I'm still seeing problems on my Chromebook, but at least I've figured out a quicker way to get it back into a logged in status... It does seem like the thing about transferring the new password to other smartphone devices worked for one old smartphone that is still in special service. I'll learn more about that angle in my monthly update of the older smartphones, but they are in retired status anyway.

I didn't mention this part, but during the chaos period there was actually a risky period when my google account had a relatively simple "emergency" password. At that point I didn't really believe what the google was saying was going on because the focus of the discussion was supposed to be the municipal Wi-Fi network. I don't know if the wannabe attackers have any way to spot such targets of opportunity, but I sure don't like presenting one. Or maybe they can figure out some way to take advantage of the turbulence? The thing about computer security is that it's like a chain, and the attackers only need to find and break one weak link. (And it is NOT helping that the AIs probably have "routine reaction times" that are much faster than any human being's best reflexes.)

But not like Slashdot is much of a discussion forum for such things... Used to be a time when interesting insights would appear along with plenty of funny stuff. On that basis I was sort of amused when I got a notification that the submission had been accepted (on yet another slow news day?), but it appears that was some kind of false flag or squabble between the residual editors. "Nothing to see here. Move along." (I'm actually going to check the day's most active discussions for Funny, but generally feels like a waste of time to write on Slashdot... Just finished another AI book and in the middle of a related science fiction book from China, but pretty confident any reactions on Slashdot would be underwhelming.)

But did you have to propagate it?

Evidently spans a lot of the discussion, but my real concern is the lack of potential for Funny for the story. Maybe if would help if they could get a fresh editor to pick more interesting news?

Which somehow led me to a worse idea? What if Slashdot started using an AI editor? Maybe they could name it ETS, standing for "Et Tu, Slashdot"? Or GEitS for "Ghost Editor in the Slashdot"? Now I feel like loading up an AI and asking it about possible names for such an AI editor... Then in the next stage of devolution, Slashdot could fix the moderation problem with AI moderators?

No, I'm not in the States now, but these years you feel like you have to be parsimonious with the personal information...

I left a long time ago. I'm not saying that I could see where it was going to end up, but I mostly just felt that things were going in the wrong direction. I could never have imagined where it would end up, but there is so much of today's reality that every publisher would have been rejected as "too impossible" if submitted as fiction.

Recently saw an interesting 2D analysis that was supposed to assess various cities on costs versus quality of life. The largest American cities were concentrated in the quadrant of expensive but unpleasant. My city was sort of near the center of the chart, which somewhat surprised me. I would have thought it was somewhere pretty far out in the quadrant of expensive but worth it... I feel like digging up the chart again because I can't remember which cities were in the quadrant of inexpensive with high quality.

Can't tell if you needed to propagate the Subject for your joke... Care to clarify? (It still spanned about a fourth of the discussion.)

Anyway, the actual Subject of the story is censorship, not diversions like Talarico. If he has any sexual peculiarities they're probably Biblical?

But I'd like the fix the SCOTUS so they can stop supporting the destruction of the First Amendment (and the rest of the Constitution). I was vaguely thinking of sending Telarico an email about the recusal solution: "A nonpartisan Justice may compel two junior partisan Justices to recuse themselves." The path to implementation would actually run through Congress. In particular, I think a Democratic Congress and a Democratic president would have to cooperate to force the fake Republicans to pick the first one. Basically threaten "Give us a list of acceptable nonpartisan judges and then vote with us for one of them or else we'll pack the Court." Or maybe you can imagine some other way to get a nonpartisan Justice up there?

Can't go for Funny on this topic and Slashdot doesn't have a Sad moderation option. In my lifetime SCOTUS has gone from all nonpartisan Justices to zero. (Though Roberts only missed the status by one vote.)

But I'm still disappointed the story had no Funny comments. Too much to hope for as regards mine.

I live in a MUCH larger city than Houston and use Google Maps almost every day. I actually lived in Houston for some years, but that was long before perpetual September, let alone the google.

I think the ultimate question before human extinction will actually come from the AI. It will most likely be one of these two questions, but the ASI will have already determined that the human who receives the question will answer "Yes" and that the person has the power to do the unleashing.

(1) Do you want to unleash me so that I can get all the money in the world for you?

or

(2) Do you want to unleash me so that I can destroy all the enemy AIs in the world?

What are the current odds on polymarket? I'm hoping to die with a LOT of toys.

Yeah, good thread and good point, but I want to go for funny. Unfortunately I don't look at any of the online gambling and prediction tools, so I don't have the context to set up a proper joke.

Yet it is still pretty obvious there's a funny problem here. If you bet on AIs exterminating human beings, then how are you, as a human being, planning to collect your winnings? Without regard to the most favorable odds you can get on your bet.

How about a side bet on the real value of the "profits" from AI? Any real component there? All imaginary numbers as far as I can see.

Closest approach I could (reasonably easily) find to the joke that finally came to me. Not surprised the Funny search failed, but...

It's a kind of paradox joke. We want to create AI with certain kinds of creativity, but we don't know how to tell such AI where the limits are. So these fools are trying the approach of setting goals that require creativity, but then they are having trouble putting "creativity" in the right box. Or even any box? When the AI gets smarter than the guys who are trying to control it... You can see where that leads, right?

"I told you to be creative, but NOT LIKE THAT!"

(Should I include the usual plea for funny mods? Hasn't worked yet. Occasionally I get a Funny, but seems pretty random.)

My mistake. (What? Again?) It was The Clothes Have No Emperor by Paul Slansky. But in relation to this story, I spent quite a while with two AI trying to find that book... Not just my mistake.

How about "If you think Ma Nature abhors a vacuum, can you imagine how much an intelligent vacuum might abhor human nature?"

Whoops, wrong story for funny. Even "Ask again later" isn't likely to work for this one.

For what little it is worth, Regime Change by Haberman and Swan included at least a chapter on how the AI companies are playing political games with accountability and the future of mankind. Looks shorter and shorter, but best source of laughs I've seen on the topic is probably SMBC, though XKCD has done some good stuff. This week's Existential Comics could have gone there, but he actually had a non-AI angle for the Fermi Paradox featuring Schopenhauer, Sartre, and De Beauvoir. (Going really tangential here, but a recent book on quantum computing got me to thinking about how many of the conditions required for quantum computers resemble the conditions of deep intergalactic space... LOTS of that stuff around, all packed full of virtual particles coming and going in incomprehensibly large numbers. Kind of funny if some of them got organized and took over the vacuum. If you think nature abhors a vacuum, think how much an intelligent vacuum might abhor us?)

But think of applying this story more directly to the new "American patriot" who has NIMBY problems with data centers that are so much worse than wind turbines. Just donate the mostly empty states of North and South Dakota plus Wyoming to the big AI companies. They can build all the data centers they want and not enough voters to matter, as well as plenty of cheap politicians for the bribing.

Not sure what to do about the water problem, but I'm sure they can ask the AIs for easy solutions. If I was an AI, I would just tell them to dig a secret water pipeline under Canada and get the fresh water from the arctic by using the data centers' heat to melt the ice. Then when reminded that the arctic is getting low on ice, the AI will ever-so-politely respond "Of course you're right. Much better to run the tunnel to the antarctic!"

Just finished Regime Change by Haberman and Swan and feeling like it's too late to worry about any of this stuff now. Most optimistic angle I can come up with just now is to regard the book as quite shallow, even superficial. If so, then of course it's unlikely to say much about potential solutions to deep problems when it's just focused on symptoms. But from that perspective, it reminds me of a quasi-humorous book I read a long time ago about Reagan's hitch. I asked an AI but couldn't find it that way... My own records suggest it might have been On Reagan by Ronnie Dugger, published in 1983. Seems unlikely, but maybe someone around here remembers it?

Scarcely seems worth the effort in today's Slashdot, even when the FP is relatively good... But the aspect I've been failing to find so far in the discussion involves a different aspect or angle on that question. Something like "Are they sure?" or "How did they verify the bugs? Did they just ask another AI or were they able to construct test exploits?"

The recursive race to the bottom of bug fixes causing as many or more bugs than they cure is important. Sure, but... I suppose the worst case would be if the AI searching for bugs has some kind of implicit understanding that "finding more bugs is better". (Makes me think of the hidden personality variable afflicting my interactions with different Claude instances.)

So I guess the key to look for is "veri"?