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vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

This is my conversational account. For my work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

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    1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      Has anyone named this effect? I have seen it implicitly discussed but not explicitly. Human capability degrading faster than automation capability increases, creating a transient death-trap period where risks are very high. I call it the automation death trap effect.pic.twitter.com/t9e3rQPmb5

      20 replies 49 retweets 202 likes
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    2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      People assume human abilities stay constant while automation is improving. They don’t. The general degradation starts the moment you begin trusting the automation for *anything* because unused or rarely used skills degrade at the rate reinforcement schedule slows.

      5 replies 6 retweets 38 likes
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    3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      It’s been a long-standing debate in control theory and AI, but based on a false assumption: that such a thing as unmaintained emergency override skills can exist. Ie that humans deploy behavior X *only* in the emergencies where the automation fails. There is no such thing.

      1 reply 2 retweets 18 likes
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    4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      It is somewhere between malpractice and technical stupidity to base a design on this assumption. When the rate of use of a skill is lower than the rate of practice needed to keep it usable, it must be maintained at minimum practice level.

      2 replies 1 retweet 17 likes
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    5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      Driverless cars are the most familiar example. But any high-risk behavior that requires human backstopping of automation qualifies for this death-trap effect. I think a lot of infrastructure is either in, or getting close to, the death trap zone.

      2 replies 3 retweets 26 likes
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      Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 8 Jun 2019
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      This is a much more serious and real risk than AGI/singularity BS. Too much infrastructure being in the death-trap state at the same time due to correlated automation wave causing systemic collapses via contagion and 2nd order effects as failures cascade.

      3:38 PM - 8 Jun 2019
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      • 24 Likes
      • Zach Van Zandt mutual against utopia 🏴 Nick's Curve is Bent AF Dave Crossland Eric Hunter Nicola Burbach Rahul Ramchandani LuckDragon69 🚙⛓️
      3 replies 2 retweets 24 likes
        1. New conversation
        2. Dave Babbitt‏ @dbabbitt 9 Jun 2019
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          Replying to @vgr

          So, what is a more realistic plot to the 2006 Idiocracy movie?

          2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
        3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 9 Jun 2019
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          Replying to @dbabbitt

          Good question. Can't imagine one.

          0 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
        4. End of conversation
        1. New conversation
        2. Dorian Taylor‏ @doriantaylor 8 Jun 2019
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          Replying to @vgr

          consider when you have people making decisions that affect lots of other people, and some decisions in particular are decisions about installing systems that make their own decisions

          1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
        3. Dorian Taylor‏ @doriantaylor 8 Jun 2019
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          Replying to @doriantaylor @vgr

          reminds me of that piece by @jomc a while back:https://thebaffler.com/salvos/big-brothers-blind-spot-mcneil …

          0 replies 0 retweets 2 likes
        4. End of conversation
        1. 𝕭𝖊𝖑𝖑𝖉𝖆𝖓𝖉𝖞 𝕾𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖓𝖊‏ @smart_intellecc 8 Jun 2019
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          Replying to @vgr

          Can't we (or other countries w similar needs) just import more talented / less expensive people? Hmmm...

          0 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
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