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One of the key messages I carry is that we don't have to accept any of this. Sometimes I see opposition in the form of "Get in loser, you'll be left behind" and other times it's in the form of "It's all over the place, what do you mean you think you can opt out?"
[Note to the mansplainers of Mastodon: This is a thread, meaning you should read the whole thing and then even still think twice before replying.]
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@emilymbender I think that your more nuanced reality is clearer to those with enough life experience to have seen trends and fads rise and fall, new things become old, etc. It's very easy even for highly intelligent people to get swept up in the excitement of New Things, because the wisdom of perspective doesn't come from intellect but instead from observational experience. I think another significant element is FOMO, which everyone has to some degree. And again, experience mitigates that best.
@emilymbender Funny how the people worried about inevitability don't save themselves a lot of effort by curling up and dying somewhere, since their deaths are surely even more inevitable.
Reminds me of when people decry others as "unnatural." Oh, thanks for taking to the Internet, definitely a natural formation, to tell everyone that you (incorrectly) don't think that homosexuality (et al) occurs naturally and therefore should stop.
@emilymbender I didn't intend to mansplain this, but I appreciate stating from go this is a thread.
As far as the whole thing, I keep coming back to other technological paradigms and I don't recall the internet, smart phones, even social media being something so many people with so much contempt for it giving up and deciding they have to go along. I've never worked somewhere that would move my name way up the chopping block if layoffs happen because I didn't have a Facebook account or an iPhone or maybe even directly told me they would fire me if I didn't meet an internet usage quota at work. It became endemic at workplaces of mine years after it became endemic in personal settings.
@emilymbender Re: Mastodon:
I am amazed that you have the patience to interact on this buggy platform.
Otherwise I agree with what you communicate in your thread.
@emilymbender I'd recommend listening to the mirror mirror episode of cozys casts
<title><![CDATA[mirror, mirror]]></title> <description><![CDATA[<p>PLEASE don't forget how special you are <3</p> ]]></description> <link>https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/cozyscasts/episodes/mirror--mirror-e32mkui</link> <guid isPermaLink="false">f5b79bae-c00b-4661-94d6-a3b51f3a8a0d</guid> url="https://anchor.fm/s/1001eea14/podcast/play/102502802/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2025-4-11%2F3f57f7fd-3bf4-f69c-2a01-0b5253decf64.mp3
<itunes: href="https://d3t3ozftmdmh3i.cloudfront.net/staging/podcast_uploaded_episode/42869933/42869933-1746984498863-d8913437c25d2.jpg"/>
@emilymbender I wish they'd stop threatening to leave me behind and actually leave me behind already.
https://bsky.app/profile/smoothdunk2.bsky.social/post/3mvx47m5nuc2w
@emilymbender I'm too stupid to read it all, but I'm not stupid enough not to get the general message. Love it
your very nich post
It's nice seeing threads like this when there seems to be an overwhelming effort into gaslighting us into thinking we're crazy for not wanting it.
@emilymbender
> "Get in loser, you'll be left behind"
Today I answered such “wisdom” with “then why you won't leave us alone with a habitable planet?”
@emilymbender "So was asbestos" is a reply I like to give to these people.
@emilymbender I'm even second guessing my participation with the Internet, especially the phone thing. I miss when tech was exciting and fun rather than a tube for the rich to steal everything, including our relationships, thoughts and joy.
@emilymbender If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Survival of the fittest. Etc., etc..
How many platitudes between The Big Bang and The Big Crunch?.. but the priority of these differentials, applied eloquently... ... ...
To the first, I say: Fine, I don't want to go where that bandwagon is headed.
"Left behind" is an interesting phrase, it indexes a notion of a race towards a desirable/shining "future" that only some can access, and which we should all hope to participate in.
But the TESCREAList/tech bro future is not one I want any part in and in fact one that I actively resist --- and I hope others will too.
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@emilymbender Winter has arrived in Gaza. We urgently need warm clothes, blankets, and tarpaulins to protect us from the cold and rain. 💔🥶👕🧣☂️
Any donation or share can make a difference. 🙏❤️ please please 😔 🙏 help me 📎 the link in the bio
“Left Behind”…sounds kinda End Timesy to me
I recently counter the "Left behind" heard with quick reflective "Well, I am staying behind, sure. Watching you walking toward the cliff".
:)) #noai
To the second, I say not accepting it isn't the same as denying that people are using the janky tech sold as "AI", some by choice, others because it is forced on them in their job.
Not accepting it means not normalizing it, refusing everywhere I can refuse, pushing for holding the companies producing this accountable with existing & new regulation, working to protect the environment & important social infrastruture.
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@emilymbender thank you for all the work you do on this. being so vocal in saying no and showing that we can do the same in our own small parts of the world.
You can get religious exemption from using it in your job!
"It's already here, what do you mean you think you can refuse?" is just another variation of the agency-stealing inevitability narrative. The future is not yet written, and we can shape it, starting with rejecting inevitability and claiming our agency.
/fin
@emilymbender @bwana I think machine learning and the tools we can build with it are something that should be in the hands and under the direct control of everyone who wants to use them. We cannot allow a bunch of corporations to monopolise the technology. We need to stop the hyperscalers from buying up all the hardware and driving computer prices through the roof for everybody. There is a lot of open source AI software that runs locally on a regular PC, no Internet connection needed, no computing centre needed, but it does need decent GPUs and enough RAM, and those things are hard to obtain and cost an arm and a leg, no thanks to those hyperscalers.
"The future is not yet written" is giving Sarah Connor vibes. 🫡
@emilymbender My mum used to say this: if everybody is jumping off a bridge, do you just jump after them?
That's really all the reason needed to reject the AI hype.
@emilymbender Beautifully put! Way better than I would have been able to! (And with significantly less profanity. Cudos!)
@emilymbender if you use a computer, it is very likely one is at least using the product of one of the stochastic extrusion machines.
I'm with you. wherever I can, I resist.
in circles I frequent, an increasing prevalence of "ethical" / "solidarity" "AI". inevitably, looking into 2nd- and 3rd-level funders/participants are tied to the big bads in the industry. it's open/ethical-washing a fundamentally fascist tech tree.
trying to keep an open mind, hopefully my brain doesn't fall out
@emilymbender Agreed. Also, one of the main characteristic about this tech is how it's supposed to simplify everything: you don't need to know how to code/write/draw etc, you just write a prompt. This is one of its main selling point. So, *if* we really get to a point where it becomes "inevitable", at least it will be easy to catch up. No point in hurrying up now.
I think they are hoping to make the world's knowledge so turgid and unreadable that the only way to get any work done is to use their AI analysis.
@emilymbender In the moment we are forced to use it on the job so it has an authoritarian inevitability but not a technical one.
@emilymbender The 'inevitable' rethoric always reminds me of Thatcher's 'There is no alternative' (TINA).
