PendingKetchup's recent activity
-
Comment on Language models are weird for the same reason human cultures are weird in ~comp
-
Comment on If you let AI do your writing, I will come to your house and kill you in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentDoes effective literature really provide insight into the human condition because the author formed that insight and set out to convey it through fiction, rather than by writing a pamphlet of "My...Does effective literature really provide insight into the human condition because the author formed that insight and set out to convey it through fiction, rather than by writing a pamphlet of "My Insight Into The Human Condition"?
My understanding of literary analysis is that you kill off the author almost immediately, and then set about interpreting the text on its own, looking for resonance between it and reality. Good, well-observed literature with believable characters and an author who succeeds in illuminating particular aspects of reality works better for this.
But the meaning is really made by the reader. You can do the same category of thing with something like a Tarot spread. If you have a way to get fake text that passes, where the metaphor is not transparently nonsensical, the described physics of bodies is not obviously impossible, the characters' motivations are well-rendered, and the hero's journey doesn't trail off in the middle, I think you probably could get real insight into the human condition from fake humans described by a fake human, instead of fake humans described by a real one. But you would need, in effect, a working scale model of the human condition in order to do it.
So I guess the claim is that a human mind can build and operate this model in a useful way, while a next token predictor cannot?
-
Comment on If you let AI do your writing, I will come to your house and kill you in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentDid the LLM actually do what is described, though, or did it just imagine it did? Even if they can now spin out text in the context of web search results, or, hell, even in the context of whole...Did the LLM actually do what is described, though, or did it just imagine it did?
Even if they can now spin out text in the context of web search results, or, hell, even in the context of whole books, or whole bodies of work, does that do anything to counter the claim that the text coming out is in the ontological category of "bullshit"? Or does it just make it "better" (i.e. more convincing, harder to falsify) bullshit?
-
Comment on Dubmood - Fighting Words (Razor1911) (2026) in ~music
PendingKetchup LinkIt turns out cybercrime is cool actually.Support quality software. And stop fascism.
It turns out cybercrime is cool actually.
-
Comment on Google releases Gemma 4 in ~comp
PendingKetchup Link ParentI think it's a probably-deliberately misleading, and even dangerous, way to word it, because it presupposes that "intelligence" is something that can be quantified, that should be quantified, or...I think it's a probably-deliberately misleading, and even dangerous, way to word it, because it presupposes that "intelligence" is something that can be quantified, that should be quantified, or that people know how to quantify, to create a number you can divide by something.
We didn't do all that work to kill the idea that human intelligence can be boiled down to an IQ score that can then be used to assign value to people, just to have it sneak back in as an idea about computers.
If Google was announcing they had hired a new and "more intelligent per neuron" crop of human employees this year, we would recognize it as obvious eugenics nonsense. If they pitched their new cloud instance type as "more intelligent per dollar" than the previous generation, that would be obviously unhelpful when things about core counts and memory capacity can be said instead. Why put up with that rhetoric here?
We always need to keep in mind that we're using a score on a particular test as an evaluation metric, designed as a proxy for the efficiency with which a particular class of tasks might be accomplished. We can never use the shorthand of calling this just "intelligence".
-
Comment on <deleted topic> in ~life
PendingKetchup LinkIf you are co-parenting, in one sense your time really is not your own: the project of caring for children has to have first claim on it. So one really should get "permission" in some sense from...If you are co-parenting, in one sense your time really is not your own: the project of caring for children has to have first claim on it. So one really should get "permission" in some sense from one's co-parent(s) to absent oneself from the project. You can't just bail and expect them to cover for you: what if all the parents tried to do that at once?
But framing that as, oh, the woman is in charge of scheduling not just for herself but for the entire family, is a little worrying. One person doing it wouldn't be so weird, sometimes one person in a family really just does wear a sort of executive assistant hat and keep track of where everyone ought to be at any given moment and that's the way they like it. But if a lot of men are acting like this about a lot of women, you might have a systemic gendered labor imbalance.
I terms of what people mean when they say this, I think they probably think they mean Option 3, but actually have an Option 2 problem. To really figure it out you need to like check how much Gender and Women's Studies they know.
-
Comment on Android to debut "advanced flow" for sideloading unverified applications in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI'm going to double post because, the right way to stop people from being scammed into installing apps is not to make it take 24 hours. The right way to stop people from being scammed into...I'm going to double post because, the right way to stop people from being scammed into installing apps is not to make it take 24 hours. The right way to stop people from being scammed into installing apps is to make the idea of installing an app you don't genuinely want to avoid some negative consequence completely, societally absurd. Like, take-off-all-your-clothes-and-cluck-like-a-chicken, nobody-could-ever-have-a-reason-to-do-that absurd.
It is only in our society where people are routinely pressured or compelled into nonconsensual relationships with software (for a bank, a parking spot, YouTube, a news site, the government, a concert ticket) that it is even possible for someone to call you up and scam, threaten, or harrangue you into installing an app.
-
Comment on Android to debut "advanced flow" for sideloading unverified applications in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI don't think the ability of genuine developers to run software of their choosing was ever in doubt. A legitimate owner with physical access and control, among other things, of which device they...I don't think the ability of genuine developers to run software of their choosing was ever in doubt. A legitimate owner with physical access and control, among other things, of which device they actually buy, is always going to win.
The thing that's being traded off against "scammers need to scam you more slowly" is "only software that participates in the marketplace is available to the public".
If you can just give away software, different software is produced. Consider the average quality of the software in F-Droid, in terms of whose interests it acts in, versus that of the software in the Play Store.
If you must pay for the right to give away software, even a token amount, you are now operating in a regime where you want your money back. If an AppID is has to be registered to a particular legal entity, it makes an app as an entity, independent of its source code, into capital.
The existence of a genuine software gift economy that envisions all people as potential producers of software is a threat to the Play Store's offering to businesses, which is control over the devices of a captive audience of consumers, which can be sold back to them one microtransaction at a time.
-
Comment on I hope you don't use generative AI - an essay about my experience offering an open-source tool in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI feel like new programming languages and features are also the only possible answer to this sort of LLM code generation. Maybe some extremely-high-level ones for rapid application development....I feel like new programming languages and features are also the only possible answer to this sort of LLM code generation. Maybe some extremely-high-level ones for rapid application development.
People clearly want to be able to say "I want a windows to pop up with two buttons and a text box and a picture of a cat" and have that happen, without needing to worry about the details. But articulating that in English can't possibly be the right way to do it, because as soon as you start to add a few details, it quickly extends to paragraphs of dialog about what the buttons should say and do and what breed the cat needs to be, in a weirdly precise dialect that's hard to write.
Language models might be able to make programming as simple as writing a detailed spec, but a well-designed programming language should be able to make it simpler. Think of the difference between Ruby and Ruby on Rails, and then put the whole thing on another set of rails. The models prove that kind of development is physically possible, but does it have to involve several gigawatts and a slot machine?
-
Comment on I hope you don't use generative AI - an essay about my experience offering an open-source tool in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI think there's a future for generative models in computer programming, but I don't understand why people think in this teleological way. The technology used to do work is a political decision,...like it or not, this is the future of development. It's already happening at scale, and it's not going to stop.
I think there's a future for generative models in computer programming, but I don't understand why people think in this teleological way. The technology used to do work is a political decision, and many times in the past technologies that were "the" future turned out not to be, because people stopped liking them.
Once upon a time, The Future of Development was SOAP web services. Or managed code. Or whatever the hell a "Java Bean" is. Or Web 2.0 "mashups". Just yesterday it was "blockchain".
These technologies are also "here to stay" in that they have not ceased to exist, but one can lead a full and exciting life as a developer in the modern age without ever actually having to work with a SOAP web service.
-
Comment on What do you think about putting your driver's license in your digital wallet? in ~tech
PendingKetchup LinkI looked into this a while ago, and I don't see a major security or privacy problem with it over a physical card (since if someone can compromise the phone to get your name and address out they...I looked into this a while ago, and I don't see a major security or privacy problem with it over a physical card (since if someone can compromise the phone to get your name and address out they can compromise the phone to get a bunch of way more valuable stuff that's not already public record).
But I do see a major availability problem: phones lack the ontological inertia of a physical card, and you don't want to be relying on something to prove you're allowed to be driving that's one dead battery away from not being able to do that.
And there's a security problem with the system as a whole, which is that nobody knows how to check a virtual ID. Maybe the cops do, but if you want to prove your identity to a random business or a person you are trading with on Craigslist or something, they won't have the software or expertise to actually check the certificates/signatures involved. So you'd just be showing them an app on your own phone and claiming that's your ID. Which means when a scammer shows up and shows an app on their phone that claims they are you, nobody can tell the difference. So it's bad evidence, just like knowing someone's social security number, and one shouldn't go around expecting others to take it as good evidence.
-
Comment on The future of AI in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI think the answer here is a program of guerilla education. If you don't think you can take over your state education department and you don't think you can mount a successful electoral campaign...I think the answer here is a program of guerilla education. If you don't think you can take over your state education department and you don't think you can mount a successful electoral campaign to take over your local school board, or if the people who need education aren't in school anyway, then you've got to teach whoever will listen, one class at a time.
-
Comment on Update on developer access and platform security | Spotify for Developers in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentFor learning what, exactly? Learning to use a API/service that exists exclusively for you to learn to use it? Why would anyone want to learn to use this if it is specifically designed not to be...For learning what, exactly? Learning to use a API/service that exists exclusively for you to learn to use it? Why would anyone want to learn to use this if it is specifically designed not to be able to be used?
-
Comment on The assistant axis: situating and stabilizing the character of large language models in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentWhat if you post links to a malware author's blog, where they detail why they think their malware is the greatest malware of all time? Anthropic puts out a lot of marketing whitepapers where what...What if you post links to a malware author's blog, where they detail why they think their malware is the greatest malware of all time?
Anthropic puts out a lot of marketing whitepapers where what one would really like is peer-reviewed research. But I've read a couple of them and they seemed better than nothing. If it would pe appropriate to submit the official product page for the new Google Pixel, which is equally uncritical, authored by a known malicious actor, and exists to convince you that the numerous features of said Pixel are the solution to all of life's woes, it would be appropriate to link to one of Anthropic's writeups.
-
Comment on Need help unlocking phone from carrier (AT&T) in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentAre these third-party services just bribing people at the carrier or something? Do they have backdoor in the carriers' systems?Are these third-party services just bribing people at the carrier or something? Do they have backdoor in the carriers' systems?
-
Comment on Financial collapse? in ~finance
PendingKetchup Link ParentAs I understand it, bankruptcy is how you prevent people taking all your stuff to try and cover your debts. Instead of getting sued by creditors and having various savings or pieces of personal...As I understand it, bankruptcy is how you prevent people taking all your stuff to try and cover your debts. Instead of getting sued by creditors and having various savings or pieces of personal property seized in separate cases to cover different debts, you file for bankruptcy protection, which ensures that some amount of important things are not seized to cover debts, and that the creditors all lose out to the same degree, instead of the last one to sue you losing the most.
-
Comment on An AI that turns any book into a text adventure game in ~books
PendingKetchup Link ParentI don't think character copyright works like that though. My understanding is that I can't publish a work about, say, Darth Vader From Star Wars, no matter whether I prepare that work using a...I don't think character copyright works like that though. My understanding is that I can't publish a work about, say, Darth Vader From Star Wars, no matter whether I prepare that work using a legitimately purchased copy of Star Wars, a pirated copy of Star Wars, or whatever I inferred about the character of Darth Vader from talking to ten Star Wars fans.
-
Comment on Why do LLMs freak out over the seahorse emoji? in ~tech
PendingKetchup Link ParentI thought the explanation was pretty good, when it was really there an not just tell G me to ask a model and hope it explained itself correctly. L What these things really are more than anything...I thought the explanation was pretty good, when it was really there an not just tell G me to ask a model and hope it explained itself correctly. L
What these things really are more than anything else is ways to slide around in word vibe space, so it makes sense that one would output emoji by vibrating with the energy of emoji-ness and of whatever thing was supposed to be being put in emoji form, and then trying to express that.
-
Comment on Timeout when connecting to a local webserver through the internet, but only on WiFi in ~comp
PendingKetchup LinkI would look at the AP, since it is another box between you and the destination on the wifi path, and probably has a web UI and some ability to firewall. What does it think its own IP is? Is it...I would look at the AP, since it is another box between you and the destination on the wifi path, and probably has a web UI and some ability to firewall. What does it think its own IP is? Is it somehow doing triple NAT?
-
Comment on The Buff Scammer, isolation, and the male loneliness epidemic in ~life.men
PendingKetchup Link ParentI think I think of power gradients as kind of like the gradients of multuvariable calculus. If you have like rich white woman CEO over here, and a poor homeless noncitizen Hispanic man over there,...I think I think of power gradients as kind of like the gradients of multuvariable calculus. If you have like rich white woman CEO over here, and a poor homeless noncitizen Hispanic man over there, the first might have a higher "absolute" level of power than the second, but if you look at the derivative just along the gender dimension, that component points the other way. That local gradient might then be relevant if you are trying to think about gender-related aspects of their interactions, like who would be more likely to be taken to task for not giving enough attention to their children. I'm not really sure what current thinking is on who should be believed more if each simultaneously accuses the other of sexual assault, because you've put the "believe women" maxim up against the rest of the body of critical theory. I know you aren't meant to do a sort of "oppression Olympics" or start assigning point values to identity characteristics, but I don't really know what you are supposed to do instead.
Sexual exploitation indeed doesn't only happen down the gender gradient. Any power imbalance, for any reason, creates an opportunity for sexual exploitation. If people are going around thinking that is only a man thing, they are wrong. But that also means that you should take power dynamics other than gender into account when thinking about sexual assault.
Even if you don't feel more powerful as a man than women who are your peers, the theory says that the local gradient wherever you are is still "more woman -> less power", so if you were everything you are but also a woman, you would be predicted to have additional problems. I suppose it's possible you've found a place where that isn't actually true, but the theory also says that power disparities are much harder to see from the high side than the low side: the work of thinking about and dealing with them generally gets put on the people with less power. So you might want to check with the women peers to get their perspectives.
This was an interesting read, though I'm a little concerned that none of the example pictures of human cultures being weird feature the weird culture that I and I suspect the author are actually from, and I am wary of allowing the assertion that language models "will come to define our world" to be tossed in there without a fight.
This reminded me of an article from Anthropic's promotional blog where they talked about picking apart the internal data flow of one of their models in terms of "features". The article gives the impression of something kind of like a gene regulatory network, with huge numbers of tiny things that enhance and inhibit one another giving rise to the behavior of the system as a whole. What particularly struck me was an example they gave near the end where the model was unable to refuse to give instructions for making a bomb because it was not at the start of a sentence. English syntax dictates that you can only tell people that you refuse to answer their questions at a proper sentence boundary, and the machinery in the model that enforce that constraint and the machinery that enforce the principle that one should refuse when asked to give instructions on bomb-making are fundamentally the same kind of thing.
And that in turn reminded me of "features" as an important widget in a previous model of natural language: minimalist syntax in linguistics. In that theoretical system, you explain the structure of sentences by saying that sentences are really trees, with words organized into hierarchical phrases, and the trees snap together and occasionally have branches transplanted from one point to another because of a physics where "features" of the words constrain or motivate the interaction. Like in "What did you eat?", you would say it starts out as something more like
((eat what) you), until a[WH]feature on the word "what" makes it move to the subject position of the sentence, because English has some corresponding feature set on some important intermediate node in the tree that attracts it (while other languages might not). Or a plural noun can have a[plural]feature that then gets stamped onto verbs when they meet up in the tree, to give them the right verb endings.And it strikes me that the sorts of relationships between tokens modeled by transformer models, where the model digs around with its key-value lookup attention system and lights up particular previous tokens as very important for choosing the next token at particular positions, is actually quite a lot like the tree models of linguistic theories of syntax. A relationship between a token at point A and one at point B is quite like a common ancestor node in a syntax tree, and if the resulting web of these relationships is not quite a hierarchical tree, that's a lot like the sort of situation that syntax theories postulate a move operation to deal with.
So my net point is that I think language models are fundamentally syntactic creatures. They are still capable of operating on things that a human mind would handle with "semantics", the branch of linguistic theory that sits above syntax, (like the idea of bombs and the other ideas it is related to) but they are doing that by brute forcing their way through it using modeling techniques that are really best suited for syntactic problems like subject-verb agreement. This is why they can reliably produce things shaped like metaphors but the results are often unsatisfying in a literary context. The syntax says a metaphor goes here, and these ideas are nearby, so here one is. This also explains their great success at producing running computer code, where all the obstacles between a programmer and code that runs are fundamentally syntactic. And it explains their poor showing at dealing with problems above the level of running code, and their particular failure mode there of mimicking the forms of coherent architecture while missing the point, as evidenced by the extremely creative architectural approaches used in the largely LLM-generated Anthropic Claude Code codebase.
Will this go away if the bot herders find some way to mitigate "chunky post-training"? Maybe. But I still think the problem is structural. Humans don't learn this way at all; we actually deal with learning from sparse and expensive feedback surprisingly well, the author's dismissiveness around the necessity of blowing on one's corn notwithstanding. The Poverty of the Stimulus is a classic idea in linguistics: children do not actually get that much language, certainly not nearly as much as even GPT2, and yet the children come out as just as good if not better speakers. This is generally taken as evidence that the children are cheating: they are not actually re-deriving everything about their language from observed data, and instead children are thought to include, "out of the box," if you will, a lot of pre-programmed restrictions on how a language ought to be allowed to work.
Presumably one of these is that you ought to be allowed to refuse to tell people how to make a bomb at any point, not just after a period. Another might be that you oughtn't rebut people unless they are actually wrong, though the behavior of young children who have delightedly discovered the word "No!" might provide evidence that that one is learned.