4 ms·

Knuth's response here reminds me a bit of Einstein's rather dogged commitment to the "god does not play dice with the universe" philosophy. Just like non-determ

by qqtt 3y ago

Knuth's response here reminds me a bit of Einstein's rather dogged commitment to the "god does not play dice with the universe" philosophy. Just like non-determinism of Quantum Mechanics was a bit of a thorn in Einstein's side, the non-determinism and probabilistic nature of AI seems to put off Knuth from recognizing the long term value. This isn't about being a "magician" - it's more about that probabilistic non-deterministic computation can provide immense value and can be the building block for a whole new class of approaches to solve problems.

zoogeny 3y ago
It is very interesting to compare Knuth's position on LLMs to Einstein's position on quantum physics and I think it is apt. At least Einstein was explicit in his distaste for non-determinism. Knuth does not specify in this exchange why he believes these LLM approaches are inauthentic. He does demonstrate the untrustworthy-ness of the current models but he doesn't provide any evidence that shows the approach is incapable of creating trustworthy models in principle. Even on the topic of trustworthiness, it is an interesting kind of criticism in that we are holding AIs based on LLMs to a higher standard than we would hold any human. Could you imagine a vox-pop style on-the-street interview where an average passer-by was asked the same questions that Donald Knuth posed to the LLM? How many people would even be able to formulate a coherent answer to the questions about Beethoven, Rogers and Hammerstein, or The Haj? Yet somehow the imperfection of these answers from an early-generation LLM is enough to completely dismiss the entire approach.
- cozzyd 3y ago
  If you give the person internet access and some time to answer the question, then most people will do better... or at least they'll say they don't know.

4 ms·

Knuth's response here reminds me a bit of Einstein's rather dogged commitment to the "god does not play dice with the universe" philosophy. Just like non-determ

by qqtt 3y ago

zoogeny 3y ago
It is very interesting to compare Knuth's position on LLMs to Einstein's position on quantum physics and I think it is apt. At least Einstein was explicit in his distaste for non-determinism. Knuth does not specify in this exchange why he believes these LLM approaches are inauthentic. He does demonstrate the untrustworthy-ness of the current models but he doesn't provide any evidence that shows the approach is incapable of creating trustworthy models in principle. Even on the topic of trustworthiness, it is an interesting kind of criticism in that we are holding AIs based on LLMs to a higher standard than we would hold any human. Could you imagine a vox-pop style on-the-street interview where an average passer-by was asked the same questions that Donald Knuth posed to the LLM? How many people would even be able to formulate a coherent answer to the questions about Beethoven, Rogers and Hammerstein, or The Haj? Yet somehow the imperfection of these answers from an early-generation LLM is enough to completely dismiss the entire approach.
- cozzyd 3y ago
  If you give the person internet access and some time to answer the question, then most people will do better... or at least they'll say they don't know.