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If Clinton, Trump, and Did Not Vote were presidential candidates in 2016 (brilliantmaps.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I don't see it changing anytime soon. If I may go off on a tangent.

If any of us have gained anything of material use from the "AI revolution" it wouldn't be plagiarized drawings of Taylor Swift as an anthropomorphic fox with six breasts, it would be the dawning realization that we're not so special.

If so many of us can be tricked with a predictive text app into believing something is aware and alive, a technology in its infancy, what are the next several decades going to look like?

I don't believe in the AI hype, the "singularity" subreddit is packed with the most delusional people in the world. And they sound exactly like Christians, Trump supporters or scientologists or any other cult.

It's inherent to our experience here, that our brains trick us into thinking that thinking is special, that our conscious experience is somehow separated from the universe.

The harsh reality is it's not separate from the world. Most of our decisions are made up to an hour in advance, most of our life is rehearsed by parts of your brain that don't talk, that don't narrate. You are made of thousands of layers of "entities" that sort and assemble information and then make you think you're able to control the world around you with something called "choice."

So now, understanding these hard truths about the human condition... when will it get better? When will we start to set aside superstition and fear and mythology to make us feel better about that gnawing fear we all have, the one lingering in the backs of all our minds that we can't quite touch, the fear that we really aren't in control, we really aren't that special. We made cities, but can ants. We travel in space but so can fungus. We go to war with each other but so do chimps.

We are not letting go of religion or mysticism. Not in our current form. Maybe if we're really, really lucky some of the most delusional techbros are right, and we will have a system in our lifetimes for "upgrading" our brains and expanding our ability to comprehend and understand each other. I am not holding my breath though. These are the same people who tried to convince us that NFT's were the future.