AI slop & blockchaining attention

I've heard concerns about misinformation becoming a significantly harder problem as AI slop proliferates.

 

Initially I reasoned that humans generally care about quality information and would simply choose better sources in order to sidestep the garbage; but a cursory look at present news consumption habits (e.g. sourcing from social media and messaging apps, rather than credible sources like The Economist or more trustworthy institutions like academia) doesn't presage well for this opt-in mitigation.

However, there will for various reasons likely always be a significant demand for credible information. Which makes me wonder about the foundations of credible information: typically experts' communications and research, I reckon. Which are typically performed and published by humans, even when assisted by technology. 

Being able to verify that a claim was made, or data sourced, from an expert, might then become critical and valued. I can imagine a device/technology that constantly accounts for an expert's attention in, say, 15 minute increments, and that accounting is blockchained for reliability. Future claims must be attached to some not-already-claimed portion of that expert's attention- since it is only the spending of an expert's attention that produces the constituents of good information. Deepfakes of celebrities might also be rebutted in this way: exactly when did that celebrity say whatever the video claims? Sorry, the celeb was verified to have been spending their attention otherwise (e.g. sleeping) at that time. 

A precedent for this is lawyers' timekeeping: they often account for billable hours to the nearest 6-minute increment. 

I can further imagine a third-party verification provider, who reviews claims against a given individual's attention blockchain, and replies with either 1) consistent with or 2) not consistent with, the claim. This would allow for privacy (the inquirer doesn't know what the celeb was doing during that time, just that they weren't recording a video). Think of it as a 24/7 alibi service, whose data the individual owns and chooses when/how to use (e.g. to rebut a reputation-damaging claim that they said X). Claims that don't come accompanied with a specific attention timestamp (who said what, starting when and ending when, and perhaps where) will be presumed to lack credibility: and specific claims can then be refuted by the alleged actor. 

Those demanding credible information can then limit their sources to pre-AI-slop sources, + attention blockchain-authenticated expert sources. Individuals might become increasingly willing to connect to this tracking in order to facilitate their work being included within the corpus of the credible. 

Dark sides of poly

A friend of mine recently returned to monogamy, after spending a couple-ish years practicing non-monogamy. Despite significant effort and support leveraged during (including many conversations with me), overall the relationship style worked very poorly for him (his experience was similar to Why I think polyamory is net negative for most people who try it). 

A few weeks later a poly friend challenged me at lunch to "steelman" my friend and I's consensus about the dark sides of non-monogamy. Since non-monogamy is a broad umbrella, I narrowed my claims to unmarried heterosexual folks practicing solo poly (UHFPSP; which describes a substantial chunk of the bay area non-monogamy community I'm familiar with), and articulated three dark sides, when compared to conventional monogamy. 

First, I think UHFPSP does worse than conventional monogamy at providing enduring support when a person acquires a disability or significant financial setback. 

I'll begin by claiming that the majority of monogamy-practicing folks in the primary 50 dating years (roughly between ages 20-70) spend a significant portion of those years with a cohabitating partner, often a spouse. The default expectations in those arrangements is for B to support A when A acquires a disability or significant financial setback. By comparison, the default expectations in UHFPSP is for A to support A when A acquires a disability or significant financial setback. 

I've seen this play out in the UHFPSP when someone was injured, once when someone died, once when someone was laid off and almost lost their home, and once when someone experienced a significant theft. Yes, friends and lovers help out initially, much as friends and neighbors do when someone experiences a significant setback; but the "family" expectation of being there for the person 6 months and 18 months and 72 months later was not there- because the expectation is for UHFPSP to insure themselves against such setbacks, since there's no reciprocal commitment to the enduring heavier "in sickness and in health" norm more present in the conventional monogamy world. Illustrations:

• For the person who died, the answer to the question of who buries you and plans the funeral, was some relative from hundreds of miles away: instead of a partner from their week-to-week life
• For the laid off person, friends chipped in two and three digit amounts against a five-digit need
• For the injured person, their non-cohabitating partner drove them to appointments for a few weeks, then tapered off their support (the injuree turned to neighbors and a relative) 

Second, UHFPSP does worse than conventional monogamy at providing relationships to the bottom status half of men. 

In both UHFPSP and conventional monogamy, women attract abundant potential mates (just ask any woman who's hopped on a dating app). For men, the reality is quite different. Typically their dating market power is a factor of status, and in the UHFPSP world the higher status males can have multiple partners. True, the women can as well, but in my observation women desire on average fewer partners than the average male desires. You can see this by comparing partner counts between women (who generally have the number of partners they desire, given the excess supply) and high status males (who also generally have the number of partners they desire, by contrast to their low status counterparts). High status males usually have 3-4 partners, whereas women usually have 1-2.  

The mathematical result at the population level is a large group of low status males with fewer relationships/partners than they want. Often, these men go for significant periods with zero partners. By contrast, because monogamy pairings are 1:1 and match the gender split, at the population level low status males have a higher chance of having at least one partner. 

There are also a few exacerbating factors.

1. Bisexuality. In conventionally monogamous populations, women are expected to be fully or primarily heterosexual, and because of the single partner expectation, are far less likely to experiment with or have a female partner instead of or in addition to a male one. In UHFPSP circles women, much more than men, experiment with and sometimes have female partners in addition to their male ones - which results in the low-status males competing against other women in addition to the higher-status males, further amplifying their undesired relationship scarcity. 
2. The slightly higher male:female ratio of UHFPSP
3. The higher ratio of attraction to women in the trans woman population, compared to trans men 

Third, UHFPSP only "works well" for folks at a narrow intersection of traits:

1. Attachment needs are met by the relationship model (for many folks, jealousy and insecurity leave them feeling more anxious and stressed than in monogamy)
2. (if male) don't believe in the "valley of the dolls"
3. Desire the multiple partner or autonomy aspects of UHFPSP
4. Competitive in the dating market

I happen to fit all four, which is mostly down to luck, and is why I'm staying put in UHFPSP. However, I know three folks where #1 wasn't the case for them: all three of them left UHFPSP. I know two women for whom #3 faded, and they too transitioned to monogamy. Then I know a whole lot of frustrated men who ran afoul of #2 and #4, some of whom gave up and returned to monogamy and others who are still trying. 

(Valley of the dolls is the widespread fantasy among men that, without the strictures of monogamy, they can finally have what they deeply desire: low-effort casual sex with lots of attractive women. It usually only takes a few hundred of the "no ONS" and "no hookups" reminders on every other woman's dating profile on apps, and a few dozen failed attempts, to disabuse the notion that supply exists to meet this demand- but it's a compelling fantasy, partially rooted in evolutionary selection pressure, and many men have a hard time letting it go despite the lorries of evidence.) 

Conclusion:
At the individual and group level, there are dark sides to at least some poly cohorts! 

Still looking for my tribe

Though I belong, I don't quite fit in any of the communities I frequent. 
-Regular society (cuz I'm poly and monogamy is the prevailing norm)
-Bay Area poly people (cuz I'm otherwise normal, and thus too neurotypical and insufficiently woke, trans, kinky, BIPOC, or queer; insufficiently drug-positive; and insufficiently anti-authoritarian)
-Intellectuals (cuz though I listen to podcasts often and talk about issues with friends, I no longer read, write, or participate in conferences or intellectual communities, at serious levels)
-Effective altruists (cuz I'm too busy with rest of life to participate at the level most do)
-Fitness freaks (cuz though I workout often, I'm not excellent or religious about anything in particular, like lifting or a sport)
-Careerists (cuz though I work a ton, I'm not striving for a promotion or strategic next skill or role)
-Family (cuz I hate parenting, though I do a decent job of it and love my kiddos)
-Creators (cuz my blog and social posts are intermittent at best, my ant hobbying is on ice, and my poly-themed stand-up dream has yet to see the light of day)
-ExMos (cuz I no longer care as much about that identity)

I suppose I could just stop trying to find a tribe that fits fully, and tell myself that myself, a community of one, is enough. And that being a decent fit in multiple communities brings adequate tribal benefits. 

 I still thirst, though, for that full fit of the full me. I think it will be psychologically empowering, and will produce a better version of me than its absence. 

So I'll keep looking.