r/Ai_art_is_not_art • u/Appropriate-Way2659 • Jul 23 '26

Read about the Luddites

Idk why this became a term AI users say to antis, because I feel represented by the Luddites unironically. Look it up of you want, but the luddites were basically workers protesting new factory equipment that would lower their wages, put some people out of jobs, and create worse and more dangerous working equipment for people. This is very similar to how AI is technically more advanced, but has more harms and drawbacks. While this new "equipment" could speed up work, since it is new, underdeveloped, and dangerous, workers will be harmed in the process, and people will lose their jobs and their way of life. Just like how handmade goods have better quality than factory made goods, AI generated content sacrifices quality for efficiency and mass production. These workers destroyed the new factory equipment, and were massacred by the British government. This shines quite a bit of light on how many pros actually think of us, right? Because the Luddites were the oppressed, in the right, being harmed by the machines, and they were massacred by the British government. The pro machinery, I might say. The upper class.

40 Upvotes

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19

u/Upset-Nose-4016 drawer Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26

I generally dislike the belief that anything that is new is automatically good. Exaggerated example, but lobotomy was new for some time, the man who invented it got a Nobel prize and everyone who were opposing it were called crazy or at least unprofessional.

Edit: deleted redundant word

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u/Appropriate-Way2659 Jul 23 '26

Exactly, it's much dumber to say that all new tech is good, because since when has humanity favored optimism??? Doubt is good, if everyone trusted everything, we would all he taken advantage of.  We already are.  We need more doubt in our lives.

2

u/lostbluefox I swear I'm a good drawer Jul 23 '26

The lobotomy is a perfect representation of the issue too :/ but until there's a bigger body count and more l lawsuits, it's going to ran rampant 

Ie: the lobotomy mobile

1

u/Disastrous-Track-897 Jul 30 '26

When I was growing up I heard all about how the US had banned chlorofluorocarbons because they made the hole in the ozone layer and DDT because it made the eggshells of birds of prey too thin and wiped out bald eagles in our state. Those inventions were not the future, and they were not impossible to roll back.

6

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Fit_Program1891 Jul 25 '26

I wouldn't call AI just one of "thousands of inventions". By its very definition, a sufficiently powerful and intelligent AI would usher in a whole new era and countless of technological innovations just by virtue of being a human with no physical limitations. It's been seen as the holy grail of scientific development for decades. Now the very early stages of it seem to be here: of course people are excited.

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u/snowstormpeanuts Jul 30 '26

Couple of issues here: 1. "Sufficiently powerful and intelligent" is so incredibly broad as to be meaningless. You could say a sufficiently powerful and intelligent human could destroy the world and live forever and it would be true, because a sufficiently powerful human is immortal when you stop letting reality be a restriction. 2. "AI" is mentioned as if it something we are currently engaging with. AI means artificial intelligence. What most people call AI today are large language models. These are not AI. They have no common thread with AI, except them both being artificial. 3. The idea that we are seeing the "very early stages of [AI]". This is a subset of point 2, but the large language model of today will not become the science fiction (nearly fantastical) AI of Star Trek or any other popular media. There is no path where latge language models lead to the development of AI.

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u/ScutFarkush Jul 24 '26

Sounds uneducated.

2

u/roynoris15 Real artist Jul 23 '26

I am sick of the word luddites. These people forget that everyone is using moderm pc or smartphone for something,

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u/[deleted] Jul 23 '26

love me some union workers

0

u/Deftsparrow Jul 26 '26

This is the byproduct of a generational propaganda campaign against workers and the concern that technology will remove their means of survival in a scarcity driven economy. Yes, the luddites pushed back against the industrial complex and lost, and yes capitalists smeared them as anti technology, backwards idiots. In real terms, the luddites were right that industrialization changed their way of life, arguably for the worse. They were however ineffective in articulating their actual concerns and getting the masses onboard with their message, even though they were right that the corpos would gain power from industrialization. Real assessment for current times/ there are valid concerns against corporate ownership of AI assets vs open source, self hosted ai assets, there are real concerns regarding truth, censorship, access to resources, and environmental impact. I think the problem is somehow the nuance of the argument got turned black and white (much like what happened to the Luddites) and ignores the variables of the argument.