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The wilful ignorance of researchers in "AI", the charlatanism of the really-existing industry, and the techno-utopian religiosity of the media make me eager for

The wilful ignorance of researchers in "AI", the charlatanism of the really-existing industry, and the techno-utopian religiosity of the media make me eager for the on-coming AI winter.

esquivalience 5y ago
Oh yeah. Gotta love that religiosity.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
tempodox 5y ago
Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #239: Never be afraid to mislabel a product.
- throw0101a 5y ago
  * https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Rules_of_Acquisition https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Rules_of_Acquisition * https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Ferengi_Rules_of_Acquisition https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Ferengi_Rules_of_Acquisi...
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  #19 Satisfaction is not guaranteed. #27 There's nothing more dangerous than an honest businessman.
jacquesm 5y ago
And that's if it doesn't work. The fact that nobody seems to have thought through the consequences of what if it does work is to me even more frightening. In the past if jobs were made obsolete trough mechanization at least there were other jobs. But this is the 'end station', after this point there are no 'other jobs', other than highly skilled ones and preciously few at that. Because self driving cars are pretty much synonymous with general AI and that will make a good chunk of humanity redundant to a degree that we have never witnessed before in history.
- dstick 5y ago
  I can imagine the same was said when cars took over, or computers. There’s just no telling. But basic income is often cited as a solution. And we humans can go back to more creative and/or humanitarian tasks. There’s still a lot of shit in the world that we can’t deal with due to a lack of time and need to provide for our families / ourselves. If that need is removed, who knows - maybe a lot of good will happen because we have the time for it!
- elforce002 5y ago
  This right here. That's the reality.
- jstx1 5y ago
  > Because self driving cars are pretty much synonymous with general AI It really isn't, it's not even remotely close. But it also doesn't need to be general to severely impact employment numbers.
- mjburgess 5y ago
  There won't be any self-driving cars. I'll also be glad for this "ethical hysteria" to end.
  - JohnWhigham 5y ago
    I'll also be glad for this "ethical hysteria" to end. That won't end until it actually happens. Google doesn't want to deal with it, insurance companies don't want to deal with it, regulatory bodies don't want to deal with it. Because of the wonderful reactionary society we live in, self-driving cars won't be properly reined in until one of them swerves into a busy sidewalk and mows over 20 people because it was avoiding a human driver swerving into its oncoming lane.
- orangepanda 5y ago
  Nobody seems to have thought through the consequences of what if Agriculture does work is to me even more frightening
goodpoint 5y ago
I'm positively surprised that you are not being downvoted to hell for saying this. HN loves techno-utopian religiosity.
- mjburgess 5y ago
  Me too. HN's anti-hype sentiment seems to be winning. Perhaps HN doesnt realise how harsh an AI winter will be: billions in funding will vanish. PhD's staking their careers in this area will find no jobs, etc. This has happened twice before in largely identical ways (self-driving cars, ad-tech companies, university research propaganda -- 50s and 80s).
  - svara 5y ago
    I think it's more nuanced - I agree there's no clear road to AGI like some would like you to believe, on the other hand there are new and useful techniques that are real. Those PhDs may not have the stellar careers the they might currently expect, but they'll find plenty of work building automation and assistance systems for "boring" existing workflows. Things like making your IDE a bit better, making some data entry jobs redundant, automating quality checks in increasingly complex cases, assisting in biomedical image interpretation ... These things provide essentially a lower bound for how bad the "winter" might be.
    - mjburgess 5y ago
      PhDs in this area are sufficiently embedded into generic technical industrial practice, perhaps unlike early eras. > assisting in biomedical image interpretation I suspect there's going to be a (counter-)renaissance of expertise and anti-tech sentiment because of gross technical failures in these areas. I think tech budgets into these projects are presently so massive, and so unlikely to deliver on an ROI, that reputations here are going to be destroyed. So the question is what the nature of this counter-reaction will be. I suspect, within the decade, people will be hiding "AI" from their CVs and describing all the python/data-eng they were doing.
  - axelroze 5y ago

The wilful ignorance of researchers in "AI", the charlatanism of the really-existing industry, and the techno-utopian religiosity of the media make me eager for the on-coming AI winter.

esquivalience 5y ago

Oh yeah. Gotta love that religiosity.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

tempodox 5y ago

Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #239: Never be afraid to mislabel a product.

throw0101a 5y ago
* https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Rules_of_Acquisition https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Rules_of_Acquisition * https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Ferengi_Rules_of_Acquisition https://memory-beta.fandom.com/wiki/Ferengi_Rules_of_Acquisi...
matheusmoreira 5y ago
#19 Satisfaction is not guaranteed. #27 There's nothing more dangerous than an honest businessman.

jacquesm 5y ago

And that's if it doesn't work. The fact that nobody seems to have thought through the consequences of what if it does work is to me even more frightening. In the past if jobs were made obsolete trough mechanization at least there were other jobs. But this is the 'end station', after this point there are no 'other jobs', other than highly skilled ones and preciously few at that. Because self driving cars are pretty much synonymous with general AI and that will make a good chunk of humanity redundant to a degree that we have never witnessed before in history.

dstick 5y ago
I can imagine the same was said when cars took over, or computers. There’s just no telling. But basic income is often cited as a solution. And we humans can go back to more creative and/or humanitarian tasks. There’s still a lot of shit in the world that we can’t deal with due to a lack of time and need to provide for our families / ourselves. If that need is removed, who knows - maybe a lot of good will happen because we have the time for it!
elforce002 5y ago
This right here. That's the reality.
jstx1 5y ago
> Because self driving cars are pretty much synonymous with general AI It really isn't, it's not even remotely close. But it also doesn't need to be general to severely impact employment numbers.
mjburgess 5y ago
There won't be any self-driving cars. I'll also be glad for this "ethical hysteria" to end.
- JohnWhigham 5y ago
  I'll also be glad for this "ethical hysteria" to end. That won't end until it actually happens. Google doesn't want to deal with it, insurance companies don't want to deal with it, regulatory bodies don't want to deal with it. Because of the wonderful reactionary society we live in, self-driving cars won't be properly reined in until one of them swerves into a busy sidewalk and mows over 20 people because it was avoiding a human driver swerving into its oncoming lane.
orangepanda 5y ago
Nobody seems to have thought through the consequences of what if Agriculture does work is to me even more frightening

goodpoint 5y ago

I'm positively surprised that you are not being downvoted to hell for saying this. HN loves techno-utopian religiosity.

mjburgess 5y ago
Me too. HN's anti-hype sentiment seems to be winning. Perhaps HN doesnt realise how harsh an AI winter will be: billions in funding will vanish. PhD's staking their careers in this area will find no jobs, etc. This has happened twice before in largely identical ways (self-driving cars, ad-tech companies, university research propaganda -- 50s and 80s).
- svara 5y ago
  I think it's more nuanced - I agree there's no clear road to AGI like some would like you to believe, on the other hand there are new and useful techniques that are real. Those PhDs may not have the stellar careers the they might currently expect, but they'll find plenty of work building automation and assistance systems for "boring" existing workflows. Things like making your IDE a bit better, making some data entry jobs redundant, automating quality checks in increasingly complex cases, assisting in biomedical image interpretation ... These things provide essentially a lower bound for how bad the "winter" might be.
  - mjburgess 5y ago
    PhDs in this area are sufficiently embedded into generic technical industrial practice, perhaps unlike early eras. > assisting in biomedical image interpretation I suspect there's going to be a (counter-)renaissance of expertise and anti-tech sentiment because of gross technical failures in these areas. I think tech budgets into these projects are presently so massive, and so unlikely to deliver on an ROI, that reputations here are going to be destroyed. So the question is what the nature of this counter-reaction will be. I suspect, within the decade, people will be hiding "AI" from their CVs and describing all the python/data-eng they were doing.
- axelroze 5y ago