5 ms·

Treat ChatGPT like an extremely knowledgeable junior who has read everything on the internet, but simultaneously doesn’t really understand logic. You can lever

by eunoia 4y ago

Treat ChatGPT like an extremely knowledgeable junior who has read everything on the internet, but simultaneously doesn’t really understand logic. You can leverage this for your own productivity. Ask your “junior” to generate sample code for an API you don’t quite remember. Ask it to generate some bash scripts you’ve been putting off. Review its output for correctness and go from there. It’s an incredible productivity boost for a senior doing the integrating. It’s also no replacement for someone with immense domain experience doing the integrating…

ericmcer 4y ago
This seems accurate, I was super impressed with it, but I can't picture it doing something like: "Make uploading images more intuitive for users" anytime soon. It is super useful for generating boilerplate for any kind of pure function you might need.
ElevenLathe 4y ago
This seems accurate but is pretty bleak for anyone who is a "junior" themselves. I just broke into a "real" SRE role after being a "unix admin" and incident manager for my whole career. My actual software engineering skills are therefore pretty raw. I'm hoping that I will be able to sneak in as one of the last generations of "juniors" that don't have to meaningfully compete with large language models.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- throwaway1183 4y ago
  I have been gathering experience in computer vision, graphics, and natural language processing to break into the tech industry as a junior research engineer rather than a research scientist. However, with recent advancements in technology, I feel like I have no place in the field anymore. I have lost all of my curiosity and inner drive. It feels like I was just about to start my career, but now I am not sure what to do. I want to switch fields, but I am worried about all the time and effort I invested in learning these models and their implementation. If I had invested that same energy in a different field, I would have more reliable experience and skills. All I have now is pre-historic knowledge. And if I were to catch up now just because I am interested, by the time I do, the goal line will have moved further away. It's a difficult and frustrating situation to be in.
  - ElevenLathe 4y ago
    Don't be too discouraged. I'm trying not to be, and one thing I have definitely noticed in my career in corporate jobs is this: Just because a technology exists that could do a job does NOT mean that anyone in the company will implement it in a way that actually replaces the humans doing it. A startup may avoid a lot of work (and therefore labor expense) by being smart and nimble about technology, but established companies rarely do. As an example, most big companies still run multiple Exchange servers in 2022 (the multiple part is usually related to acquisitions), while a startup started in 2022 would of course never dream of doing so, since it would be madness. There are a lot of jobs out there that are the equivalent of running an on-prem Exchange server. They aren't glamorous but they will keep you fed and housed. Also, there will likely be plenty of work in the coming decade unwinding half-baked attempts to integrate large language models into business processes where it doesn't ultimately make sense and is a net negative. Many of these negative-value projects are probably being conceived at this very moment. All is not hopeless.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - throwaway1183 4y ago
      This gives some hope! I want to learn that skill that is equivalent to "managing these exchange servers" that might actually last throughout the career. This "latest and greatest" hype chasing has seriously burnt me out.
      - eunoia 4y ago
        Something to think about btw: a lot of big companies have a _ton_ of proprietary, internal complexity that is not exposed to the public and therefore cannot be assisted by these general purpose LLM’s. Seems a bit strange but being a “Company Man” might actually bring a new degree of job security…
        ElevenLathe 4y ago
- eunoia 4y ago
  I unfortunately agree with the sentiment, and agree it’s quite scary if this is how you bring food home and don’t already have enough (what is enough?) experience. Fwiw I’m facing this in a hobby where I very much am a “junior”. Currently trying to decide if it’s worth continuing building the skills to create from scratch rather than just leveraging ML and being an “editor”. I think I’ve decided to continue building the skills. Editing/reviewing is easier if you can create as well and this is a hobby I enjoy after all. Also there has to be some light at the end of the tunnel right? If we kill the process via which juniors grow, we eventually kill the industry…
clnq 4y ago
GPT-3.5 is an extremely knowledgeable junior who will never grow past entry-level skills. Which is something of very little value to tech companies. There's a reason why entry-level positions are non-terminal - you must either be promoted into a mid-level engineer or eventually many companies will ask you to leave. I wouldn't worry - much less have existential dread - that GPT-3/3.5 will replace a significant portion of engineering jobs. If AI technology continues to evolve as it has in the last 30 months, then perhaps we can start worrying in a few years. Now there is very little overlap between what GPT-3.5 produces and what engineers do day-to-day. What ChatGPT could maybe replace is a need for an engineer in a company that barely needs one. Perhaps if a company needs to write a few bash scripts a year. But even with that, there would be luck involved and such a company would be better off hiring a contractor. GPT-3.5 does produce some fantastic results, but not consistently. It's a little bit better in low-level implementations and not that good with implementations from non-technical descriptions. And then there's all the work engineers need to do adjacent to writing code that ChatGPT has no means to do. All in all, I believe that these models look like they could replace engineers only until one gets a bit more experience with them. They are amazing works of engineering and they are fantastically capable in some areas like text synthesis, but it's very difficult to see a model replacing, let's say, anyone on my team of engineers in a tech company.
- than3 4y ago
  cinq, that opinion shows a real naivete and a spectacular lack of vision. Promoting the idea that it will happen slowly so don't worry is the equivalent of burying your head in the sand until its too late to do anything. How long ago was it that people said object detection wouldn't be possible, or that realistic fakes couldn't be made, or super-resolution "enhance" was not possible. The rate of change of these things is exponential, in one direction, and people are notoriously bad at understanding what that means or entails because very few people deal with exponentials on a regular basis. If the gap between abilities is even near close now, it will far exceed our abilities in a far faster time than you would ever think possible because humans in general are bad at eyeballing exponential relationships. You already have AI designing machines and structures that exceed the engineering specifications of what we are capable of creating using 3d printers. (SOTA, State of the Art). I wouldn't call those feats junior level.

by eunoia 4y ago

ericmcer 4y ago

This seems accurate, I was super impressed with it, but I can't picture it doing something like: "Make uploading images more intuitive for users" anytime soon. It is super useful for generating boilerplate for any kind of pure function you might need.

ElevenLathe 4y ago

This seems accurate but is pretty bleak for anyone who is a "junior" themselves. I just broke into a "real" SRE role after being a "unix admin" and incident manager for my whole career. My actual software engineering skills are therefore pretty raw. I'm hoping that I will be able to sneak in as one of the last generations of "juniors" that don't have to meaningfully compete with large language models.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
throwaway1183 4y ago
I have been gathering experience in computer vision, graphics, and natural language processing to break into the tech industry as a junior research engineer rather than a research scientist. However, with recent advancements in technology, I feel like I have no place in the field anymore. I have lost all of my curiosity and inner drive. It feels like I was just about to start my career, but now I am not sure what to do. I want to switch fields, but I am worried about all the time and effort I invested in learning these models and their implementation. If I had invested that same energy in a different field, I would have more reliable experience and skills. All I have now is pre-historic knowledge. And if I were to catch up now just because I am interested, by the time I do, the goal line will have moved further away. It's a difficult and frustrating situation to be in.
- ElevenLathe 4y ago
  Don't be too discouraged. I'm trying not to be, and one thing I have definitely noticed in my career in corporate jobs is this: Just because a technology exists that could do a job does NOT mean that anyone in the company will implement it in a way that actually replaces the humans doing it. A startup may avoid a lot of work (and therefore labor expense) by being smart and nimble about technology, but established companies rarely do. As an example, most big companies still run multiple Exchange servers in 2022 (the multiple part is usually related to acquisitions), while a startup started in 2022 would of course never dream of doing so, since it would be madness. There are a lot of jobs out there that are the equivalent of running an on-prem Exchange server. They aren't glamorous but they will keep you fed and housed. Also, there will likely be plenty of work in the coming decade unwinding half-baked attempts to integrate large language models into business processes where it doesn't ultimately make sense and is a net negative. Many of these negative-value projects are probably being conceived at this very moment. All is not hopeless.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - throwaway1183 4y ago
    This gives some hope! I want to learn that skill that is equivalent to "managing these exchange servers" that might actually last throughout the career. This "latest and greatest" hype chasing has seriously burnt me out.
    - eunoia 4y ago
      Something to think about btw: a lot of big companies have a _ton_ of proprietary, internal complexity that is not exposed to the public and therefore cannot be assisted by these general purpose LLM’s. Seems a bit strange but being a “Company Man” might actually bring a new degree of job security…
      - ElevenLathe 4y ago
eunoia 4y ago
I unfortunately agree with the sentiment, and agree it’s quite scary if this is how you bring food home and don’t already have enough (what is enough?) experience. Fwiw I’m facing this in a hobby where I very much am a “junior”. Currently trying to decide if it’s worth continuing building the skills to create from scratch rather than just leveraging ML and being an “editor”. I think I’ve decided to continue building the skills. Editing/reviewing is easier if you can create as well and this is a hobby I enjoy after all. Also there has to be some light at the end of the tunnel right? If we kill the process via which juniors grow, we eventually kill the industry…

clnq 4y ago

GPT-3.5 is an extremely knowledgeable junior who will never grow past entry-level skills. Which is something of very little value to tech companies. There's a reason why entry-level positions are non-terminal - you must either be promoted into a mid-level engineer or eventually many companies will ask you to leave. I wouldn't worry - much less have existential dread - that GPT-3/3.5 will replace a significant portion of engineering jobs. If AI technology continues to evolve as it has in the last 30 months, then perhaps we can start worrying in a few years. Now there is very little overlap between what GPT-3.5 produces and what engineers do day-to-day. What ChatGPT could maybe replace is a need for an engineer in a company that barely needs one. Perhaps if a company needs to write a few bash scripts a year. But even with that, there would be luck involved and such a company would be better off hiring a contractor. GPT-3.5 does produce some fantastic results, but not consistently. It's a little bit better in low-level implementations and not that good with implementations from non-technical descriptions. And then there's all the work engineers need to do adjacent to writing code that ChatGPT has no means to do. All in all, I believe that these models look like they could replace engineers only until one gets a bit more experience with them. They are amazing works of engineering and they are fantastically capable in some areas like text synthesis, but it's very difficult to see a model replacing, let's say, anyone on my team of engineers in a tech company.

than3 4y ago
cinq, that opinion shows a real naivete and a spectacular lack of vision. Promoting the idea that it will happen slowly so don't worry is the equivalent of burying your head in the sand until its too late to do anything. How long ago was it that people said object detection wouldn't be possible, or that realistic fakes couldn't be made, or super-resolution "enhance" was not possible. The rate of change of these things is exponential, in one direction, and people are notoriously bad at understanding what that means or entails because very few people deal with exponentials on a regular basis. If the gap between abilities is even near close now, it will far exceed our abilities in a far faster time than you would ever think possible because humans in general are bad at eyeballing exponential relationships. You already have AI designing machines and structures that exceed the engineering specifications of what we are capable of creating using 3d printers. (SOTA, State of the Art). I wouldn't call those feats junior level.