[HN Gopher] Project Aria 'Digital Twin' Dataset by Meta
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Project Aria 'Digital Twin' Dataset by Meta
        
       Author : socratic1
       Score  : 148 points
       Date   : 2023-07-20 13:21 UTC (9 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.projectaria.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.projectaria.com)
        
       | germinalphrase wrote:
       | While acknowledging the utility of this kind of
       | object/environment mapping in AR applications - the privacy
       | obliteration is stark.
        
         | KaiserPro wrote:
         | Yes, and it scares the shit out of me.
         | 
         | Now. Facebook, the company that nobody trusts to do this sort
         | of thing, is going to have to really work hard to demonstrate
         | that they are to be trusted with this data. Apple, and to a
         | lesser extent google, don't.
         | 
         | That cool startup could get away with lots of things, so long
         | as people like the product.
         | 
         | Fortunately for us, AR glasses are limited by power
         | consumption, this means that they can't really do always on
         | realtime streaming of data to the backend for mining. Sure you
         | could have always on mm accurate location, but you can't have
         | video recording at the same time. If you want facial
         | recognition, you'll have to stop the music playing.
         | 
         | Now, what would help is a decent set of privacy laws, ie:
         | 
         | Any cameras smaller than x, must only allow recording of data
         | from persons that expressly allow it, unless in the public
         | domain. People attempting to re-create personally identifiable
         | data from such sensors will be liable to 5 years in jail and or
         | an unlimited fine. (insert carveouts for legitimate research
         | and persons working towards providing evidence for court cases)
         | 
         | This isnt perfect, but its a lot better than what we have now.
        
           | jayd16 wrote:
           | I think you underestimate the power consumption of streaming
           | video compared to what a VR headset already does. I mean,
           | they already Chromecast the feed if you so choose.
           | 
           | I will say that Meta is fairly aware of their reputation. The
           | TOS is clear that they do not upload or share any video
           | capture and they seem committed to it. As it is now, all the
           | scene understanding is done on device.
        
             | KaiserPro wrote:
             | > I think you underestimate the power consumption of
             | streaming video compared to what a VR headset already does
             | 
             | Rayban stories have a 167mah battery[1] the quest2 has a
             | 3640mah battery[2] even then, it only last 2 hours, more or
             | less, rather than an entire day.
             | 
             | [1]https://beckystern.com/2023/04/30/ray-bans-stories-
             | teardown/
             | 
             | [2]https://www.meta.com/gb/legal/quest/product-information-
             | shee...
        
       | dustypotato wrote:
       | First thing I notice while browsing from EU is that there's only
       | one option regarding cookies. Accept all! Even if I click "Learn
       | more" there's no "accept necessary cookies" or "Reject cookies".
       | First time I encounter something like this.
        
         | WhackyIdeas wrote:
         | Noticed the same thing as I always select 'necessary only' or
         | something like that.
         | 
         | Instead, I just closed the page and clicked on HN comments to
         | see what it was about.
        
         | littlestymaar wrote:
         | > First time I encounter something like this.
         | 
         | Facebook itself use to have this exact banner with no
         | alternative until they were strong-armed to properly comply
         | with GDPR.
        
         | anthonyskipper wrote:
         | That's a common dark pattern.
        
           | master-lincoln wrote:
           | Dark pattern is a term normally used for legal, but immoral
           | user experience. In this case legality is questionable as
           | they redirect you to other external sites to manage your
           | "consent" https://optout.aboutads.info (at least from a
           | European GDPR perspective)
        
           | constantly wrote:
           | It's not really a dark pattern because they're not tricking
           | you into accepting or coercing more than is acceptable into
           | doing so, they're just not allowing you to decline. Which
           | means if not accepting cookies is a dealbreaker for you, no
           | problem, just: move along.
        
             | [deleted]
        
         | coldpie wrote:
         | I have to admit, for technical folks like ourselves, I don't
         | understand why you care what options the dialog presents. Just
         | use a "Kill Sticky" plugin to nuke the stupid dialog so you can
         | read the page, or even Accept them, and then instruct your
         | browser to do whatever you like with the cookies the site
         | creates (i.e. delete them). It's all in your hands, the popup
         | dialog doesn't do anything you can't do yourself.
        
           | master-lincoln wrote:
           | you should care because often this agreement is not about the
           | technical detail of cookies, but allowing the company you are
           | interacting with to share data about you with 3rd parties.
        
             | coldpie wrote:
             | If you think which HTML div element you click on to dismiss
             | a sticky banner has any bearing whatsoever on how your data
             | is handled server-side, I've got a trip to the Titanic in
             | an Oceangate submersible to sell you.
        
               | Etheryte wrote:
               | Legally it does, at least if you're in the EU. The only
               | reason websites are slow on the uptake around this is
               | that the legal gears are slow, however we have seen many
               | considerable fines in this space in the last few years
               | and things are improving.
        
             | bad_username wrote:
             | It's also in direct violation of GDPR.
        
           | guy98238710 wrote:
           | Or just use private window in the browser and then close it.
        
           | explaininjs wrote:
           | Learned helplessness. Teach the citizens that the only thing
           | protecting them from the Big Scary Internet is their
           | benevolent government. Meanwhile the politicians collect
           | millions from the mass media companies that lobbied for the
           | god-awful implementation of the law we all ended up with, and
           | as everyone gets worn down into Accepting All always, they
           | simultaneously forget that their User Agent holds all the
           | cards (or in this case, cookies), and it can be instructed to
           | do anything the User wants with them.
        
             | js8 wrote:
             | Aside from what ethbr0 said, which I agree, that you're
             | blaming the victim, I want to address the "learned
             | helplessness" idea.
             | 
             | I heard recently that's actually wrong. We are born
             | helpless, and learning to take control. The helplessness is
             | innate, and we learn to overcome it.
             | 
             | In democracy, the innate helplessness of citizens is
             | overcome by learning to participate in governance -
             | activism, elections, public functions and so on.
             | 
             | The people who say "government does nothing good ever" are
             | the ones who want to keep people in their natural helpless
             | state. It's like telling a student, "you're doing it all
             | wrong and can never be good".
        
               | explaininjs wrote:
               | Please don't tell me you're unironically arguing "learned
               | helplessness" doesn't exist because you "learned" you're
               | born "helpless" and the only path to actualizing change
               | as an individual is through the official government
               | sanctioned mechanisms... because if that is your _honest_
               | argument... wow.
               | 
               | For reference, in my experience, the public works
               | projects that get front page news coverage with tons of
               | anecdotes from locals about how incredibly helpful and
               | long-needed the installation was, are those that were
               | completely unsanctioned.
               | 
               | And the _only_ path to substantial policy change in all
               | of history has _always_ been violent revolution.
        
               | guy98238710 wrote:
               | You are definitely not born helpless. Babies keep
               | screaming until they get what they want. They also
               | tirelessly try to master mobility. Learned helplessness
               | would mean they wouldn't even try crying or moving.
        
             | ethbr0 wrote:
             | Did you just take a problem that free market tech created
             | and blame it on the government? ;)
             | 
             |  _User_ agent sovereignty would be nice... except the most
             | used browser and 1 /2 of smartphones are controlled by
             | Google, the largest ad tracking company on the planet.
             | 
             | We're way past the 90s.
        
               | explaininjs wrote:
               | Google, the same company that provides a _litany_ of fine
               | grained cookie retention options in its User Agent's
               | options page? Except thanks to the government's
               | antagonistic policies (read: big-media's lobbying) those
               | are useless as you need to keep on clicking the damn pop
               | ups every time you visit a page "anew".
               | 
               | Also never forget we already had a perfectly good
               | solution in the form of Do Not Track headers that a
               | benevolent governing body would have simply mandated
               | abiding by. Instead we have this shithole.
        
               | ethbr0 wrote:
               | DNT was ignored from the time it was implemented.
               | 
               | The only way it ever would have been respected if it was
               | required to cryptographically sign an acceptance of
               | cookies, then the server was required to retain that
               | attestation as proof of acceptance, subject to legal
               | liability if they were found in possession of tracking
               | data without a valid attestation.
               | 
               | Absent enforceability, _even when the server actively and
               | maliciously decided to ignore it_ , it was a toothless
               | solution.
        
               | PaulHoule wrote:
               | The EU just should have said "if you don't respect DNT,
               | go directly to jail and don't pass Go".
        
               | ethbr0 wrote:
               | How would not respecting DNT have been proven?
               | 
               | The rub here is that everyone wanted to ignore DNT,
               | because it made them lots and lots of money.
        
               | PaulHoule wrote:
               | How can you prove that they respect your preferences in
               | those consent theater pop ups?
               | 
               | I think those pop ups are the worst thing that ever
               | happened to the web because they eliminated the moral
               | authority that anyone had to say "it is user hostile to
               | use pop ups". Once the EU made it appear "required" and
               | even "laudable" or "prosocial" there was no basis to say
               | "you shouldn't put this other popup in that will make
               | users feel harassed".
               | 
               | So now we get pages where the popups get in the way of
               | the other popups.
        
               | ethbr0 wrote:
               | Point.
               | 
               | I suppose the formalism around popups, and specifically
               | when the EU decided to start levying fines on entities
               | who used dark patterns to avoid the spirit of
               | "accept/reject must be equally easy to click", convinced
               | me that user-visible was a better way to win the fight.
               | 
               | Granted, it's not a _technically_ optimal solution, but
               | it may be a politically optimal one. Vis-a-vis the people
               | vs the advertising industry.
               | 
               | I'm unconvinced that DNT would have ever garnered the
               | same support as something that people, and specifically
               | politicians, can see. Which would have led to ad money
               | quietly carrying the day.
               | 
               | I'm hopefully after we've chiseled "Thou shalt respect
               | user decisions" in stone deeply enough, we can flip back
               | to enabling a user agent to automatically respond to that
               | question for us.
        
               | explaininjs wrote:
               | GDPR doesn't involve any of your crypto-nerding so I
               | don't see how this is relevant in any way.
        
               | rglullis wrote:
               | Is it the time of the day where I make Brave advocacy
               | again?
               | 
               | Brave has shown that we can have an user agent that is
               | aligned with the user, even if the browser engine is made
               | by Google.
        
               | ohgodplsno wrote:
               | The same Brave that is selling data for AI companies,
               | which may or may not include personal data ?
               | 
               | I'd say it's probably not a good day for Brave advocacy.
               | Neither is any other day.
        
               | rglullis wrote:
               | That's a very good example of "argument-by-Google". You
               | know what conclusion you want to achieve, so you just go
               | around looking for statements that are either taken out
               | of context or misunderstood and that can be backed by a
               | (shallow) google search.
               | 
               | For the record: go back to the article that you are
               | (wrongly) alluding to [0] and see how much the author has
               | retracted. Also, see the response from Brave's Chief of
               | Search.
               | 
               | I "have" to keep advocating them because all the
               | opposition that is presented is always based on false
               | information, biased and prejudiced and clearly made by
               | people who never used the browser or tried to understand
               | the value proposition.
               | 
               | There are tons of things to criticize about Brave (their
               | "partnerships" with Binance and Solana, their complete
               | lack of interest in making BAT an _actual currency_ for
               | payments online, them completely losing the train of
               | decentralized social media) but none of that ever comes
               | up from the detractors, only this kind of bullshit like
               | the one you bring up.
               | 
               | [0]: https://stackdiary.com/brave-selling-copyrighted-
               | data-for-ai...
        
               | ohgodplsno wrote:
               | I'm just going to quote the updated, follow up article:
               | 
               | The Brave Search API does not respect the site's
               | licensing, and Brave is under the assumption that 1)
               | because they are a search engine and 2) because they
               | attribute the URI of data - this puts them in the clear
               | to scrape and resell data word-for-word.
               | 
               | Brave steals data and resells it, and is not to be
               | considered a trustworthy entity.
        
               | rglullis wrote:
               | The article went from "selling personal data to AI
               | companies" to "selling results in the API search with a
               | longer summary than Google which might be a violation of
               | fair use policy", and yet you still don't want to back
               | down.
        
               | sanderjd wrote:
               | This particular problem with annoying cookie dialogs is
               | actually a government-created problem though...
               | 
               | But I do agree with you that "free market tech" created
               | the problem of "tracking cookies are ubiquitous and users
               | don't know how to control them". But then regulators just
               | layered another annoyance on top of that, instead of
               | solving that actual problem.
        
           | samstave wrote:
           | I have to admit, for the non-technical folks like not-
           | ourselves, I don't understand why people dont know about such
           | "simple lifehacks" -->
           | 
           | You're knowledge is sound, but rather than condescedingly
           | relegate people to your 'simple' workaround - the ENTIRE
           | premise of cookies and tracking against ones implicit desire
           | to be private, is assinine.
        
         | mensetmanusman wrote:
         | It's amazing how much worse browsing the web has gotten after
         | all these pop-ups everywhere.
        
           | kaffeeringe wrote:
           | You mean how much worse surfing the web got after it became
           | visible, how much companies are tracking us? The problem is
           | the tracking, not the banner. If you don't sell your readers
           | data, you don't need a banner.
        
         | marcinzm wrote:
         | Isn't that a GDPR violation since they're not allowed to
         | prevent access if you refuse to share data not necessary for
         | the service to function? Since it's from Meta I suspect
         | regulators would enjoy another thing to add to the list for
         | future fine calculations.
        
           | mike_d wrote:
           | Not at all. You can have a single prompt with a single accept
           | button if you are only using functional cookies on a site.
        
             | capableweb wrote:
             | In that case, you don't need anything, no notice nor
             | consent required at all, get rid of the entire
             | modal/popup/banner.
        
           | dspillett wrote:
           | It depends. If everything stored & tracked is genuinely
           | necessary (as defined by the regulations) then consent is not
           | required. If they are just telling you that they are storing
           | & tracking necessary things like session information, then
           | all is good (unless the things they store & track are not, in
           | fact, strictly necessary and non-privacy-affecting).
           | 
           | Of course if they don't need consent, then why are they
           | making a song & dance about it having us click an accept
           | button?
        
         | cutler wrote:
         | This one is tame compared with a whole industry of "data
         | privacy" popups which hide "Legitimate Interest" opt-outs
         | within Vendor lists containing hundreds of entries. Someone
         | needs to slap some serious lawsuits on these gangsters.
        
         | nightpool wrote:
         | This is common on many, many sites like this because they do
         | not have any tracking cookies or anything else that they would
         | need consent for, but they're still required to display a
         | cookie banner "notifying" you that cookies are "in use" as per
         | the terms of the old 2009 ePrivacy Directive. In this case, it
         | appears that projectaria.com sets 1) one cookie for the user's
         | DPR (1 or 2) so that the backend can serve optimized images, 2)
         | one cookie for the user's locale, and 3) one cookie for a CSRF
         | token for form submission.
        
           | rglullis wrote:
           | AFAIK, that is not true. Cookie banners are only required if
           | they are used for tracking purposes.
        
           | capableweb wrote:
           | > but they're still required to display a cookie banner
           | "notifying" you that cookies are "in use"
           | 
           | Common misconception but this is not true. If you use cookies
           | only for functional purposes (not for tracking for example),
           | you do not need to show any cookie banners. Like if you have
           | a shopping cart and you have a cookie for keeping track of
           | what's in it, it's for functional purposes for the user and
           | hence needs no notice to be used.
           | 
           | The UK's ICO made a handy summary for people who are curious
           | about what the directive actually says:
           | https://ico.org.uk/media/for-
           | organisations/documents/1545/co...
           | 
           | Specifically:
           | 
           | > Exceptions from the requirement to provide information and
           | obtain consent
           | 
           | > Activities likely to fall within the exception: [...] Some
           | cookies help ensure that the content of your page loads
           | quickly [...] Certain cookies providing security that is
           | essential to comply with the security requirements [...]
        
             | nightpool wrote:
             | > Common misconception but this is not true. If you use
             | cookies only for functional purposes (not for tracking for
             | example), you do not need to show any cookie banners. Like
             | if you have a shopping cart and you have a cookie for
             | keeping track of what's in it, it's for functional purposes
             | for the user and hence needs no notice to be used.
             | 
             | Personally, I would not put a cookie banner of any kind on
             | my website. However, given this text:                   The
             | term 'strictly necessary' means that such storage of or
             | access to information should be essential, rather than
             | reasonably necessary, for this exemption to apply. However,
             | it will also be restricted to what is essential to provide
             | the service requested by the user, rather than what might
             | be essential for any other uses the service provider might
             | wish to make of that data. It will also include what is
             | required to comply with any other legislation the person
             | using the cookie might be subject to, for example, the
             | security requirements of the seventh data protection
             | principle.              Where the setting of a cookie is
             | deemed 'important' rather than 'strictly necessary', those
             | collecting the information are still obliged to provide
             | information about the device to the potential service
             | recipient and obtain consent.
             | 
             | I think it's clear why a more risk-conscious organization
             | like Meta might take a more conservative reading of
             | "Strictly necessary" that does not apply to e.g. bandwidth
             | optimizations related to a device's DPI
        
             | sanderjd wrote:
             | But it's easier and less risky to just always put in the
             | standard language that everyone ignores and mindlessly
             | clicks through anyway. Which is why this was very silly
             | legislation. People helping develop future legislation (in
             | the EU and elsewhere) should be aware of this as a
             | cautionary tale of incentivizing theater with only cost and
             | no benefit.
        
           | croes wrote:
           | Then why does the banner say?
           | 
           | >We use cookies to personalise and improve content and
           | services, deliver relevant advertisements and increase the
           | safety of our users
        
             | SkyPuncher wrote:
             | It's probably the default language for the company.
             | Technical, t he at allows them to have tracking cookies
             | even if they don't have them now
        
               | guy98238710 wrote:
               | Language is all that matters when it comes to law. It's a
               | blatant violation of GDPR.
        
               | sangnoir wrote:
               | What if the banner language suggests they _might_ break
               | GDPR, but in reality they are not doing those things? If
               | my SaaS forces you to select a checkbox that states you
               | 're agreeing to allow me to set fire to your house (which
               | is illegal) - would the sign up itself be breaking the
               | law? IANAL, but I don't think it would be; I wont be
               | breaking any laws until I commit arson.
        
               | nerdponx wrote:
               | It's breaking the law because you're essentially being
               | forced to consent to some thing that they legally must
               | give you the option to opt out of. It's not about them
               | doing it, it's about the validity of their request for
               | consent.
               | 
               | If I hire a hitman to murder somebody, but the hitman
               | chickens out, I'm still guilty of having hired a hitman,
               | even if nobody died.
        
               | croes wrote:
               | Deceptive
        
               | nerdponx wrote:
               | Right, I'm sure this is boilerplate language provided by
               | a law firm.
        
         | otikik wrote:
         | Yep, closed it down immediately. IANAL but that might not be
         | legal in Europe
        
       | machinekob wrote:
       | Non-commercial licence :[
        
         | optymizer wrote:
         | "I can't use this to make money". Sad face.
         | 
         | If I had a company, which is a for-profit entity, I wouldn't
         | want competitors to use my company's tech for free either.
        
         | Roark66 wrote:
         | I wonder, let's say one uses it on an open source project that
         | accepts donations. Is that non-commercial enough? Or is it a
         | no-no because money is involved? I'm just curious.
         | 
         | I'm glad such free datasets exist even if they are restricted
         | to educational/hobby use.
        
           | sp332 wrote:
           | You can't use it in an open-source project. Open source
           | licenses don't restrict commercial use.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | zombiwoof wrote:
       | love Meta. they fell face first into the "Metaverse" and now are
       | just releasing all their AI related work to juice their stock and
       | be "innovative".
        
       | achr2 wrote:
       | > All sequences within the Aria Digital Twin Dataset have been
       | captured using fully consented researchers in controlled
       | environments in Meta offices.
       | 
       | The requirement and boastful nature of this heading is a
       | frightening tell against the company/industry's perceived
       | practices.
        
       | quietthrow wrote:
       | Genuine question: What is an egocentric data set? Eli5 please?
       | What can this be used for?
        
         | KaiserPro wrote:
         | As you know, to make machine learning work, it needs loads of
         | data.
         | 
         | Most picture and videos are taken from a camera at arm's
         | length, not attached to someone's face.
         | 
         | so if you want to make AR glasses "see" and "understand" the
         | world from the point of view of a human (ie navigation, where
         | is x, etc etc) then you need to make a dataset with that sensor
         | configuration.
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vnZCwf5_QE has a simple
         | example from CMU, rather than facebook
        
         | ikhatri wrote:
         | Egocentric means that the sensors frame of reference is the
         | same as the ego (self). The person walking around is wearing
         | the sensors/glasses themselves & their pose is given as "ego
         | pose".
         | 
         | This dataset is clearly targeted for research on AR/XR/VR
         | applications.
        
           | AndrewKemendo wrote:
           | +1
           | 
           | I'll "yes and" here...beyond AR/VR a more powerful use case
           | is multi-modal learning (with RL) which is what Meta is
           | probably the leader in IMO.
           | 
           | Example paper here: " Towards Continual Egocentric Activity
           | Recognition: A Multi-modal Egocentric Activity Dataset for
           | Continual Learning"
           | 
           | https://arxiv.org/abs/2301.10931
           | 
           | This IMO is the pathway to AGI, as it combines all sense-
           | plan-do data into a time coordinated stream and mimics how
           | humans transfer learning to children via demonstration
           | recording and behavior authoring.
           | 
           | If we can create robotics with locomotion and dexterous
           | manipulation, egocentric exploration, and a behavior
           | authoring loop that uses human behavior demonstration and
           | trajectory reinforcement - well, we'll have the AI we've been
           | all talking about.
           | 
           | Probably the most exciting area of research that most people
           | don't know or care about.
           | 
           | That's why head mounted all day ego centric AR is so
           | important - it gives eyes ears and sense perception to our
           | learning systems with human directed egocentric behaviors,
           | guiding the whole thing. Just like pushing your kid down the
           | street in the stroller.
        
             | posterboy wrote:
             | > a behavior authoring loop
             | 
             | A behaviour that authors loops?
        
               | germinalphrase wrote:
               | I would read it as "a loop that authors behaviors".
        
             | socratic1 wrote:
             | +1
             | 
             | Applications of embodied AI very interesting. Additionally
             | a lot of hard problems are increasingly being solved in
             | simulation like this. See Wayve's GAIA world model
        
             | dleeftink wrote:
             | Just to make sure I understand your excitement: we _need_
             | guinea-pigs _ahem_ people to wear  'head mounted all day
             | ego centric AR' with who knows how many integrated sensors
             | for long stretches on end, so we can finally get to our
             | fabled A.G.i?
             | 
             | That is some B.F. Skinner level future we're aiming for--
             | only this time around, humans become the fully surveilled
             | 'teaching machine'.
        
               | KaiserPro wrote:
               | As with most technology, there are plusses and minuses.
               | 
               | If used correctly (if is doing lots of heavy lifting
               | here) this type of system, eye gaze, imu & microphones
               | would provide much much better hearing aids than the
               | current state of the art, at a much cheaper price (go
               | look up the price of hearing aids, its _extortion_ )
               | 
               | Using gate analysis, it would be possible predict when
               | someone is prone to falls, allowing much longer
               | independence for older people.
               | 
               | Assuming that its possible to understand who you are
               | talking to and what they said, you could mitigate and
               | support dementia much more than we can now.
               | 
               | However.
               | 
               | You also have a vast network of headsets with highly
               | accurate always on location, able to see what you are
               | looking at, who you talk to, what you say, and in
               | somecases what you feel about things.
               | 
               | Add in some basic object/facial recognition and you have
               | an authoritarian's wet dream.
               | 
               | now is the time to regulate, but alas, that wont happen.
        
               | AndrewKemendo wrote:
               | Well no...not guinea pigs. But correct conceptually - if
               | it's opt-in only and perfectly transparent to everyone
               | what is happening, which in this specific case of Aria it
               | absolutely is.
               | 
               | If we want to make machines with equivalent or better
               | capacity as humans we have to transfer the process for
               | scientific discovery, including the sum of our cognitive
               | capacity and knowledge to them.
               | 
               | If you quantize human adult-infant interactions, then it
               | boils down to Human adults introducing learning
               | trajectories, labeling input data and biasing weights
               | with reinforcing behaviors for new reinforcement agents.
               | If we can re-build the infrastructure to do precisely
               | that, where the agent is in the place of the infant and
               | society is in the place of the "Human Adult" then we will
               | have re-built at scale the process for human development.
               | 
               | The best way we know how to do this today is implementing
               | transfer learning approaches from the basic human
               | developmental research. I started down this road back in
               | 2010 trying to follow the work of Frank Guerin out of the
               | University of Aberdeen [1] [2].
               | 
               | [1]https://www.surrey.ac.uk/people/frank-guerin
               | 
               | [2] https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?view_op=view_c
               | itation...
        
               | msaeki wrote:
               | Is that model (parents giving labeled input and affecting
               | some weights in the child's head with reinforcement)
               | really a good fit for the reality of how people learn to
               | do things?
               | 
               | It's my understanding (though I haven't looked at the
               | primary sources myself) that one of the facts that
               | inspired Chomsky's language theories and work for
               | instance, was that when you quantify the information
               | communicated by parents to language learning children,
               | there's actually not very much of it. Not nearly enough
               | to support that what's going on is anything like the kind
               | of learning embodied by machine learning models.
               | 
               | If that's true, and there is something of how to act
               | intelligently / humanly already encoded in children
               | (maybe genetically?) and not communicated by this sort of
               | training, wouldn't ignoring that and trying to get to it
               | purely in this machine learning way be.. at least not at
               | all informed by evidence / examples of it working in
               | nature?
        
               | AndrewKemendo wrote:
               | So this is extremely complicated and nuanced with respect
               | to intelligence acquisition, and I don't think there's a
               | definitive right or wrong answer.
               | 
               | I certainly acknowledge my own bias with this however,
               | with respect to what Chomsky discusses, I make the
               | distinction that most of the "code/data/information" that
               | you need in order for the language capacity to develop is
               | actually embedded in our biological mechanical systems.
               | That is to say, if you were to take a human infant and
               | never expose it to another human with respect to
               | generating sounds for language, the infant would still
               | develop some sort of sound based communication system. We
               | see this with feral children, mute children, deaf
               | children. They still have a verbal function, even if it's
               | not connected to any semblance of coherency.
               | 
               | So in that sense it's like you're given all of the
               | building blocks for language out of the gate biologically
               | and then the people who are around you tell you how to
               | assemble them into some thing that is functional. This is
               | why different languages have different rules yet language
               | acquisition is consistent across cultures.
               | 
               | This is why I am insistent on holistically understanding
               | the computing infrastructure and systems because the
               | sensors processors, etc. are the equivalent to our cells,
               | genes muscles, bones, etc. Most people don't think about
               | computing systems and generally intelligent systems this
               | way.
               | 
               | If you go back and look at the work of wiener and early
               | Cybernetics it does discuss a lot of this, however, after
               | Cybernetics was absorbed into artificial intelligence,
               | which was an absorbed into computer science, it doesn't
               | really look holistically at systems of systems,
               | unfortunately, in the general case.
               | 
               | And I would argue that all of machine learning currently
               | is very much moving in to the direction that I am
               | describing where is exposure to frequency of correlated
               | data that gives you your effective understanding of the
               | world, and being able to predict the future state. That's
               | what I mean when I say multi-modal is "sequential and
               | consistent in time" with respect to causal action.
        
               | dleeftink wrote:
               | But what about observer effects? People act differently
               | when recorded, and rarely do we catch humans acting
               | natural when knowingly observed (some of the early
               | 24h/day Twitch streamers come to mind). And what happens
               | once trials are done? How would people feel about their
               | actions becoming part of a technology potentially able to
               | replace them?
               | 
               | Even when this barrier can be overcome (i.e. people
               | become accustomed to wearing these devices), I worry
               | about the opt-in nature of it. We've yet to see a
               | disruptive technology adhering to this principle through-
               | and-through, and if current learning efforts are anything
               | to go by, training data is not something companies want
               | to willingly let go or lose out on.
               | 
               | Taken both, this path has the potential to be quite
               | coercive if no strong guarantees or safeties can be
               | upheld, especially if early exciting trials generate an
               | interest-boom similar to the one we're seeing right now
               | in the LM-space.
        
               | AndrewKemendo wrote:
               | This is a great point and why, I advocate so vociferously
               | thatall of these systems and future organizations that
               | are going this direction should be cooperatively owned,
               | based on mutual voluntary Democratic principles, rather
               | than owned by a small subset of wealthy individuals in
               | your standard business construct.
        
               | dleeftink wrote:
               | That would be a welcome future, indeed. And hopefully,
               | not just upheld in some regions of the world, but
               | everywhere where AR-backed AGI gets off the ground. And
               | this governing structure would need to work for some
               | decades at least. Which would be quite a feat.
               | 
               | That still leaves my first question regarding observer
               | effects and how people would respond to such a technology
               | on an individual level. It would have the capacity to
               | reshape behaviour towards preferential and/or optimal
               | interactions, would it not? Seeing how we do not want
               | reinforce models with 'erroneous' interactions?
        
               | AndrewKemendo wrote:
               | TBH I don't know, and I think there's a real chance that
               | there's going to be actual changes in how people behave
               | as a result - which, if it's integrated like many other
               | social changes will become another layer in the fabric of
               | society, displacing another layer. For better or worse I
               | think it's just an exposure thing.
               | 
               | You are persistently surveilled in London and Shanghai
               | and New York City - yet people act just as unhinged in
               | ways they did before cameras were installed.
               | 
               | I'm not sure what other data acquisition/technology arc
               | is possible though, and open to ideas.
        
               | JohnFen wrote:
               | > You are persistently surveilled in London and Shanghai
               | and New York City - yet people act just as unhinged in
               | ways they did before cameras were installed.
               | 
               | Unhinged people do, but ordinary people? I'd be willing
               | to bet that normal people who are in areas where they are
               | aware they're on camera don't behave as their normal
               | selves. It's hard to see how it could be otherwise.
        
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