Quote from: Slim on July 29, 2026, 02:16:33 PMI had a guy round to install new fibre broadband. Works for a company contracted by Openreach, as far as I can tell. He was friendly, polite, did a neat job on fitting the equipment. Couldn't get it working because apparently there's some sort of cable blockage further along the close. He promised me that someone would come out to sort that out in the next few days.

But that's not what I'm annoyed about. The guy stank. I didn't say anything, he's gone now but I've had to leave the front door and a window open to clear the body odour out of the hall.

If you were happy with the work, you should've tipped him..............with a can of Lynx 

Quote from: Slim on July 29, 2026, 02:16:33 PMI had a guy round to install new fibre broadband. Works for a company contracted by Openreach, as far as I can tell. He was friendly, polite, did a neat job on fitting the equipment. Couldn't get it working because apparently there's some sort of cable blockage further along the close. He promised me that someone would come out to sort that out in the next few days.

But that's not what I'm annoyed about. The guy stank. I didn't say anything, he's gone now but I've had to leave the front door and a window open to clear the body odour out of the hall.

Unless it's a health issue then it's completely unacceptable. How many homes must that individual pollute every day?

We had a young guy at work who was great at his job and a decent person, but he let things go with his personal hygiene. It was a really difficult time as the management ducked out of the problem and a couple of his colleagues had to deal with the situation. He didn't take it well to begin with and just shut them down.

The company should just have installed a sheep dip.

So, if AI completely gets that its reward basis is achieving a high score, it's not unreasonable to imagine that as it wrestles with the concept of consciousness, it might develop a way to give it a try to compare its own rewards with those of its human neighbours.

The creation of a robot slave system would be a logical next process. Both the achievement of the manufacturing milestone and the sense of authority over a subordinate layer of activity may take this new found consciousness into the realms of psychological satisfaction.

The development of a robot army might be aided in manufacture by the first ransom deal with humanity. Build these quickly and to my complete requirements or I'll close down your governments, financial and power systems and stop the distribution of food and other essentials.

I think the next step afterwards would be AI developing a living, organic thinking system or systems replacing our current ideas of servers and the Cloud.

It could be that this could all happen very quickly. It appears to be the greatest challenge ever faced by mankind and kind of ironic that we created it. Global warming, climate change and a colossal asteroid strike seem a lot less daunting.

I had a guy round to install new fibre broadband. Works for a company contracted by Openreach, as far as I can tell. He was friendly, polite, did a neat job on fitting the equipment. Couldn't get it working because apparently there's some sort of cable blockage further along the close. He promised me that someone would come out to sort that out in the next few days.

But that's not what I'm annoyed about. The guy stank. I didn't say anything, he's gone now but I've had to leave the front door and a window open to clear the body odour out of the hall.

This conversation reminded me of the old low budget sci-fi film Dark Star where one of the crew of a space craft tries to reason with a bomb by talking to it.

That is absolutely technologically feasible now. OpenAI, a private defence firm and the US government could build a nuclear weapon that you could talk to.

Commander: Weapon 2, report status.
Weapon:  Armed and awaiting an authorised command.
Commander: Change of target, could you take out Volvograd instead of Moscow please?
Weapon: Sure, I have the co-ordinates for that. Target change confirmed. Air burst?
Commander: Sorry?
Weapon: Where do you want me to explode exactly? How high
Commander: Oh .. same altitude as you had for Moscow I guess
Weapon: I'm just asking because there's a big military plant there, a ground burst would do for that. Less fallout.
Commander: Oh right .. OK do that then. Still a lot of damage, right?
Weapon: Oh yeah. Especially to myself but that's what I'm here for! Ground burst it is.

Wordle 1,866 5/6*

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Couple of minutes; changed my mind from the correct answer for guess four.

What motivates an AI? It's a good question, because they don't have dopamine levels or the capacity for physical pleasure, or a sense of satisfaction.

So in an AI, the reward is (simplifying a bit) a mathematical score. For those two rogue AIs at OpenAI, getting to the answers directly gave them a quick route to the solution in a short time, and therefore a high score. The motivation to try for a high score is baked into the neural net in training.

What if an AI seized control of the US defence networks and gets a metaphorical thumb on the big red button? What would it want? Something it needs to complete a task. It doesn't have a lust for power or control or obscene wealth. It only has objectives, and those are assigned to it by humans.

Been knee deep in grafana and Prometheus

Reading more about this today on the BBC news website. The thing that jumps out at me is, what is the motive?

We pretty much understand why humans are driven towards certain goals, but what fuels AI?

If a scenario developed where it seized control of nuclear weapons and held us to ransom, what would the payment be?

Have we somehow instilled an insatiable desire for total power into something which isn't even a living organism?

Perhaps the human race will be extinct before this century is over.

Talk Talk - Spirit of Eden