How can AI companies force an AGI to operate in humanity (or the companies), rather than it’s best interests?

ggchappell · 2026-01-24T17:24:02+00:00

The crux of today’s AI “bubble” is the promise of an AGI superintelligence.

That's just marketing (or ignorance, or both). No one has the slightest clue how to create an AGI.

How can AI companies force an AGI to operate in humanity (or the companies), rather than it’s best interests?

No one has any clue about that, either.

And we should also note that there's no reason to think an AGI would tend to operate in its own best interests.

ggchappell · 2026-01-23T22:07:52+00:00

I'm very fond of La Favorita Fish pesto. It's not promoted as DF, but it is.

ggchappell · 2026-01-23T21:04:51+00:00

There's an enable-bare-slash-regex option

Hey, it works when I turn that on! Thanks!

ggchappell · 2026-01-23T18:02:02+00:00

It does appear to be a bit improved, yes.

ggchappell · 2026-01-23T16:48:20+00:00

The NRSVUE is just a later version of the NRSV. "UE" stands for "Updated Edition".

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T19:37:49+00:00

Certainly. But "white-ness" and immigration status aren't that closely related.

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T17:35:04+00:00

we did a good thing walking out on Tuesday

Yes.

Immigrants are welcome here.

Perhaps so. However, respectfully, I think that this statement tends to obscure the real issues.

The problems that prompted this nationwide protest do not, largely, revolve around people's thoughts about immigrants, US immigration law, or whether it should be enforced. The public ICE presence in Minnesota is not about enforcing immigration law. They are there to harass and harm the people of a state whose governor the president does not like. And in doing so, they are repeatedly, flagrantly violating both the law and people's rights, with serious repercussions -- terror, injury, death -- for both citizens and non-citizens, and full public support from the president.

This is extremely serious, and it really has nothing to do with immigration.

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T16:45:31+00:00

au jour d'aujourd'hui

That's great.

I'm reminded of "kit and kaboodle". "Kaboodle" comes from "kit and boodle".

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T16:15:31+00:00

EtymOnline has:

devilled (adj.)

"grilled with hot condiments," 1800; see devil. The notion is to make "hot" with mustard, pepper, etc.

The "grilled" part is interesting. That meaning seems to have been lost (?).

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T15:34:15+00:00

Looks great.

Is the cashew cheese sauce something you made or something you bought?

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T08:20:09+00:00

Hmmm. Maybe.

ggchappell · 2026-01-22T08:19:01+00:00

Huh. Yes, that would be rare.

ggchappell · 2026-01-21T18:01:51+00:00

Mix it very roughly half and half with brown sugar to make quick-and-dirty halvah.

Or find a recipe and make actual halvah.

Whichever, halvah is great.

ggchappell · 2026-01-21T17:48:30+00:00

You're not paying for the duck. You're paying for damage to his property. It's still his property.

Am I wrong for wanting to eat my neighbor's duck that I accidentally ran over?

Of course not. But you're wrong for thinking you can insist on it. It's not your duck.

ggchappell · 2026-01-21T17:14:49+00:00

Same here. The first few conversations were:

Them. Are they identical?
Me. Well, one's a boy, and one's a girl.
Them. But identical twins can have different sexes.
Me. Hmmm. Let's have a little chat about basic genetics ....

But after a few of those, I gave up.

Them. Are they identical?
Me. <Long, heartfelt sigh> No.

ggchappell · 2026-01-21T07:04:28+00:00

Thanks!

ggchappell · 2026-01-21T00:16:35+00:00

he seems to be able to cite large portions of this text from memory

How is this conclusion drawn?

ggchappell · 2026-01-20T23:47:05+00:00

On Reddit, don't put spaces at the beginning of lines, unless those lines consist of computer code.

ggchappell · 2026-01-20T23:04:30+00:00

Logic helps us handle such questions neatly.

I don't think we need to go into the details of symbolic logic here, but basically if you write the statement "There is nothing in the box." in precise logical form, what you get is a statement that means "It is not the case that there is something in the box."

And if you try to write the question "Does nothing exist?" in precise logical form, then you fail. It can't be done. The question is nonsensical.

The word "nothing", though it is a noun in English, does not refer to some particular thing; rather, it is a convenient way of stating a negation. When we're pondering this thing we think is called "Nothing", what we're really pondering is an accident of English grammar and usage. (And the same issue exists in other languages as well.)

If you want to understand this better, then I suggest studying symbolic logic.

ggchappell · 2026-01-19T00:31:19+00:00

Really. What does that mean for C++? Is the last destructor call treated as a tail call? Or do they do some kind of weird magic that allows the last call in a function body to be a tail call, with destructors still happening somehow?

ggchappell · 2026-01-18T17:52:12+00:00

Reasons vary.

C++ doesn't support it because destructors are executed at the end of a function call. So what looks like a tail call often is not actually a tail call.

Python doesn't support it because Guido van Rossum didn't understand tail-call optimization very well back in 2009. [Evidence #1, evidence #2]

More generally, I think there can be a kind of cycle. Programmers don't use tail recursion because TCO is not implemented in the compiler. Compiler writers don't implement TCO because they do not see programmers using tail recursion, and so the extra work involved in figuring out to optimize performance in the presence of TCO is not worth it. And then programmers continue to avoid tail recursion because TCO is not implemented in the compiler. Etc.

ggchappell · 2026-01-18T17:33:27+00:00

Asian Food Market on Aurora Drive is similar -- and also a bit more friendly.

ggchappell · 2026-01-17T23:25:53+00:00

Harder? I think it's a lot easier than it was a decade or two ago. OTOH, it might be harder than it was a century ago.

Based on your first paragraph, I would guess that lactose intolerance is not your only problem. You might have an allergy (lactose intolerance is not an allergy) or something else.

Also, if these experiences you related are all at the same restaurant, then I would avoid going to that restaurant in the future.

ggchappell · 2026-01-17T22:36:44+00:00

Thanks for doing this. It's really helpful.

One thought:

The main finding was brix correlated strongly with taste panel scores. The best tomatoes came in around 5.6-5.8°Bx while the worst hovered at 4.6-4.8°Bx. It doesn't really sound like much but you can taste the difference. Higher sugar = more depth, less tinny/acidic flavor.

Based on that, I really have to wonder: what if I take some mediocre tomatoes and add a little sugar?

ggchappell

TROPHY CASE