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@Ciaraioch@mastodon.ieKinda hate the idea that all tech development is "progress", particularly with AI stuff. Sometimes tech makes life worse, and it's not "being a luddite" to believe that.
@Ciaraioch yeah! and also the luddites kinda had some cool ideas anyway!!
@jacqueline @Ciaraioch the other day i read that luddites weren’t technophobic, but just against advancements in tech being used to send workers into poverty instead of being owned collectively and enriching everyone. the technophobic spin was a propaganda thing used after their violent suppression.
at least that is what i read on this totally credible technology site
@Ciaraioch I feel like a lone voice crying out in the wilderness, saying maybe all this ChatGPT stuff isn’t the absolute fabulous thing you think it is.
@softicecreamlesley @Ciaraioch One obvious issue with ChatGPT is that it harms the educational process.
@hamedalazri @Ciaraioch I agree. A lot of teachers are at a loss about how to handle it. Some people are comparing it to a calculator but that’s simply not true. Teachers already had to adapt to teaching during COVID and now this??
@Ciaraioch the myth of technology as saviour
@Ciaraioch I found this episode of Hard Fork informative, with
great insights from Sarah Anderson regarding the negative impact of AI on artists, and how she and others are pushing back.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7j23TCIS7aDlvEaAHuZLwo?si=vsrcjuOgTQebeM_CzWNY7A&utm_source=copy-link
@Ciaraioch Software engineers have a not-actually-a-joke: "How do you get started in woodwork? Spend ten years as a software engineer then give in to the overwhelming urge to quit the world and go live in the woods".
Seeing how the sausage is made is a remarkably effective cure for thinking "new" always means "improved"
@Ciaraioch I've been a software engineer for 25 years.
@markdennehy Gorgeous!
@Ciaraioch thank you! Product of a burned-out mind!
@markdennehy @Ciaraioch I spent five years as a content specialist on software development projects and now I hardly want to own a computer.
(jgg) A distant relative of me worked in a cookie factory. He never eat cookies after that.
I am a software engineer working always on Windows. At home I use Ubuntu. Causality.
@Ciaraioch Good point! Am not a historian, but I gather academic battles are still being fought over whether living standards during the industrial revolution rose or fell (particularly for the working classes and impoverished). I wonder if these questions of technological progress are ever settled?
@Ciaraioch two worlds collide
@Ciaraioch I'm a software dev, and all this AI stuff gives me serious NFT vibes. People just see money.
It's a double-edged sword now that people are becoming more suspicious of creative output. I'm hoping it'll become obvious when AI is used the more it's seen.
@Ciaraioch Not to mention the Luddites weren’t against technology but against being exploited at the hands of the propertied class that owned the technology. The Luddites were masters at using the technology; they just didn’t want to be (ab)used by it.
@aral @Ciaraioch TIL I’m a Luddite
A lever and fulcrum can be used to rescue a person trapped beneath a rock. Or to break into a house.
Progress?
now spilling over into "art" as well (AI generates images from text prompts)
tech cannot save us
(from ourselves)
@Ciaraioch The problem - and I say this as someone in tech with a STEM background - is that tech is full of people who haven't studied humanities and exist in a naive little bubble of seeing the best possible uses of everything and none of the trouble. A lot of the people who built Facebook legitimately thought it was gonna make the world a better place by encouraging people to talk to each other more, for example.
@Ciaraioch love the ‘stash! You see almost funny but definately amusing 
I put a dancing penguin there but I don’t really know what it means outside a Mary Poppins reference.
I do understand your point about tech when it is either poorly or incompletely designed. It can get in the way and that can be exasperating. When tech works well and is intuitively designed, it’s great! Big, big timesaver!
@Ciaraioch you might look at it as a step saver or a way to start a process. Then, move on from that starting point. The nice thing is that you might use it for multiple starting points and create a synthesis or be inspired by what it returns to move in a different, maybe even a unique direction. It won’t mind when you ask it the same thing with slight variations to produce different views of the same problem. Then, you can put on your ‘stache and move in on it!
@Ciaraioch youll have to develop an evil villain maniacal laugh, or maybe a Mark Twain witticism, if that’s your intention and produce your initial, intermediate or final work. Investing in dancing penguins is just a start, sometimes, and not usually an end in itself.
Just a thought! Hope you keep rocking the ‘stache!
@Ciaraioch I would say tech as a general rule is neither a net positive or a net negative for society. It doesn't make life better, just more interesting. But technological innovation will continue regardless of how much people try to fight it, so really the best thing to do is to adapt. When it comes down to it, I wouldn't want to live in a world that just stays the same throughout my life. Having to constantly adapt to changing times is what makes life exciting.
@Ciaraioch a violent insurrection that left people dead, incited over twitter by a president that didn't want to leave office is a pretty good example of technology making life worse for many.
@Ciaraioch In order to solve a problem you have, tech creates another problem that you didn't have. The total number of problems remains constant!
@Ciaraioch I have a love/hate relationship with technology. I have been saying for 20+ years that tech will be the death of us. But here I am in the tech industry and contributing… conflicted of course, but I love tech/geeking and I also don’t think we can stop it from evolving either.
@Ciaraioch Whiggery is a pox.
@Ciaraioch stop hating on the juicero, dammit.
@Ciaraioch yes. The conflation of progress and change. Pretty rife.
@Ciaraioch shout it louder for the people in the back!
@Ciaraioch Years after drum machines, there’s still mad bastards gloriously deafening themselves to entertain us every night the old fashioned way. The tech doesn’t disappear but we always find a way to make our own art.
@Ciaraioch capitalism is the problem, I think we need to develop technologies because we never know where the ultimate benefits will be.
As humans though, we definitely need to keep plenty of "inefficient" jobs/roles in that they're only inefficient from a capitalist standpoint, many inefficiencies offer benefits in human connectivity as well as incidental exercise that certain technologies can ruin.
I'm sure someone nerdier than I could write a thesis on it.
@Ciaraioch there's always something that each piece of tech makes worse. Just a judgment call of did it help more overall.
@Ciaraioch For me the whole discussion is skewed. Unless you’re an engineer or scientist the questions around tech should only focus on sustainable prosperity and human well-being.
@Ciaraioch
Maybe, but I don't think those "parts" last in the long term.
Have you seen the video of ChatGPT and WolframAlpha working together? Like two different parts of the brain working in unison.
Conversational intelligent AI is almost here.