For extra humor they took a volunteer from the audience, wrapped him in a sheet and made him play Caesar.
I'd like to recount a scene from that show which I think will express both the humor and compression that it featured.
oh my god, you can turn off those fucking EVIL sign in with #google popovers on random websites
https://myaccount.google.com/
> Security
> Signing in with Google
> Google Account sign-in prompts
(I've decided to abandon this thread.
Reporting on what I've read or watched makes it feel like a chore.
Bad vibes.)
Dear devs,
It's NEVER ok to lock people out of a webapp because their User-Agent doesn't match your predefined list. 😡
Especially webapps they need to manage their healthcare.
(I am in fact using one of the browsers on this list, your code just isn't able to tell.)
Please boost for basic education.
In 1999 to 2000 I was going through a very rough patch in my life. In the span of a few years, I'd gotten married, lost a parent, birthed a child, gotten divorced, changed careers, and relocated 3,000 miles away from everything and everyone I knew. What with the state of things, I didn't get to see #GalaxyQuest when it was first released.
Finally, on a day I was feeling particularly low, and shortly before the movie left the theaters, I canceled work and took myself out to a midday matinée.
I was the *only* person in a vast theater, of a size that no one builds anymore, sitting and waiting for the lights to go down. At one point, I turned and peered up at the projectionist's booth. I saw a shadowy figure moving back and forth behind the window, bending and straightening. This was in the days before automated, digital films. The Phantom Menace had been released digitally in 1999, but the equipment to show such films was extremely expensive and most theaters hadn't converted yet; "projectionist" was still a real job.
While I was looking, the figure paused, strode to the window and peered back at me, then disappeared quickly.
I turned back around and continued to fidget and ponder the misfit pieces of my life.
At the top of the aisle behind me, the theater door swung open and banged loudly on the wall. The projectionist strode down the aisle toward me, a tall barrel-shaped man with a thick beard and glasses. My first thought was that the matinee was canceled due to low turnout, and I'd be getting a refund. Just as I'd resigned myself to that, the marching projectionist shouted out in a booming voice,
"WELCOME to your PRIVATE viewing oooooooof GALAXY QUEST!!!"
He stopped in front of my row, and I saw that he had an *armload* of STUFF. One by one, he began presenting each thing to me, and as the pile in his arms dwindled, the one in my lap grew.
"As our SPECIAL VIP Galaxy Quest GUEST today, YOU are entitled to..."
"- A commemorative t-shirt!"
"- A poster suitable for framing!"
"- A limited edition refrigerator magnet!"
"- A button to pin to your lapel!"
The list and the shwag went on. With every ridiculous item, I laughed harder and harder, until there were tears leaking out of the corners of my eyes.
Then he bowed and shouted, "WE HOPE YOU ENJOY THE SHOW!" and turned on his heel to march back up the aisle and out the exit door.
Alas, of all the shwag only the magnet has stood the test of time. But the humor and kindness of the unknown projectionist lives on.
I have seen all three of these seriously discussed by people downstream of the LessWrong memeplex.
In version C, we're talking about Reward Hacking, and the AI has "maximized" something by overwriting the memory cell where it tracks the count. The "paperclips" are tiny memory cells that the AI can use to increase the number it cares about.
In version B, we're talking about Inner Alignment failures, where the AI is programmed to maximize human happiness, and the "paperclips" are 10-neuron constructs that count as human to the AI and can only feel happiness.
In version A, we're talking about the Orthogonality Thesis, and the paperclips are actual paperclips*, because the point is that a superintelligent AI might not care about what you care about.
* This also applies to bolts, or Facebook share prices.