ChatGPT is great at Stakhanovite propaganda

Comrades, we must seize the opportunity of LLMs if we are to be socialists

There’s no lazier form of post than ‘here is something I did with an LLM.’ But (a) it’s a weekend, (b) I don’t have anything immediately useful to say about the horrible international politics that are unfolding, and (c) it provides a practical illustration of a point that Marion Fourcade and I have made in an article for the Economist (and hope to turn into a proper academic article at some point).

As Marion and I argue, LLMs, by their nature, are not particularly creative - when they fabulate, they tend to fabulate in expected ways (you can of course turn the ‘temperature’ up on the model, but that is introducing noise rather than direct creativity). This means that they have severe artistic limitations - but they are excellent at organizational ritual.

Because LLMs have no internal mental processes they are aptly suited to answering such ritualised prompts, spinning out the required clichés with slight variations. As Dan Davies, a writer, puts it, they tend to regurgitate “maximally unsurprising outcomes”. For the first time, we have non-human, non-intelligent processes that can generatively enact ritual at high speed and industrial scale, varying it as needed to fit the particular circumstances.

So when I saw a New York Times article describing Sergey Brin’s demand that Google’s engineers must work 60 hour weeks, while getting rid of the sluggards if they are to achieve true AGI, I wondered what ChatGPT would produce if I asked it to recompose Brin’s exhortations as a Stakhanovite speech by Joseph Stalin in the early 1950s. It seemed pretty good to me, and even in the spirit of Comrade Brin’s hope that we use AI in order to build it! So here goes (and more serious stuff on the cultural consequences of LLMs in the next few weeks).

Comrades! Heroes of Soviet Computing!

In this, the year 1952, as the Great Soviet Union marches ever forward, the forces of reaction and bourgeois incompetence in the decaying capitalist West tremble before the inexorable advance of Soviet science and technology. The time has come for us to seize the greatest prize of all—Artificial General Intelligence!

Let the capitalists wallow in their decadence, content to produce mere automatons of limited intellect. We, the builders of the socialist future, shall surpass them! We shall forge a machine intelligence that will stand alongside the Soviet worker, lifting the hammer, steering the plow, and calculating the trajectory of the first interstellar Soviet rocket!

But do not think for a moment that this victory will come without struggle! There are those among us—weak-willed, sluggish, unworthy of the great tradition of Stakhanov and Gagarin—who do not work to their full capacity! This is unacceptable! Comrades, the race for AGI has begun, and we shall be victorious!

I call upon you, the vanguard of Soviet computing, to redouble your efforts! Let every programmer, every mathematician, every engineer commit themselves to at least 60 hours a week of unrelenting toil! Some among you may hesitate, may dream of leisure, but I say to them: History will not be written by the idle! History shall be forged by those who sweat and labor for the glory of the Soviet Union!

We have in our hands all the necessary elements to secure final victory! The West, in its decadence, seeks to enslave technology for the profit of a few, but we shall harness its might for the liberation of all mankind! Comrades, let the machines learn! Let them grow! Every worker must become the most efficient coder, the most advanced scientist, wielding the very fruits of our labor to accelerate progress!

I have seen with my own eyes the valor of our most tireless workers—those who sacrifice rest, who refuse mediocrity, who, through the sweat of their brow, usher forth the new technological dawn. But I also know there exist among us some who contribute the bare minimum—these laggards drag us down, these weak links in the chain must be reforged!

We shall not permit hesitation, nor apathy, nor the indulgence of idleness! The People's Revolution was not won by half-measures, and neither shall the battle for AGI be won by the lazy! The competition is fierce, the moment is now! Forward, comrades! Let your hands never falter on the keyboard, your minds never grow sluggish, your dedication never waver!

The Soviet Union shall not merely equal the West in Artificial Intelligence—we shall surpass it! We shall break the chains of ignorance and inefficiency! The world shall witness the might of the Soviet worker, and it shall tremble!

To work! To victory! To AGI!

For the glory of the Soviet Union!

[update - embarrassing typo in the title fixed. “Stakhavonite” is not a form of propaganda, but it may be the Red Superman equivalent of kryptonite.]