There are different levels of AI books, and websites like BN and Amazon ask on their submission what specifically was done by or assisted by AI to get a read on what authors are doing. Full AI written based on a bunch of prompts gets garbage, I agree there, and it’s also the easy route so the market is being flooded, especially the low effort ones, since that’s far easier to do than actual prose from AI. But AI can also have a subtle aid to an actual writer. I realize some people are dead set on zero AI, period, and I understand the reasons. It sucks we’ve gotten to this point where some incredible things can be done, and yet so much as been ruined by that progress too, when it could have been done better and more honestly.

As someone who has a few books on Amazon and BN, I’ve used AI for a bit of behind the scenes for artwork, then taking that in Gimp for the final product. The books were done mainly to see if I could put them together and was fun to do. The hard part is actually selling any, it’s a nightmare for the same reason, oversaturation.

I will say that BN’s website sucks big time. I thought Amazon’s was flaky but figured it out, but I’m surprised I ever got books onto BN as much as it hangs, and I haven’t been able to get onto my account in a while to even see how the books are doing there, but I doubt I’ve sold any because I haven’t seen evidence, and I question who goes there now to buy a book.

Fix your website!

Oh, and they also just raised the minimum print price to like $14.99, so no cheap books, and if you have a low cost book there, no one is going to buy it now for those prices. Brilliant.

Clicking on newer revision lets you walk through time.

It’s not about finding habitat, but a large scale version of kill or be killed, or stay quiet and hope they don’t see you.

Definitely not to enslave. The path that the 3 Body Problem goes down is a science-based eldritch horror.

Yes, the problem was solved.

listens to the last scene

Oh no.

I knew I remembered that name. Great book and reference.

I was with Pizza Hut when we got that directive of empowerment to do what was best to retain the customer. No manager needed for most things, just treat them well. We had a lot of regular customers, I wonder why. That was a long time ago.

Escaping from one gravity well to go to another gravity well that is far more deadly is foolish. Both Mars and the Moon, as well as probably any body that doesn’t have some sort of erosion mechanic, has fine, sharp dust which is terrible on both equipment and biology.

I still am a believer just as I was a 70s kid that O’Neill was on the right track, and space is the next logical place for humanity. What has changed over the decades is my belief that we can get there. Not because of the science or the technology, but because of our tendency to focus resources on other things that don’t help anyone. The window is all but shut on space now. And any billionaires that send people to Mars in some grand colonization scheme are just dooming them and wasting more on their own ego.

So whatever happens now, humanity will have its eggs in one basket, and that basket does have an expiration date.

AGI “can’t” happen like man can’t fly or 256 KB is enough memory. Will or can it happen? No one is sure. Will it happen this way, through plugging more compute and power into LLMs, that’s a definite no. But it’s the money grab right now, and anyone who didn’t follow the leaders would have been left behind with nothing.

So you’re right for this discussion, but in the broader sense we can’t say that for sure. One thing I’m sure about is how LLMs and the profit scramble for it have ruined actual research into the real thing.

I’d say answer just to see if the Dark Forest is valid. If it is, honestly they’re going to find us eventually anyway.

So, Ender’s Game

Large NEOs are very unlikely at this point for the reasons you’ve given. It’s advanced warning on anything else that’s needed. Redirection is another topic, but we have no experience and only theory on the best ways to do it, and wouldn’t know which technique to try before a close examination (which means time to find it and get to it just to figure that out). As for advanced warning for evacuation, that’s probably the most likely scenario, but it’s also morbidly funny to mention in a thread discussing near misses found days before its passing, and often we see articles about the rock after the fact. (Although maybe it was known about before by experts, just didn’t hit the press in time)

*Another

What’s needed is a 24/7 space-based observation system, not rely on leftover observation time on telescopes and amateur aid. The near misses are rarely even close, and the sizes are small enough to at most endanger a small area, but it’s a lesson that if there ever was a big one, we wouldn’t even know or be able to do anything. Find the big ones very early, we might be able to change the future, but we won’t find them with how we look now.

Not all parts of the brain deteriorate at the same rate.

I’ll bet the cause of that is simple. The one person who knew how to change the message no longer works there, and while that has been mentioned to the higher ups, it’s not a priority so it got shoved into the “to-do” pile.

It’s not a matter of getting back what you put in, but to be able to not worry about supporting your basic needs in the last part of life. That many have paid into the system their entire working life and it isn’t enough without some extra supplement suggests it’s not working well enough.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s instructions to modify the system prompt to maximize effectiveness, and everyone leaves it at the generic default. Just like so many people leave other things at the default and just plug it in and go. Thank goodness the Cisco hold music is decent. I grew to love it while holding on the VA phone lines a lot for my dad.

Could be, but there’s also population growth. It’s not really a surplus if it’s an ongoing balance between incoming and outgoing with an above zero balance that fluctuates. You don’t want it to dip below zero.

The last part is exactly what they want you to think. It WAS meant to be sufficient, but that would have cost someone else, so they invented the idea of people taking care of themselves with the 401K invention. Now when your SS doesn’t mean your needs, they can point and say, well, you should have saved up better.

There used to be company pensions too, but they’ve slowly eroded away as younger people entered their jobs. My job gave me the option years ago of keeping the pension going or converting it to a secondary 401k that would earn lots of money, promise. I said hell no, give me my pension.

Funny you mention a phone tree, something that’s been hit by AI. It’s actually been around longer as voice recognition that finds a close match to a keyword, but in theory AI should be able to take a request and break down what is actually needed.

I haven’t run across an AI version that works well. I don’t know if that’s because the voice recognition part is still bad, or if they’re using Co-pilot (since I know how it mangles simple requests in text).