> can’t even conceive of a way to incentivise yourself to care about it
A lot of people on this forum came of age at a time when the internet and computers and tech companies built around them were ascendant and seen as a force for good in the world. We had the open source movement and peer-to-peer sharing and everything was going to be free and egalitarian and connected. Google was "organizing the world's information" and went from underdog to champion while telling us "don't be evil" was their core value. Kids who were bullied for being sincere and passionate were becoming the adults who ran things and got success and admiration.
Also, in the first ~decade or so that I was on HN speculative fiction about AI was extremely popular here. We weren't really sure if superhuman intelligence would happen anytime soon, but we all had the sense that if/when it did it better be designed and run by people with high ethical standards if we have any hope of avoiding major catastrophe.
(I personally see the concerns about mis-aligned "superhuman AI" and mis-aligned mega-corporations as representing essentially the same underlying anxiety: that there are powerful forces in the world that are beyond our ability to influence in meaningful ways but which have outsized effects on our environment and lives while being completely agnostic to our happiness or even our existence.)
Now we've been through one or more cycles of seeing our heroes turn into villains. Google got rid of "don't be evil". Musk turned his attention away from the stars and the "good of humanity" and toward petty political spats and gossip. And now OpenAI, which sold itself as the organization that will "do AGI" and do it the safe and ethical way, looks like it's run by somebody who is incredibly shrewd and self-serving.
So while I understand why you wouldn't care about this, I also completely understand why it's such an engaging topic for so many people here.
A lot of people on this forum came of age at a time when the internet and computers and tech companies built around them were ascendant and seen as a force for good in the world. We had the open source movement and peer-to-peer sharing and everything was going to be free and egalitarian and connected. Google was "organizing the world's information" and went from underdog to champion while telling us "don't be evil" was their core value. Kids who were bullied for being sincere and passionate were becoming the adults who ran things and got success and admiration.
Also, in the first ~decade or so that I was on HN speculative fiction about AI was extremely popular here. We weren't really sure if superhuman intelligence would happen anytime soon, but we all had the sense that if/when it did it better be designed and run by people with high ethical standards if we have any hope of avoiding major catastrophe.
(I personally see the concerns about mis-aligned "superhuman AI" and mis-aligned mega-corporations as representing essentially the same underlying anxiety: that there are powerful forces in the world that are beyond our ability to influence in meaningful ways but which have outsized effects on our environment and lives while being completely agnostic to our happiness or even our existence.)
Now we've been through one or more cycles of seeing our heroes turn into villains. Google got rid of "don't be evil". Musk turned his attention away from the stars and the "good of humanity" and toward petty political spats and gossip. And now OpenAI, which sold itself as the organization that will "do AGI" and do it the safe and ethical way, looks like it's run by somebody who is incredibly shrewd and self-serving.
So while I understand why you wouldn't care about this, I also completely understand why it's such an engaging topic for so many people here.