palordrolap

We like Linux, but not to the point we’re aping Steve Ballmer.

(If this is lost on you, search up “Developers developers developers” along with his name.)

Condescending tone was not intended, but on rereading I can see how I’ve come across that way. Sorry about that.

I’m not going to disagree with this on the grounds that you could replace Python with any language and still be right for a handful of programmers using it.

Relatedly, there are plenty of people who write code in Python who know exactly what they’re doing (thus defeating the quote), to the point that an amateur reading that code has literally no idea what’s going on. Abstractions upon abstractions. Horrors upon horrors. Likewise this can be done in any language. Try taking apart one of the standard Perl modules (that’s written in Perl anyway), for example.

What does concern me is that the only source I can find for this quote is your comment. I can find Conal Elliot and even a suggestion that they have written code in Python (making the quote a self-burn, perhaps), but not the quote itself.

So who should be held accountable when (mis)use of AI results in a needless death? Or worse?

Let’s say a company creates an AI taxi that runs you over leaving you without legs. Who are you going to sue?

“Oh it’s grey, so I’ll have a dollar from each shareholder.” That doesn’t sound right to me.

My initial thought was that the computer pictured on the cover was a VIC-20 not a C64, then I remembered that they used old-stock VIC-20 keyboards and cases to get the first C64s out of the door quickly, so it’s probably an early model. Not enough pixels to make out what’s on the ID plate to the top left of the keyboard.

As for AI, I got a load of old Commodore magazines in the mid 90s, and one letter sent in to one of them has always stuck with me. The writer asked if AI was needed in order to make an enemy character follow a player character around the screen, and the response was along the lines of “no, you can do that with simple mathematics”, and provided a very simple algorithm.

The concept clearly generalises to “do not attribute to intelligence what can be achieved with simple mathematics” as well as being akin to “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” and then “if you can convince a mark that your simple mathematics is intelligent, they’ll throw money at you”.

Is it just me or is this response the wrong response? I would have expected:

not everyone speaks bri’ish english

(that missing “r” in “ameican” inspires the use of the “improper” option here). It’s American English that uses “tire”, after all, and the rest of the Anglosphere that has “tyre”.