Matt Levine linked today to this entertaining story about how Casper, the online mattress retailer, sued and then ultimately acquired* a top online mattress review site in order to silence its negative reviews of their mattress

(makes it sound like all mattress review sites just give the best reviews to the companies they have the best financial relationship with)

(*technically they loaned another mattress review site money to acquire the site that was giving them bad reviews, and then mysteriously all the negative Casper stuff disappeared)

The thing went from learning the rules of the game to beating an already superhuman AI 100-0 in three days on its own. The fact that the algorithm is only applicable to simulations of the real world rather than the world itself is very little reassurance.

So what's the first big civilization-level disruption that comes from AI? Stock markets?

The stock market has been run by competing AIs for years already.

Ok so any speculation on when the scary **** happens or what it looks like?

For those interested in AI taking over the world, this two-part post is fantastic:
https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artif...olution-1.html

It's ****ing long, though, so consider it a small book before you begin.

lol do you really have to ask. who's gonna take it away?

If the whole post I linked is too long, skip to Part 2 and then scroll down to the hypothetical story starting with "So what ARE they worried about? I wrote a little story to show you:"

Jesus

Disgusting. Anyone in the organization who knew and did nothing should be fired or worse. I've heard this before about gymnastics at lower to mid- levels, and to hear that it goes to the very highest levels is repulsive.

That is a mature and thoughtful statement. Hopefully all this creates change. From Hollywood to gymnastics and other sports to Catholic priests to everywhere else that hasn't been uncovered, let there be change.

I think you OOT a little, but have you seen the paperclip game?

https://www.theverge.com/tldr/2017/1...me-frank-lantz

It's based on an AI thought experiment that I hadn't heard of where someone tasks an AI to make paperclips and the AI knowing just that goes about turning all the matter in the universe into paperclips.

https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/920709146789515272

Perhaps it's misplaced, but I still have some faith in Yelp, but I don't generally trust online reviews at all. The ones I have any direct experience with are awful. And, I think most people know this, but the BBB is the worst. They, like some others, are an extortion racket.

Trip Advisor has been gamed so hard it's becoming unusable. I wound up at a place in India that had rat turds all over the place. Nothing but glowing Trip Advisor reviews - certainly all paid for.

Another place kept begging me to write them a review. So I gave them 4 stars but complained about the ****ty day trip they arranged. If they wouldn't have bugged me I wouldn't have written anything.

I don't pay much attention to yelp either.

That reminds me, I have to write my Spanish teacher, who kept trying to flirt with me inappropriately and made me drive her all over, a Yelp review. Otherwise she won't stop bugging me. You think I'm gonna be honest and deal with her wrath? Hell no. But I won't put my all into it either. She was a very good teacher. Just half-crazy.

It's all variations of a poorly programmed but highly capable AI decides to kill or do something horrible to everyone for some unfathomably dumb reason.

The same doctor Moroney is accusing is already in prison for possession of child pornography. He is also awaiting trial on three separate sexual assault cases (that cover nine girls in total). He is also being sued in civil court by 125 former gymnasts who allege sexual abuse.

So...yeah. If people cared about gymnastics the way they do about Hollywood or college football, this dude would be a lot better known.

How in the hell did that go on for so long?

Who believes little athletes?

He was passing it off as treatment from what I read. Might have taken time for a lot of the girls to figure out something was seriously wrong and ofc the confusion/guilt/shame aspect of molestation might have prevented them to come forward.

Young kids, person in position of power, guise of a legitimate medical/therapeutic procedure.

That's the theoretical justification. If you read the accounts he's obviously guilty as sin though, and then there's 37,000 child abuse images and 'The FBI also has Go Pro video of Nassar allegedly molesting girls in a pool.'

http://time.com/4675589/gymnastics-sex-abuse-nassar/

Thanks for sharing this. Concise breakdown without leaning one way or another.

Per Bruce Blair, nuclear security expert and former launch officer, the nuclear launch codes from 1962 to 1977 were "00000000".

It's suggested that that was intentional. The codes were meant to prevent strategic air command from being able to launch and they were set to zeroes to get around that.

We were at greater risk from accidental detonation during that time than someone trying to launch them on purpose. Read Command and Control if you’re into scary non-fiction books.

When it comes to child molestation, USA Gymnastics is up there with Penn State if not worse.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/05/s...e-coaches.html

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...b00705db4cf8ce

Yeah, the guy is a great writer. He's really skilled at breaking down complicated ideas into simpler explanations. The drawings are a big help, too.

Lots of other good posts on the site about topics like the fermi paradox, procrastination, cryonics, and the brain.