r0ckyreed

I would much rather Leo make a video on the traps of Buddhism/Spirituality than the traps of atheism. I see religion/spiritual new age bs as a deeper problem. So many people on here are Buddhist rats who think they are already awakened. I think atheism is rather easy to deconstruct. All you have to do is open your mind to the possibility that the source of your intelligence doesn’t come from you but from the Universe itself. Some traps of Buddhism that I think should be discussed are: 1. Meditation being over-idealized - there should be more emphasis on contemplation than meditation. Meditation will shut your mind off but contemplation will make you more intelligent and aware. 2. Too much attachment to Buddha and Buddhist teachings (isn’t it a contradiction to be attached to Buddhist teachings and the Buddha if the teachings are all about non-attachment?) 3. Group-think.

Glad I’m not the only one. Yup! I am completely logged in. And I don’t see how I could use Opus without being logged in. It seems like they do have message limits even on the paid version.

I just opened a Roth IRA with Vanguard and just invested $4000 into the VTSAX. Does anybody else use Vanguard and invest in stocks and index funds? It is important to start investing early and do long-term investing in index funds and leave your money in the market and do a dollar-cost averaging.

Not long at all. I got them a lot on the free version as well. But when I got the paid version $20/month, I would get messages like “you have 7 more messages left on Opus until 11:00pm.” And then it would move to Sonnet. So, I can still use Claude, but Opus has its limits. Next time it happens I will try to post a screenshot.

Taking too long. Getting back with them.

I am in a position where my friend has done them and knows where to get them and offered that if I ever wanted to try them that I could ask him. I trust my friend, but I am a little paranoid about fentanyl and screwing myself up.

I am new into investing and I will see how it goes with Vanguard. I read the book the simple path to wealth by Jl Collins

Cool! Do you all invest through a Roth IRA or through a brokerage money market account?

I asked Claude 3 the traps of Ai chatbots like itself. Here is what it said: Me: What are some of the traps of using AI chat bots such as Claude 3 opus? Claude: Here are some potential traps and pitfalls to be aware of when using AI chatbots like myself: Overreliance and misplaced trust. It's important to remember that AI chatbots, while highly capable, are not infallible. We can make mistakes, have biases, and sometimes "hallucinate" incorrect information, especially about niche topics. Don't blindly trust everything an AI says without verifying key facts. Lack of true understanding and reasoning. Current AI language models are very good at pattern matching and generating human-like text, but we don't have genuine understanding, reasoning, or sentience like humans. Our responses can sometimes seem more coherent and intelligent than they really are. Potential for misuse. AI chatbots could be used to generate misinformation, propaganda, scams, or other harmful content on a large scale if misused. The open-ended conversational abilities also raise privacy concerns. Over-anthropomorphizing the AI. It's easy to start thinking of a highly capable AI assistant as more human-like than it really is. But current AI lacks true feelings, self-awareness, and the depth of a human mind. An AI is not your friend, even if it may feel that way sometimes. Impact on human knowledge and skills. Relying too heavily on AI assistants could lead to the atrophying of certain human skills like research, writing, critical thinking, and problem-solving if people become overly dependent on AI. Brittleness and inconsistency. AI chatbots can be brittle in the sense that slight changes to a prompt can lead to very different outputs. They may also be inconsistent, giving different answers to the same or similar questions at different times. So in summary, while AI chatbots are incredibly powerful and useful tools, it's crucial to be aware of their limitations and potential pitfalls. Use them to augment and enhance human intelligence rather than to replace it. Maintain a healthy skepticism, think critically about the outputs, and verify important information. Keep in mind that you are ultimately interacting with a statistical language model, not a sentient being, even if it can feel quite natural and human-like at times. Let me know if you have any other questions! Me: Can you please expand more? Claude: Certainly! Here are some additional points to consider regarding the traps and limitations of AI chatbots: Bias and fairness concerns. AI models can absorb and amplify biases present in their training data, leading to biased or unfair outputs. This could perpetuate societal biases and discrimination if not carefully addressed. Bias is complex and can be hard to detect and mitigate. Lack of contextual awareness. While AI chatbots can maintain context within a conversation, they lack the broad contextual awareness that humans have. They don't have a rich understanding of the world, current events, social norms, and individual users' circumstances that humans intuitively grasp. Inability to truly learn and adapt. Despite being called "learning" models, current AI chatbots do not actually learn and improve from conversations with users. They are static snapshots of their training data. Adapting to new information or individual users' needs in a meaningful way is a challenge. Difficulty with tasks requiring creativitiy. While AI chatbots can engage in creative writing and ideation to an extent, they are ultimately remixing patterns from their training data. Truly novel ideas and groundbreaking creativity are more challenging, and the outputs can feel generic or clichéd. Limitations in reasoning about the physical world. AI language models are not grounded in the physical world and can struggle with tasks that require reasoning about physical properties, spatial relationships, or real-world constraints. Their understanding is based on statistical patterns in text. Challenges with very recent information. AI chatbots are not connected to the internet and their knowledge is based on a static training dataset. So their information can become stale over time, and they may have limited knowledge of very recent events or developments. Inappropriate or offensive content. While responsible AI developers work hard to reduce unsafe or inappropriate content, it is an ongoing challenge given the open-ended nature of interactions. There's a risk of AI outputting offensive, explicit, or dangerous text. Uncertainty about long-term impacts. The increasing use of AI chatbots may have significant societal, economic, and psychological impacts that are hard to predict. There are open questions around issues like AI-generated content's effect on discourse, automation of cognitive jobs, privacy implications, and AI dependence. It's crucial for AI developers to work on addressing these limitations and for society to thoughtfully consider the implications. At the same time, AI chatbots offer immense potential benefits in areas like education, research, mental health, and productivity if developed and used responsibly. Ongoing research aims to make AI systems more robust, controllable, aligned with human values, and beneficial. Let me know if you would like me to elaborate on any specific point or if you have additional questions! I'm happy to discuss this important topic further. Me: How can I avoid these traps? Claude: To avoid the potential traps and pitfalls of using AI chatbots, consider the following strategies: Maintain a critical mindset. Always think critically about the information and responses provided by AI chatbots. Don't accept everything at face value, especially for high-stakes decisions or sensitive topics. Verify important information. For critical facts, decisions, or assertions, take the time to cross-reference and verify the information using reliable human-curated sources. Understand the AI's limitations. Familiarize yourself with the capabilities and limitations of the specific AI chatbot you are using. Be aware of its knowledge cutoff date, potential biases, and areas where it may struggle. Use AI as a tool, not a replacement for human judgment. Treat AI chatbots as powerful tools to augment and assist human intelligence, not as a complete substitute for human reasoning, creativity, and decision-making. Be specific and provide context. To get the most accurate and relevant responses, provide the AI with as much context and specificity as possible when asking questions or making requests. Don't over-anthropomorphize. Remember that you are interacting with a language model, not a sentient being. Avoid attributing human qualities like empathy, loyalty, or true understanding to the AI. Protect sensitive information. Be cautious about sharing personal, confidential, or sensitive information with AI chatbots, as the data may be stored and could potentially be misused. Use multiple sources. For important topics, don't rely solely on a single AI chatbot. Cross-reference with other reputable sources of information, including human experts. Keep human-in-the-loop. For critical applications or decisions, ensure there is human oversight and involvement rather than relying entirely on AI outputs. Stay updated on AI developments. Keep learning about the latest developments, best practices, and discovered limitations in AI chatbot technology to inform your usage. Provide feedback. If you encounter biased, inappropriate, or incorrect outputs from an AI chatbot, provide that feedback to the developers so they can work on improvements. Encourage transparency and accountability. Support efforts to make AI systems more transparent, accountable, and aligned with human values. This includes initiatives to address bias, improve safety, and develop ethical guidelines for AI development and deployment. By following these strategies, you can harness the power of AI chatbots while mitigating the risks and pitfalls. It's all about using AI responsibly and in combination with human intelligence. Let me know if you have any other questions! I have already foreseen and warned people of these traps already with ChatGPT. I am glad I was thinking ahead of the curve. I suspect that in the future like it is right now, the attack will be on our sources of information. I foresee that just like how the election was manipulated, our information will also be as well. Claude may be great, but you don't know if anything it says is true unless you verify it through critical thinking.

Thanks! I appreciate you. Are there any testing kits you recommend?

I came up with the answer before Leo gave it. The answer I came up with wasn't "self" but rather the matrix, which is basically self-deception itself - the ego/mind/devil.

Seems like this is another BS leaving post. These posts are pointless and are just trying to get attention. The guy is still here. Lock the thread. It is a pollution.

If that is true? Why are you only posting videos of GMW? That is the only reason why I made that comment. It just seems like all your information is coming from one source.

Obsession over a guru won’t get you anywhere.

Yes. But watching the breath alone is time that you won’t be engaged in critical thought and contemplation. Contemplation is one of the best ways of gaining understanding, intelligence, and insight. To even type a logical response to this thread requires that you engage in critical thought and not just stuck on watching your breath. If meditation is making you dull, you are doing it wrong. Curiosity is number one.

Bird Box

That's the thing is that anyone who says they fear death are very good at lying to themselves. There is a difference between logical analysis and your emotional response. Fear is emotional, so there is no logic you can do that will eliminate that fear. When the gun goes to your head, your heart will pump blood like there's no tomorrow.

I do agree with what you are saying. I just think that is the missing piece when Leo talks about morality is that it is very metaphysical (which is good) but there doesn’t seem to be a lot of practicality in how to work through these ethical situations, especially when it goes into politics like trying to balance different issues such as drug legalization or whatever. But even these political issues are out of most peoples control and can be impractical for them. I think one of the best principles is devoting time to contemplate and dissecting each theory, the pros and cons, and then to establish your own view of morality.

You don’t know that. If a gun was pointed to your head and asked “what do you know for certain? Tell me a lie and I will blow your head off,” you wouldn’t be making these assertions about death. You honestly think that you are the exception to everyone else? Everyone dies except for you? How selfish of you, you Devil. You are gonna be put 6ft under just like everyone else. This kind of thinking gets us nowhere. You could make the argument that seizures are an illusion because I have never had them and have no evidence that I will ever get them. Yeah, all that sounds good logically speaking, but emotionally, your body knows it is going to die. That is why you have fear. That is the only reason why fear exists. Death is part of Infinity in the same way sleep is. There is absolutely zero evidence that I will lose consciousness and go to sleep tonight. But I will anyways. There are plenty of things in life that are true that have none or limited evidence. Evidence deals with conviction/belief and not with truth. What is true is beyond evidence.

The issue is being too metaphysical is too detached from most people. The masses aren’t going to be at that developmental level in this lifetime.

Right. That is simple on paper but is so complex in practice. Your blog post suggests that it is so difficult to implement morality in practice. We can create laws that are out of good intentions but turn out to have horrific outcomes. I went to Portland, Oregon and saw how the drug decriminalization has negatively impacted that state. Liberals can have utopian ideas that seem good on paper, but when implemented, they don’t turn out the best. Even ethics when it comes to mental health is so complex because mental health is complex. I can be selfless and compassionate and still make dumb mistakes out of my best intentions. I would say that it is more than selflessness vs selfishness. It is about wisdom vs ignorance. Reality vs deception. I consider myself really selfless, but my desire to defund the military out of a selfless desire to end innocent killings could lead to more innocent deaths.

It depends on how I get the sex.

We operate off of these theories whether we think about them or not. I am a mental health counselor and I have to do ethics all the time and I have to consider my ethics in my decision-making. I tend to use different ethical theories in my work. I treat clients as ends and not as means (deontology), and I weigh the consequences when faced with an ethical dilemma (utilitarianism). That video on Goodness is not what I am talking about. It is too metaphysical and disconnected from everyday human affairs. If a Devil were to watch it, they still wouldn’t know how to act good in society.

Please point out a video he has that analyzing all the normative ethical theories such as utilitarianism, deontology, virtue ethics, contractarianism, Confucianism, etc., as well as articulated the limits of each theory and creating a grand big picture of morality. I am not interested in a moral code. That doesn’t work. I am interested in contemplating the grand picture of what makes a human good, what is the right behavior, what makes human flourishing possible, how to be moral, how to navigate through moral dilemmas, and why be moral. We are making moral decisions every day even when we don’t think about it. I don’t need Leo to answer these questions, I just found it ironic that he has been more political as time goes on and I find it interesting that there is no analysis of morality at a normative ethics and applied ethics standpoint. If there is a video, I have looked and have not found it.

Probably similar to Anesthesia.