Before this thread starts trading apocalyptic visions of future
societal breakdown caused by LLMs and our eventual turn to
cannibalism
i do not see how this is relevant
That directly negates the possibility of "taking stances" and
"stating opinions" which are divisive, controversial and/or that
don't achieve consensus.
we can take stances, and state divisive opinions, and still reach
consensus about implementing those stances and opinions. the GCD
process is not about stating what everybody already agrees with,
it is about finding consensus on implementing everyone's opinions
in a way that finds broad acceptance. if i had to hazard a guess,
what GCD 008 is today is much closer to finding broad acceptance
of contributors than either of completely allowing LLM
contributions and a blanket LLM ban, and this would not have been
possible if we only took stances and stated opinions that
everybody else already agreed with. failing that, we can still
state opinions—as individuals, not as a whole—that do not achieve
consensus.
Second, if this is about 'political change' then I question
what's special about LLMs? Guix doesn't have GCD's that cover
use of public transport, cutting down forests or reducing
domestic violence against women and girls.
only one of those things is of immediate relevance to us; as far
as i know, there is no software that blows up busses, cuts down
forests, or contributes to domestic violence in a way that is
usable as a tool for Guix and contributors, or in any way relevant
to the project otherwise—i would be dismayed to be proven wrong.
We need to take "stances" we all agree on, and I (and the
previous writer) do not agree that a Free Software project
should be (a) be taking stances on societal topics, (b)
constraining freedom of individuals.
i do not see a way «LLM contributions are not allowed*» is
constraining freedom of individuals. if this is constraining the
freedom of contributors, then disallowing packaging and promotion
of nonfree software also does, as does the fact that we expect the
contributors to have the legal right to submit their
contributions. i would think the last reason alone is enough to
reconsider whether allowing LLM contributions—at least at this
point—is a good idea, as we still have no idea about what the
legal status of LLM output is.
--
λx.x (she/they)
