ChinAI #266: An Ordinary Beijinger's Thoughts on AI
Greetings from a world where…
human writing is full of hormones
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Feature Translation: An Ordinary Beijinger’s Thoughts on Interacting with AI
Context: What does an ordinary 50 year-old, retired woman, who lives in Beijing, think about recent advances in AI? In this week’s feature translation, we hear from Yuanban Erjie (psuedonym, which loosely means “original version of second-eldest sister”). She explains, “A while ago, I got very keen about asking AI various types of questions. A Renwu [人物] editor found out about this and assigned me this topic to write about an ordinary person's experience in interacting with AI.” Renwu is a magazine that covers human-interest stories, such as this investigative report (ChinAI #112) of the algorithmic pressures faced by Chinese delivery drivers.
Key Passages: Erjie wanted to play around with ChatGPT, so she asked a junior high school kid (son of a former colleague) to get around the Great Firewall, in order to test its writing capabilities. Her main conclusion: AI-generating writing lacks vitality. “Just like when I was a kid, there was a class of good students in my class who had really great grades but were really boring people,” she analogizes.
She writes, “Sometimes, when I read some articles, I can feel that there are hormones in the author's words. Yes, those words are full of hormones, with vigorous and lively vitality. It has this very human touch. And this human touch, even if it’s very colloquial, and I can't even make sense of it, I still like it.” Here, she references Li Juan[李娟], a Chinese essayist who write about nomadic lifestyles in the Altay region of Xinjiang, China.
Her evidence came from asking ChatGPT (via this junior high kid), Alibaba’s Tongyi Qianwen, and Baidu’s ErnieBot to write an essay about spring. She also asked these models to review the Japanese drama “Rebooting.” On this task, she found the reviews to be pretty competent and comprehensive.
As a retiree with a husband who recently had lumbar spine surgery, she mused about AI applications in elderly assistance and end-of-life care.
She tells one story about how her husband tested out a sock assistance device, because she was feeling angry about having to get up at 6AM to help him put on his socks. Regarding this sock assistance tool: “How do you describe it? First, put the socks on the so-called artifact, then put them through the toes, and then pull them up. At best, you are only wearing half the sock. Usually, this magic sock assistance device cannot complete the step that we elderly people are accustomed to: ‘tuck the legs of long trousers into socks.’ So one day, my husband finally came to the conclusion that ‘no sock assistance tool is as good as you.’ I wonder if we can have intelligent robots to help with life scenarios like this in the future?
On a system for assigning robot caregivers: “In the future, our population will also be aging. Can we have robot caregivers? We can buy them, or customize them on demand. Or we can exchange them for points according to a person’s lifetime of virtue. For example, if you have rescued stray animals, you will be given points. After reaching a certain score, you can purchase an AI that will help you live out the last part of your life with dignity.” She also seems to have given some serious thought to the use of AI to assist with euthanasia, even jokingly naming an AI assistant “小murder”(Little Murder).
Lastly, there was one brief passage about her reflections on superintelligence: “I am also worried that technological progress is growing at an exponential rate. Maybe in a few decades, there will be a superintelligence that has independent consciousness and is not controlled by humans. Just like what some Hollywood blockbusters show, the machines rebel... What will humans do then? Is there any way for us to survive? Therefore, I always feel that in the face of AI, we still should use it in a limited way.”
FULL TRANSLATION: An Ordinary Beijinger’s Thoughts on Interacting with AI
ChinAI Links (Four to Forward)
Must-read: The State of AI Safety in China
Authored by Jason Zhou, Kwan Yee Ng, and Brian Tse, Concordia AI has published its “State of AI Safety in China” Spring 2024 report. Features really cool details such as data on the number of frontier AI safety papers as well as frontier safety research groups in China.
Should-read: How China is using AI news anchors to deliver its propaganda
In The Guardian, Dan Milmo, Amy Hawkins, Chi Hui Lin report on the use of AI-generated avatars, highlighting that current tactics are relatively crude.
Should-read: CSET’s policy.ai newsletter
Written by Alex Friedland, this monthly round-up is so helpful for keeping abreast of the fast-changing AI policy landscape. Consistently good and informative.
Should-read: China’s aging tech workers hit by ‘curse of 35’
In FT, Kai Waluszewski and Eleanor Olcott write: “The curse of 35 is a source of major anxiety for tech workers. A survey by recruitment platform Lagou Zhaopin last year found that 87 per cent of programmers were ‘seriously worried’ about being fired or being unable to find a new job after turning 35.”
Thank you for reading and engaging.
These are Jeff Ding's (sometimes) weekly translations of Chinese-language musings on AI and related topics. Jeff is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at George Washington University.
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