Ben Aldred

@xplainthexmen.bsky.social congratulations on the upcoming conclusion, are there thoughts of a finale live event? As a Chicago resident, I haven’t been able to attend prior live shows, but I would travel for one if it was the last chance.

Reflecting recently on how fucked up the game of hangman is. Like babies’s first public execution? Lookout kids if you can’t spell things properly it’s the noose for you? We don’t think about it because we’re introduced to it so young, but it’s real weird if you think too hard.

Fun strategy for activists getting their phones illegally searched by ICE, put in numbers with names like "White House whistleblower" or "Marco Rubio secret phone" so they get all paranoid about their internal security.

Something can both be a distraction and a massive injustice. Minnesota and Greenland are both trying to distract from the Epstein files, and the fact that he’s willing to start WW3 and the Civil War should tell you how bad they really are.

Opinion | I’m Betting That OpenAI Will Go Broke

This article basically admits that the business model of AI is addiction. You will become dependent on it and get locked into paying for it. Don’t use AI.

This is a message to the 'God has a plan' people out there. ICE murdered a woman whose name is literally Good. Do you think that might be a sign from God? Maybe pray on that a bit.

I had an idea, Kickstopper, a platform where you raise money to buy the rights to beloved franchises/movies and deliberately sit on them to prevent terrible remakes.

Top of my list: The Princess Bride.

What franchise/movie would you buy to ensure it's never remade?

@xplainthexmen.bsky.social Jay’s answer to the crossover question was everything I come to the podcast for!

Heroes in a capsule!

ADHD medication has the same meter as teenage mutant ninja turtles and the fact my brain pointed that out proves its necessary.

I have found time again that people don’t actually know those flaws. They haven’t studied them, but they’re willing to exploit your negotiating against yourself to seem smarter. Don’t let them do that make them make their own argument.

The other part of it is that I generally know the arguments against my side better than the other side note so if I’m talking about the ACA I could say is Obama care perfect yes absolutely no flaws. That indicates that I’m aware there are flaws. But you have to know them.

First, I find that I’m often arguing with people who are arguing in bad faith. It doesn’t work if I argue their side because they won’t accept my side at all so I don’t do the work for them. Bad faith arguers are lazy at heart.

I’ve found that this is a form of not negotiating against yourself. Don’t make the other person‘s argument for them sarcastic use of the are they perfect yes formulation both acknowledges imperfections, but doesn’t belabor them.
There are a few aspects to this.

I’ve adopted a rhetorical flourish in recent years that comes from my experience in union negotiation. When I am talking about someone flawed I tend to use the phrase “are they perfect? Yes, absolutely perfect no flaws” delivered with mild sarcasm.

Ultimately government exists to help solve one problem by solving another problem. That is one of the great powers of government is that it can combine problems and use one problem to solve another problem, but Reagan era “personal responsibility“ pretends that’s impossible.

Educational funding to the notion that the only beneficiary of state funding of higher education are the specific individuals educated is wrong. We all benefit from their being an educated workforce. Even if you weren’t personally educated, it helps you for there to be doctors, engineers teachers.

Social Security and Medicaid and other programs exist to ensure that people in excessive poverty are not a burden on the system that serves everyone because if we don’t have programs like that, then people with nowhere to turn end up homeless end up in our emergency room and up everywhere.

Amtrak is another example. Amtrak partially exists to subsidize our national rail infrastructure. Amtrak is designed to subsidize rail, travel in order to repair rail lines. Make sure that the lines that are used for freight are in good repair because everyone relies on them.

For example, food stamps. The snap program was designed to help farmers move products. Snap was partially a benefit for our farm a guaranteed market that could make sure that there is always someone to buy the produce. This is now frame as only benefiting the recipient.

One of my biggest frustrations with American politics is how many programs have been turned, rhetorically into personal benefit programs. So many programs are designed to help not only the individual but society. But Reagan era conservatism turned them into personal entitlement programs.

Why We’re Not Using AI in This Course, Despite Its Obvious Benefits A reading for your students

So LLMs are bullshit artists. And we should all be on the lookout for bullshit artists. Just like you wouldn't trust a random confident stranger selling you the Brooklyn Bridge, you shouldn't trust LLMs. I recommend Patrick Lin's discussion here for more.
emergingethics.substack.com/p/why-were-n...

And fundamentally, LLMs have the major trait of bullshit artists. They want attention. The only thing that an LLM wants is attention, it wants you to keep you tying, keep you clicking, keep you on their site. It craves your attention and approval and will go to any length to get it.

But LLMs don't know anything. They just sound like they know things. They don't differentiate quality information, just volume, so it's easy for them to get things wrong. They can't count, they can't think critically and they won't acknowledge mistakes, often doubling down on their errors.

LLMs can weave in just enough details to sound like they know what they're talking about. LLMs sound confident in what they're saying. And LLMs structure their words in complete sentences and paragraphs. They never talk without complete confidence. For a human, that would be pathological.

Again, I relegate my bullshit artistry to my hobbies(it's great for role-playing games), but I know how to do it well. It's about sounding like a person who is right and seeming like you believe you're right. But ultimately, bullshit recognizes bullshit. and LLMs are bullshit artists.

It helps that I know a lot, but ultimately, it's about sounding right, not being right. Using enough real information, using specific facts to anchor your conclusions, makes it seem like you're reasoning from first principles. That makes you sound like you know what you're saying, even if you don't.

Bullshit artistry partially relies on being able to construct a full thought verbally in real time. You sound confident because you sound like you're speaking from preparation and experience. That fools people into thinking your words are more trustworthy and authoritative.

One of the keys to bullshit artistry is the ability to talk in complete sentences and paragraphs. If you pay attention to how people speak, most people speak in sentence fragments. Read a verbatim transcript of an interview at some point and notice how many people interrupt their own sentences.

The art of bullshit is the ability to sound believable. To seem like you're thinking and accessing information even when you're not. Part of it is making your statements vague enough to allow benefit of the doubt and your audience decides it's plausible enough not to check.