4 ms·

The credibility of everyone who was involved in this imbroglio is shot for me until I get some receipts for this. I personally doubt RLHF can scale anyway. Alt

by CSSer 3y ago

The credibility of everyone who was involved in this imbroglio is shot for me until I get some receipts for this. I personally doubt RLHF can scale anyway. Altman recently gave an interview at Oxford (right before all of this drama) of all places where, while answering an unrelated question about compute costs, he mentioned that he “seriously thinks” we’ll achieve fusion in the next few years. The recklessness and silliness of that comment really struck me. It made me wonder how much he’s applying this kind of lazy, undisciplined cognition to his own work. I haven’t seen hype, drama, and speculation like this since crypto. Someone, please, bring this back down to earth. Lately I’m beginning to feel like we’ve crossed over into some weird Twilight Zone where HBO’s Silicon Valley has moved from entertaining parody to cutting social commentary.

cmrdporcupine 3y ago
You see the same kind of thinking here on HN all the time. There's a few generations of us that were brought up on a kind of teleological notion of technological progress, inspired by the insanely massive late 20th century advances in aerospace, then semiconductors, and computer science, and being brought up in a triumphalist west where the G7 had buried its economic and political foes etc. In that context, with a heavy dose of science fiction and a heap of ideology, it somewhat makes sense that there's people who see these kinds of things (fusion in 5 years! AGI right around the corner!) as not only posisble, but inevitable. But the magic of Moore's law in transistor technology was/is accomplished through insanely hard nuts and bolts engineering and science by dedicated smart people. It's not investors and techbros and writers and pundits that make this stuff happen. It's just grit and hard work and continuous incremental improvements. There's no magic that makes technology grow in exponential terms. Moore's law doesn't apply to anything but transistors. "Progress" is not inevitable. Technology doesn't change the world -- people do. Practical fusion energy doesn't happen just because Altman's friends sprinkle cash all over it and talk it up. Anyways, yeah, just ranting to agree with you. I am getting so sick of this crap.
- d0mine 3y ago
  Where are the promised cities on the Moon? ChatGPT may be the Moon-landing event: highly inspirational, highly expensive, modest (relative to the hype) actual practical value long term.
  - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
    Man, the popular science stuff I remember ingesting as a young child in the late 70s and early 80s... we were supposed to have the whole solar system colonized by now...
actionfromafar 3y ago
Maybe Q said it could fix fusion? :-)

by CSSer 3y ago

cmrdporcupine 3y ago

You see the same kind of thinking here on HN all the time. There's a few generations of us that were brought up on a kind of teleological notion of technological progress, inspired by the insanely massive late 20th century advances in aerospace, then semiconductors, and computer science, and being brought up in a triumphalist west where the G7 had buried its economic and political foes etc. In that context, with a heavy dose of science fiction and a heap of ideology, it somewhat makes sense that there's people who see these kinds of things (fusion in 5 years! AGI right around the corner!) as not only posisble, but inevitable. But the magic of Moore's law in transistor technology was/is accomplished through insanely hard nuts and bolts engineering and science by dedicated smart people. It's not investors and techbros and writers and pundits that make this stuff happen. It's just grit and hard work and continuous incremental improvements. There's no magic that makes technology grow in exponential terms. Moore's law doesn't apply to anything but transistors. "Progress" is not inevitable. Technology doesn't change the world -- people do. Practical fusion energy doesn't happen just because Altman's friends sprinkle cash all over it and talk it up. Anyways, yeah, just ranting to agree with you. I am getting so sick of this crap.

d0mine 3y ago
Where are the promised cities on the Moon? ChatGPT may be the Moon-landing event: highly inspirational, highly expensive, modest (relative to the hype) actual practical value long term.
- cmrdporcupine 3y ago
  Man, the popular science stuff I remember ingesting as a young child in the late 70s and early 80s... we were supposed to have the whole solar system colonized by now...

actionfromafar 3y ago

Maybe Q said it could fix fusion? :-)