This story, as well as other gender-related issues within the Sequences, mean that despite them containing what seems to be to be a lot of value, I definitely would not recommend them to anyone else without large disclaimers, in a similar fashion to how Eliezer refers to Aumann.
This story irresistibly reads to me as the author endorsing or implicitly assuming:
1) There are exactly two genders, and everyone is a member of exactly one;
2) Everyone is heterosexual;
3) Humans have literally 0 use for members of the other gender other than romance.
1) There are exactly two genders, and everyone is a member of exactly one; 2) Everyone is heterosexual; 3) Humans have literally 0 use for members of the other gender other than romance.
As a general aesthetic rule, avoiding works of literature that do not contain explicit evidence of these facts doesn’t sound particularly fun.
In particular, however, notice that we were told a story about a single protagonist who is an apparently-heterosexual male with an apparently-heterosexual female partner. The other characters aren’t human. How exactly do you make it relevant to the plot that all of us homosexual males live in pleasure domes on the terrraformed shores of Titan?
OK, look, literally a five-year-old would say “but what about my friends who are girls”. That the author writes a ‘superintelligence’ who does not address this objection, and a main character who does not mention any, say, coworkers, board-game-playing rivals, or recreational hockey team members who are women, gives an overwhelming, and overwhelmingly unpleasant, impression that women are solely romance and sex objects. That’s not only gross, it’s a very common failure mode of “we’re too smart to be sexist” male tech geeks. And, indeed, downthread you can see other commenters talking about how great a utopia this sounds like.
That the author writes a ‘superintelligence’ who does not address this objection
That is, the point of the entire exercise, i.e., to show one out of a gazillion possible failure modes that can happen if you get FAI almost (but not quite) right—a theme that shows up time and time again in EY’s fiction. Acting like the superintelligence character is some kind of Author Avatar is really ignorant of… well, everything else he’s written. That’s why this a “Failed Utopia” and not a “Utopia.”
and a main character who does not mention any, say, coworkers, board-game-playing rivals, or recreational hockey team members who are women, gives an overwhelming, and overwhelmingly unpleasant, impression that women are solely romance and sex objects.
How long does the plot take—perhaps ten minutes? We see the main character in a moment of extreme shock, and then, extreme grief—an extreme grief that is vitally important to the moral of the story (explicitly: “I didn’t want this, even though the AI was programmed to be ‘friendly’”). Adding anyone else to the plot dilutes this point.
And, indeed, downthread you can see other commenters talking about how great a utopia this sounds like.
That is, the point of the entire exercise, i.e., to show one out of a gazillion possible failure modes that can happen if you get FAI almost (but not quite) right—a theme that shows up time and time again in EY’s fiction. Acting like the superintelligence character is some kind of Author Avatar is really ignorant of… well, everything else he’s written. That’s why this a “Failed Utopia” and not a “Utopia.”
That much is true, but looking at SamLL’s contributions it seems that what made him untranslatable 1 was “The Opposite Sex”, which is written in EY’s own voice.
This story, as well as other gender-related issues within the Sequences, mean that despite them containing what seems to be to be a lot of value, I definitely would not recommend them to anyone else without large disclaimers, in a similar fashion to how Eliezer refers to Aumann.
This story irresistibly reads to me as the author endorsing or implicitly assuming:
1) There are exactly two genders, and everyone is a member of exactly one; 2) Everyone is heterosexual; 3) Humans have literally 0 use for members of the other gender other than romance.
As a general aesthetic rule, avoiding works of literature that do not contain explicit evidence of these facts doesn’t sound particularly fun.
In particular, however, notice that we were told a story about a single protagonist who is an apparently-heterosexual male with an apparently-heterosexual female partner. The other characters aren’t human. How exactly do you make it relevant to the plot that all of us homosexual males live in pleasure domes on the terrraformed shores of Titan?
Triple negative :(
OK, look, literally a five-year-old would say “but what about my friends who are girls”. That the author writes a ‘superintelligence’ who does not address this objection, and a main character who does not mention any, say, coworkers, board-game-playing rivals, or recreational hockey team members who are women, gives an overwhelming, and overwhelmingly unpleasant, impression that women are solely romance and sex objects. That’s not only gross, it’s a very common failure mode of “we’re too smart to be sexist” male tech geeks. And, indeed, downthread you can see other commenters talking about how great a utopia this sounds like.
That is, the point of the entire exercise, i.e., to show one out of a gazillion possible failure modes that can happen if you get FAI almost (but not quite) right—a theme that shows up time and time again in EY’s fiction. Acting like the superintelligence character is some kind of Author Avatar is really ignorant of… well, everything else he’s written. That’s why this a “Failed Utopia” and not a “Utopia.”
How long does the plot take—perhaps ten minutes? We see the main character in a moment of extreme shock, and then, extreme grief—an extreme grief that is vitally important to the moral of the story (explicitly: “I didn’t want this, even though the AI was programmed to be ‘friendly’”). Adding anyone else to the plot dilutes this point.
That’s the bloody point. FAI is hard.
That much is true, but looking at SamLL’s contributions it seems that what made him untranslatable 1 was “The Opposite Sex”, which is written in EY’s own voice.
And the AI would reply “if you had never met said friends, would you still miss them? Sounds like a clear case of sunk cost bias.”