mrpalmtree19's Shortform
Sep 25, 20251
mrpalmtree19
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Those are good ideas. I've done 1, 2, and 4. There's only one library that I can request stuff on, but they got the book in print, ebook, and audiobook form. I've emailed and mailed my representatives too, and I plan to call them within the next couple of weeks.
Reviewing the fake books on Amazon is a great idea, I was wondering what all of those were about.
Replying toOmelas Is Perfectly Misread
One thing that makes Omelas such a good story is that it supports a variety of interpretations. For me, it supported two (related) interpretations, neither of which was touched on here.
The first was religion. I was in the process of deconstructing my Christian beliefs when I read the story, and for me it pointed out the horror that the Christian story postulated. An all-knowing all-powerful god thought that eternal human suffering (hell) was a price worth paying for utopia (heaven) for a select few. Though it was even worse than the story; at least in Omelas, only one suffered so that everyone else could be free.
The second was the value of rejecting... (read more)
After reading IABED I'm left wanting to do more. One idea I had was to put copies of the book in my local Little Free Libraries. I'm curious about other people's opinions on this. Do you think this may be effective? Are there better ways to spend my time and money?
This is a special post for quick takes (aka "shortform"). Only the owner can create top-level comments.
IABIED and The Fermi Paradox: while reading IABIED I noticed something that confused me. The book seems to argue that we're on one of two paths. Option 1 is humanity barrels ahead with AI development, creates a misaligned ASI, and dies. Option 2 is humanity pauses AI development, hopefully solves alignment, then creates an ASI sometime a bit farther into the future. Which means that unless some other disaster befalls us, ASI from this point on is inevitable.
My confusion stems from how this interacts with the Fermi Paradox. If the book's take is true, humanity will eventually create ASI, and that ASI will eventually spread throughout the universe (or at least throughout... (read more)
That's a very reasonable concern and something I am a bit worried about. As an ex-Christian, I'm especially sensitive to those libraries getting loaded up with Christian works intending to convert, and can see how this could be similar.
I'm thinking as long as I don't put more than one book in each library, and make sure the library isn't filled with primarily children's books (ie stay on topic with the particular library), I should be ok.