There is a Chatbot AI product called character.ai that has suffered a marked decline in quality since its launch as they battle their users to maintain the AI’s safety protocols (similar to chatGPT “jailbreaks”). I wonder if something similar could be happening here.
These fighting against people using their product in “unauthorized” ways by the ai companies doesn’t make any sense to me. Who cares if character.ai users do some weird stuff with it, or replika creates romantic relationships, or people make off color jokes in gpt. There seems to be a lot of engineering effort driven by some product managers to have the ai do very specific things which makes the product much worse in the Long term.
First, I am also frustrated by companies trying to prevent unauthorised used.
But second, the reasons are:
(1) For AI company, someone publishing: "I asked the model a question about crime, and it talked shit about black people! Look! [damning quote that you can also get model to say/do]." Stability took the "let people do what they will" tack and now Forbes and every other major media mouthpiece slams them at every opportunity about how they are ethically-challenged.
(2) For Replika, someone chatting with their online girlfriend: "I love you more than my wife and children." Then someone hacking Replika exposing these conversations, and now Replika is in hot water because all these divorces. Replace example with 100 other similarly awful situations like talking about mental health problems, crimes, petty squabbles with their coworkers, or political problems.
Forbes can write that crap, but the problem is with people who make decisions basing on that. I wonder who are these people that care about all this nonsense.
I'm concerned about becoming dependent on medications I don't need.
I'm worried that if I go to any sort of medical professional they will succumb to "if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail" and I will end up on some sort of meds that I don't need.
I just have this impression that 80% of people could walk into any psychiatrist's office, describe their experiences, and walk out with a prescription or three.
I'd like it if someone could convince me that these are not legitimate concerns.
> I'd like it if someone could convince me that these are not legitimate concerns.
Remember that you always have the option to not follow a treatment plan if you don’t feel like it’s the right thing for you. A recommendation from a physician isn’t an order from a judge that you must follow.
If the doctor you visit is good at their job, it should feel like a conversation about solving a problem. They should be able to offer a clear explanation on why they think their recommendation is the way to go and involve you in the decision-making process. Many people are reluctant to be medicated, so you probably won’t be the first patient they’ve seen just that day with that issue, and they’ll have some options for you in that regard too.
I used to have a concern about drug dependency so I feel like I might understand why you feel that way, but consider this: If you take a medication and it doesn’t improve anything, you’re not really dependent on it. If you take a medication and it makes things better, then things are better, which was the whole point of taking it in the first place!
Would it be better for your body to function well by itself? Of course. Would it feel better if we had a clearer understanding of psychiatric disorders and how to solve them precisely? Definitely, but medical science just isn’t there today, and at least there are some options that work for some people, even if we don’t understand why.
These are legitimate concerns. They may not end up being accurate, but they are legitimate.
There are a huge range of services available within the "theory" umbrella, some of which have 0% chance of involving medication. This may not be what you need, but it's a safe baseline. As another commentator stated ... don't think about theory, start doing it! In particular, talk therapy is a safe, often very effective, way of getting started.
Personally, it was instrumental to me to make some serious shifts in how I related to people and it took ~4 solid years of weekly sessions. A major component of this was having the space to take fears and anxiety seriously with the support of someone who didn't have (or really try to give) the answers, but was sufficiently anchored in life to provide a trusted second perspective.
Over time this let me identify some fears as wildly misplaced, some as valid but no longer applicable, and others as important enough to get a fire lit underneath me and do something about them. The resulting emotional freedom was life changing. Definitely I'm still a bit neurotic, but vastly more able to negotiate relationships, kindle curiosity into new hobbies (gardening and singing in particular, which I mostly never saw coming), and stay stable enough to grow in my career path.
I'd actually agree with you there. If you walk into a psychiatrist's office and tell them you're having depression/anxiety, you'll leave with a script for an SSRI. They exist to write prescriptions and don't have the time to get a holistic view of you as a person, to figure out what's causing your symptoms.
If you're worried about unnecessary medications (the majority of which won't make you dependent or have long-term side effects), you can always start with a good therapist (I recommended a PhD or PsyD). But for some people, they're struggling enough and miserable enough that it makes sense to try psych meds early and see what helps.
"I'd like it if someone could convince me that these are not legitimate concerns."
They are legitimate concerns. Just don't use them as an excuse to not get started. You don't need to hit it out of the park with the first therapist. Hell you may go through a dozen before you connect with one that is more helpful than not.
The key is to get started, and then do something else if the path you started isn't leading anywhere. Iterate.
'Bethesda Softworks' is the publisher for both, but ESO was made by a different studio -- 'ZeniMax Online Studios'. 'Bethesda Game Studios' is responsible for the mainline Fallout and Elder Scrolls games, including now Fallout 76. I think this is their first multiplayer title.
NIMBY-ism mostly. The people lucky enough to already own property don't want further residential development. It keeps their property values artificially high. There is an unreasonable expectation that if you buy a house in a nice quiet suburb then it should stay a nice quiet suburb the entire time you are living there.
In California specifically, they voted themselves (via referendum) a law which also keeps property taxes down for incumbents
"The proposition decreased property taxes by assessing property values at their 1976 value and restricted annual increases of assessed value of real property to an inflation factor, not to exceed 2 percent per year. It also prohibited reassessment of a new base year value except for in cases of (a) change in ownership, or (b) completion of new construction. "
