
Those jobs sure gonna get a lot more applicants = less money.
Remove the bargaining power of the people with the “best” [1] brains and you hurt the bargaining power of literally *everyone* with a brain.
([1] if we must indulge that juvenile simplification)
([1] if we must indulge that juvenile simplification)
December 19, 2025 at 10:56 PM
Remove the bargaining power of the people with the “best” [1] brains and you hurt the bargaining power of literally *everyone* with a brain.
([1] if we must indulge that juvenile simplification)
([1] if we must indulge that juvenile simplification)
And yes the existing system sucks and privileging human intelligence is demonstrably problematic etc etc etc.
But this does matter. The change currently outbidding our own grandparents for power for heating and being foisted upon us *will only make things worse*.
But this does matter. The change currently outbidding our own grandparents for power for heating and being foisted upon us *will only make things worse*.
December 19, 2025 at 10:52 PM
And yes the existing system sucks and privileging human intelligence is demonstrably problematic etc etc etc.
But this does matter. The change currently outbidding our own grandparents for power for heating and being foisted upon us *will only make things worse*.
But this does matter. The change currently outbidding our own grandparents for power for heating and being foisted upon us *will only make things worse*.
When you transfer economic power from the owners of brains to the owners of GWs of datacentres, you are improving the bargaining power of capital. (And if you weren't, frankly, given what the tech does, capital would never fund it like this: it’s the only payoff)
December 19, 2025 at 10:49 PM
When you transfer economic power from the owners of brains to the owners of GWs of datacentres, you are improving the bargaining power of capital. (And if you weren't, frankly, given what the tech does, capital would never fund it like this: it’s the only payoff)
Just because the AI economy and the politics it is recruited to produce has opened the wonderful opportunity of joining, say, Peter Thiel‘s hareem of personal fucking organ donors and/or walking blood bags does NOT mean things are fucking okay.
December 19, 2025 at 10:46 PM
Just because the AI economy and the politics it is recruited to produce has opened the wonderful opportunity of joining, say, Peter Thiel‘s hareem of personal fucking organ donors and/or walking blood bags does NOT mean things are fucking okay.
Of course net net the economy will exploit the surplus labour created by a new mode of production. So what.
The real issue is that the *bargaining power* is radically shifted away from the workers (in aggregate, but especially in particular): the new job ain’t gonna be half what the old one was.
The real issue is that the *bargaining power* is radically shifted away from the workers (in aggregate, but especially in particular): the new job ain’t gonna be half what the old one was.
December 19, 2025 at 10:44 PM
Of course net net the economy will exploit the surplus labour created by a new mode of production. So what.
The real issue is that the *bargaining power* is radically shifted away from the workers (in aggregate, but especially in particular): the new job ain’t gonna be half what the old one was.
The real issue is that the *bargaining power* is radically shifted away from the workers (in aggregate, but especially in particular): the new job ain’t gonna be half what the old one was.
The whole frame of “will AI take jobs or not” is dumb, slanted towards the AI companies, and inviting of glib ill faith crap like that of this Fabian Stephany.
December 19, 2025 at 10:43 PM
The whole frame of “will AI take jobs or not” is dumb, slanted towards the AI companies, and inviting of glib ill faith crap like that of this Fabian Stephany.
What a good job that AI can apparently do “90%” of what a historian can do. Maybe it will teach these idiots some fucking history.
More generally I think that the failure to wrangle with this stuff points to a failure of historical education, likely ideogically driven.
More generally I think that the failure to wrangle with this stuff points to a failure of historical education, likely ideogically driven.
December 19, 2025 at 10:39 PM
What a good job that AI can apparently do “90%” of what a historian can do. Maybe it will teach these idiots some fucking history.
More generally I think that the failure to wrangle with this stuff points to a failure of historical education, likely ideogically driven.
More generally I think that the failure to wrangle with this stuff points to a failure of historical education, likely ideogically driven.
… and the weirdest part is _for why_?? Given all their other principles and interests, why on earth have they decided to go totally supine to capital on this?
Some desperate desire for a productivity tailwind to rescue Starmer and co?
I mean I get that at least but I‘ve bad news for them…
Some desperate desire for a productivity tailwind to rescue Starmer and co?
I mean I get that at least but I‘ve bad news for them…
December 19, 2025 at 8:58 PM
… and the weirdest part is _for why_?? Given all their other principles and interests, why on earth have they decided to go totally supine to capital on this?
Some desperate desire for a productivity tailwind to rescue Starmer and co?
I mean I get that at least but I‘ve bad news for them…
Some desperate desire for a productivity tailwind to rescue Starmer and co?
I mean I get that at least but I‘ve bad news for them…
Together with the utterly inane interview with Jared Kaplan the week before — gullibly swallowing his self-serving premiss of a dichotomy between paradise and AI rebellion without any sign of critical thought — it’s hard not to see the Guardian as having been totally corrupted by these thieves.
December 19, 2025 at 8:53 PM
Together with the utterly inane interview with Jared Kaplan the week before — gullibly swallowing his self-serving premiss of a dichotomy between paradise and AI rebellion without any sign of critical thought — it’s hard not to see the Guardian as having been totally corrupted by these thieves.