Philosophy Eases Fears Of AI Eroding Personal Meaning
I don't feel deeply attached to my current life projects, and if external forces like AI make them subjectively meaningless, I feel okay pivoting to other projects, and optimistic about finding meaning even if others (human or AI) exceed me entirely at whatever I pursue next.
xuan (ɕɥɛn / sh-yen)@xuanalogueOne benefit of going through a nihilist-existentialist phase as a teenager and later encountering Buddhist no-self doctrine is that I don't feel worried about AI "robbing my life of meaning" even if it eventually exceeds me at e.g. all knowledge production work I could do.
I do worry about the psychological impact of full automation (if we reach it) on everyone who hasn't gone through similar "meaning crises", and I'm not keen or excited about the existential angst that continued AI development wool likely cause for many people.
xuan (ɕɥɛn / sh-yen)@xuanalogueI don't feel deeply attached to my current life projects, and if external forces like AI make them subjectively meaningless, I feel okay pivoting to other projects, and optimistic about finding meaning even if others (human or AI) exceed me entirely at whatever I pursue next.
But at least personally, the threat to meaning here doesn't feel fundamentally different in kind from reckoning with the recognition that we live in an uncaring universe, that I exist for no good reason, and that even the concept of "I" is constructed and not fundamental.
xuan (ɕɥɛn / sh-yen)@xuanalogueI do worry about the psychological impact of full automation (if we reach it) on everyone who hasn't gone through similar "meaning crises", and I'm not keen or excited about the existential angst that continued AI development wool likely cause for many people.