Using sequences of life-events to predict human lives(arxiv.org)
arxiv.org
Using sequences of life-events to predict human lives
https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.03009
55 comments
I have mixed feelings about this. It could be a great tool to help people, but on past experience it seems more likely that HR departments/ financial service providers/ governments would use it to write people off if they have too many negative life indicators.
Every time we get better at things like this, all the power tends to stay with organizations, and individual people are lucky if they get anything out of it.
Amazon, Wal-Mart, MacDonalds, giant banks, insurers, et c., analyze their competition, suppliers, and consumers in great detail with computer data and models. Where’s the widespread automated buyer’s agent for consumers, to balance that power so strongly that it shoves profit margins the other direction, so it’s not just megacorps pushing ever closer to some absolute limit of the last tenth of a cent they can wring out of us? Fucking nowhere, they’d never allow that kind of access to the data we’d need, the best we get is “CamelCamelCamel”, not some Siri-alike we can casually tell to go find the best price/quality intersection on the market for [product] and have that show up a couple days later.
And we’ll never get it. Just an ever-tightening noose of perfect price discrimination and risk calculation that goes only one way. Short of legislating radical levels of availability (and reliability and consistency—standards and minimums) for price and product information, anyway, and I’m pretty sure that’s on nobody’s radar.
Amazon, Wal-Mart, MacDonalds, giant banks, insurers, et c., analyze their competition, suppliers, and consumers in great detail with computer data and models. Where’s the widespread automated buyer’s agent for consumers, to balance that power so strongly that it shoves profit margins the other direction, so it’s not just megacorps pushing ever closer to some absolute limit of the last tenth of a cent they can wring out of us? Fucking nowhere, they’d never allow that kind of access to the data we’d need, the best we get is “CamelCamelCamel”, not some Siri-alike we can casually tell to go find the best price/quality intersection on the market for [product] and have that show up a couple days later.
And we’ll never get it. Just an ever-tightening noose of perfect price discrimination and risk calculation that goes only one way. Short of legislating radical levels of availability (and reliability and consistency—standards and minimums) for price and product information, anyway, and I’m pretty sure that’s on nobody’s radar.
And here I am just watching Kaczynski’s predictions all the way back at 1970 become truer with the decade. Technology clashes with human autonomy.
It’s even argued that the path of technological progress would not change even if you there were aliens, AI bots, any entity with the instinct of self-preservation, intelligence and replication. The mechanisms of the macro-system comprised of human biology + technology are explained in his book Anti-Tech Revolution in great detail.
It was a hard and bitter conclusion to come as a software dev, but I can never again unsee the fact that all technology is inherently evil. For a shorter but enlightening read, see his original manifesto “Industrial Society And Its Future”: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/unab...
It’s even argued that the path of technological progress would not change even if you there were aliens, AI bots, any entity with the instinct of self-preservation, intelligence and replication. The mechanisms of the macro-system comprised of human biology + technology are explained in his book Anti-Tech Revolution in great detail.
It was a hard and bitter conclusion to come as a software dev, but I can never again unsee the fact that all technology is inherently evil. For a shorter but enlightening read, see his original manifesto “Industrial Society And Its Future”: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/unab...
Can I read that without getting on a watchlist somewhere?
IT's not so hard to find, and I would really recommend it. I don't agree with all of Kacyzinski's ideas, and quite a few of his fans are unhinged, but he was a unique individual whose written work is worth engaging with. Electronic media also saves you the worry of opening a package.
Clever and funny. This is why i like HN.
Seize the means of computation
Scraping is legal; as are assistive technologies.
What’s lacking is the collective willpower to develop social organizations, which could orchestrate and fund such efforts. There’s a complete lack of organization among the public.
The problem is neither technical nor legislative: people just don’t care to, and are happier accepting the status quo.
What’s lacking is the collective willpower to develop social organizations, which could orchestrate and fund such efforts. There’s a complete lack of organization among the public.
The problem is neither technical nor legislative: people just don’t care to, and are happier accepting the status quo.
People don't have the time, money, or energy. And they will continue to lose all three until there is no option but to figure out collective organisation
[deleted]
It definitely feels deliberate and yeah it is a feedback loop.
Preferential attachment is a natural phenomenon, but corporations have gotten really good at exploiting it. This is one reason I favor just breaking up businesses beyonda. certain size. The ostensible consumer benefits of scale are outweighed by the 2nd order costs of market distortions. Efficiency is nice but not worth the combination of rent-seeking and adversarial zero-sum strategies.
I hold some hope that it’s just an unexpected outcome of a complex system. otoh, that would male it more difficult to remedy.
Except on LinkedIn apparentlt.
This. It would be the envy of every insurance company. How risky are you really? I’m glad I’m not the only one that immediately thought about this.
Insurance companies are probably already doing something like this anyway
I remember talking to an actuary once.
Actuaries have to be scientifically accurate with respect to risk. If they underestimate the risk, the premiums don't cover the losses. If they overestimate them, they lose in the market.
So I asked her if a red sports car should REALLY be that much more expensive to insure than a grey family car.
She told me, yes, the pricing actually correlates very well with the risk.
The only time when pricing is NOT correlated with the risk is AFTER an accident. Statistically after an accident, drivers become safer, but the insurance companies will not lower the rates charged to reflect it.
Actuaries have to be scientifically accurate with respect to risk. If they underestimate the risk, the premiums don't cover the losses. If they overestimate them, they lose in the market.
So I asked her if a red sports car should REALLY be that much more expensive to insure than a grey family car.
She told me, yes, the pricing actually correlates very well with the risk.
The only time when pricing is NOT correlated with the risk is AFTER an accident. Statistically after an accident, drivers become safer, but the insurance companies will not lower the rates charged to reflect it.
This is a critical problem of our time in my opinion. Persons are approached as static unchangeable objects, as if their trajectories are deterministic and what you're doing with these models are resolving the trajectories like a telescope or microscope. Measuring the substance of the person so you can extract from them.
The other schema is one where you're modeling manipulation effectiveness, to probe and predict how you can best (most effectively with the least resources) achieve some change in the trajectory. Engineering a person. It seems like we really only think of interventions as trying to return someone to some baseline condition, rather than to try to improve people beyond the baseline, to invest in them.
The paper has a bit at the end about using it for personalized interventions but it feels performative, like lip service. I know one of the authors professionally in a distant sense so I think they're probably genuine about it, but I can't help but wonder how the paper might be different if intervention was actually their focus. Wouldn't they be modeling changes in trajectories, the deviations or something?
The other schema is one where you're modeling manipulation effectiveness, to probe and predict how you can best (most effectively with the least resources) achieve some change in the trajectory. Engineering a person. It seems like we really only think of interventions as trying to return someone to some baseline condition, rather than to try to improve people beyond the baseline, to invest in them.
The paper has a bit at the end about using it for personalized interventions but it feels performative, like lip service. I know one of the authors professionally in a distant sense so I think they're probably genuine about it, but I can't help but wonder how the paper might be different if intervention was actually their focus. Wouldn't they be modeling changes in trajectories, the deviations or something?
I'd like to believe that lives are way too nuanced to properly train and evaluate a transformer this way.
Also, I would wager that upon release, suddenly everybody says they eat healthy and exercise daily.
Also, I would wager that upon release, suddenly everybody says they eat healthy and exercise daily.
I have an acquaintance who is convinced that Google ads stalk him because the ads make inferences yet shouldn't be able to, like offering flight prices from one city to another he frequents when he's never done that search in Google before.
I've tried to explain to him that people aren't actually very unique in large models, and there's probably several signals Google does have from his other searches to conclude he's interested in those two cities.
I've tried to explain to him that people aren't actually very unique in large models, and there's probably several signals Google does have from his other searches to conclude he's interested in those two cities.
Does he use Gmail? Because it gets all of his flight confirmations and Calendar events. Does he use Google Maps, because it gets his realtime location whenever he uses it. If he frequently goes to those cities, they would certainly know if he uses any other Google service.
They’re doing it anyway. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
I tried to build a startup based on a similar idea, but the traction was not good. The squarespace website is still up https://sundialcalendar.com/
It’s stunning how much of our lives are predictable. We are free will surfers on waves of determinism.
It’s stunning how much of our lives are predictable. We are free will surfers on waves of determinism.
> We are free will surfers on waves of determinism
As the cost of real-time surveillance, prediction and "nudging" continue to fall, the cumulative feedback loop can converge into human archetypes which are as much a function of the observer as the observed.
In an ocean of sensors and stimuli, how can past free will influence our future selves? Any stories you can share from users of your service?
As the cost of real-time surveillance, prediction and "nudging" continue to fall, the cumulative feedback loop can converge into human archetypes which are as much a function of the observer as the observed.
In an ocean of sensors and stimuli, how can past free will influence our future selves? Any stories you can share from users of your service?
The website is still up, but I take it the startup is fully shuttered? If not, I'd love to try it. Clicking on the Signup/login button I see a message saying:
This Deployment has been disabled.
Your connection is working correctly.
Vercel is working correctly.
This Deployment has been disabled.
Your connection is working correctly.
Vercel is working correctly.
When I was a kid, I was involved in a study with UCSD. I grew up in California on a Commune in the 1970s very famous in the Bay area. The study with UCSD would follow a range of various people from all various socio-economic backgrounds.
I first recall going to San Diego when I was 3. They would check in on me every few years up until I was 18 and I asked to leave the study.
I don't recall what it was named... but it was interesting. I wont share the insights they had of me - but some of them were insulting and very wrong.
This will do that at scale.
I first recall going to San Diego when I was 3. They would check in on me every few years up until I was 18 and I asked to leave the study.
I don't recall what it was named... but it was interesting. I wont share the insights they had of me - but some of them were insulting and very wrong.
This will do that at scale.
“the most comprehensive registry data in existence, available for an entire nation of more than six million individuals across decades. Our data include information about life-events related to health, education, occupation, income, address, and working hours, recorded with day-to-day resolution.”
I shuddered just reading this. What a nightmare for individuals’ freedom and privacy. What a bloody nation is that?
I shuddered just reading this. What a nightmare for individuals’ freedom and privacy. What a bloody nation is that?
How do we build a system where there is enough trust that this data will be used for “good”?
Address the problem that people have a proclivity to do "bad". Call it mental health, resolving trauma, spiritual practice. When people are no longer wounded and "broken" internally, they will go out and sculpt the outer shared physical world to match their improved internal state, and all will be good.
I'm not sure this is possible, but I am sure that any attempt to control human behavior externally will fail.
I'm not sure this is possible, but I am sure that any attempt to control human behavior externally will fail.
I always point towards the change in public perception towards drink driving as an example of how it’s possible to achieve significant change to society in a relatively short period of time
Predictive algos have long been used for market segmentation, predating LLMs and were illustrated in WestWorld S3E3 screenshots of individual human lifespan profiles, https://gizmodo.com/the-tech-in-westworlds-episode-3-shocker...
> Our work has important societal and ethical implications, which we outline in the Discussion as well as in Methods, Sec. 4.1, and SI: Model Card.
Maybe those ethical implications should have led to the decision not to pursue this avenue of research at all, or not to publish the results.
These "ethics disclaimers" are so stupid. It's as if scientists believe that they can somehow free themselves from moral responsibility by waxing philosophical about the ethical implications of their research in an appendix.
That's not how it works, folks. By choosing to publish, you have already incurred shared responsibility for whatever is built upon your work. Claiming that you have "considered" this means Jack Shit.
Maybe those ethical implications should have led to the decision not to pursue this avenue of research at all, or not to publish the results.
These "ethics disclaimers" are so stupid. It's as if scientists believe that they can somehow free themselves from moral responsibility by waxing philosophical about the ethical implications of their research in an appendix.
That's not how it works, folks. By choosing to publish, you have already incurred shared responsibility for whatever is built upon your work. Claiming that you have "considered" this means Jack Shit.
Strange to see these ideas on a site called “Hacker News” given the “hacker ethic” is to make information available to all: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic
Like other vague, vogue philosophical concepts, the Hacker Ethic is many things to many people.
To me, "every avenue of research must be pursued at any human cost, and ethics are at best an afterthought" has nothing to do with being a Hacker.
To me, "every avenue of research must be pursued at any human cost, and ethics are at best an afterthought" has nothing to do with being a Hacker.
I wonder how an ethical board was convinced to allow this kind of research
It's surprising to see that this was done in Denmark, on data on more than the million people, and I couldn't find any reference to the ethical board/approvals in the manuscript
what's unethical about it?
These days every time you do experiments that involve humans it's expected that you run your experiment design by your institutions ethics committee.
In this case I would expect that the committee perked up their ears, but once they heard that the data was anonymous they did not have any further concerns.
In this case I would expect that the committee perked up their ears, but once they heard that the data was anonymous they did not have any further concerns.
Part of me wants to be able to encode my life2vec and see what the next predicted tokens are. On the other hand, as much as going to a fortune teller sounds fun to me, I worry that if I go I will simply make what they say come true since I will be anxious about what the fortune teller said.
That said, my life is already on a certain track, and because I'm afraid of change, it's unlikely to be much different than it was before. Maybe this is just a weird call to actually do what your gut says, and to follow your dreams.
That said, my life is already on a certain track, and because I'm afraid of change, it's unlikely to be much different than it was before. Maybe this is just a weird call to actually do what your gut says, and to follow your dreams.
> because I'm afraid of change, it's unlikely to be much different than it was before
Life changing events are often out of your control
Life changing events are often out of your control
That's sometimes but not always, or even often, true. You're thinking of accidents or death. But what about marriage or jobs or education or divorce? Those usually require an active choice (or many of them).
Didn’t see input for astrology sign though, maybe they can make it more accurate lol
I believe this is the corresponding code:
https://github.com/SocialComplexityLab/life2vec
https://github.com/SocialComplexityLab/life2vec
[deleted]
I wonder if fine tuning GPT-4 on the records would do significantly better
So that's how Precrime works.
One of my rules for life:
If someone does something once, they will do it twice. Given similar circumstances, people act the same
If someone does something once, they will do it twice. Given similar circumstances, people act the same
Unfortunately, the rule still holds when "someone" is yourself. :-)
Well...yes. We aren't random action generators.
[deleted]