Post

There's no tenable middleground on air travel or eating meat, either, but most of us do it anyway. Like everyone I'm afraid of AI's impacts on the planet and society, but/so I'm researching it, which means I need to use it. Guess I'm unethical: oh well.

Emily M. Bender@emilymbender.bsky.social

A phenomenon I've noticed recently is people trying to occupy some untenable middleground wrt to the use of systems sold as "AI" -- this is a position where people try to recognize the harms of this tech but also hold space for "responsible" or "ethical" use. 🧵>>

24/6/26, 9:42 pm1 repost8 likes

Denise Utochkin

@denise-utochkin.bsky.social

24 June

I hope this isn't an amount of getting real that is deemed inappropriate for bsky, but: the "so I'm researching it" line omits a key part: "... because it's clear 'AI' is a bad idea, but I'm assuming it's inevitable until proven otherwise".

Denise Utochkin

@denise-utochkin.bsky.social

24 June

As a fellow vulgar Marxist, I don't think much analysis needs to be done beyond thinking 'AI' and reification together for five minutes (esp. after Weizenbaum lowered the difficulty level for both understanding this and for nourishing this understanding in others).

Yep, same ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

@gabrielh.bsky.social

24 June

yes I'm writing a thing on this in relation to illicit knowledge more generally -- how can one know a forbidden thing and yet not participate in it, how can one condemn and yet not know