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I see the current gold rush of AI the same way I saw crypto-currencies. Even if originally there were people that believed in the concept it became just a snake

I see the current gold rush of AI the same way I saw crypto-currencies. Even if originally there were people that believed in the concept it became just a snake-oil sellers business. The parallelism is made even more relevant by its hungry use of electricity. There is a future for AI but it is not what we see companies developing right now. Chat-bots are more dystopian and problematic than useful. AI future (and present) is on analyzing big chunks of data about chemical bounds, traffic-flow, astronomical observations, etc. But all that really useful AI is not attracting the kind of investment that flashy consumer-oriented chat-bots are getting.

knowaveragejoe 2y ago
For what it's worth, all of that really useful AI you mention(and then some!) is attracting the kind of investment you want, you just don't hear about it because it's not interesting to the average person.
ETH_start 2y ago
There is reason to be cautious about every kind of endeavor where the potential for enrichment can cloud judgment. However, the possibilities opened up by technologies this radical in the magnitude of the improvements they make in specific fundamental societal functions are enormous, and for that reason, they are on the balance massively beneficial, and that includes chat bots.
- piva00 2y ago
  > However, the possibilities opened up by technologies this radical in the magnitude of the improvements they make in specific fundamental societal functions are enormous, and for that reason, they are on the balance massively beneficial, and that includes chat bots. The improvements it can be dreamed of to the bottom line of companies by replacing expensive labour are massive, that's why it got US$ 1tn Capex downed into it as noted in another article from Goldman Sachs shared today on HN. It doesn't mean it's massively beneficial to societal functions, a bigger case for that would be a clean, and massively cheap energy source (if fusion turned out to be viable and scalable, for example) but we don't see US$ 1tn poured into the pursuit of that because it does not promise improving companies' bottom line in a short time frame. AI can definitely turn out to be a panacea but more and more grifters are attaching themselves to it, and the companies churning out the most advances of it are not really invested in improving society as a whole, that's the marketing speak used but we in tech have seen those empty promises of utopian changes turning out to be just smoke and mirrors for the surveillance capitalism age to set in.
  - TeMPOraL 2y ago
    > AI can definitely turn out to be a panacea but more and more grifters are attaching themselves to it, and the companies churning out the most advances of it are not really invested in improving society as a whole I came to see the "AI hype" not as reminiscent of crypto-hype, but of dot-com boom. Lots of grifters attached themselves to this new Internet thing. Lots of bullshit products was made. Lots of people lost their shirt through this. That had no bearing on how useful the Internet was, and turned out to be. And so today, we also have a lot of AI-grifters, and this also doesn't mean the underlying tech is bogus.
  - ETH_start 2y ago
    Reducing the need to expend expensive labor to produce goods/services is massively beneficial. It is the basis of all economic development and wage growth.
    - seadan83 2y ago
      This can also describe the great enshittification race of every good/product/service. The 'wage growth' part does not always follow. Middle-skilled laborers are still be pushed out of the economy. [1] [1] https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/31566/411633-America-s-Forgotten-Middle-Skill-Jobs.PDF https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/31566/... (data is on pages 13, 20, 21 & 23)
      - ETH_start 2y ago
        Wages, after adjusting for inflation, are more than 20x greater today than they were 200 years ago. That's why infant mortality has declined so much. We still have a lot of room for improvement, with the masses still forced to subsist on sub-par products (e.g. ultra-processed foods, products that poison them with microplastics, etc) and long work hours just to afford basics (housing, healthcare, childcare, etc), and the only way to get there is continued economic development, which literally amounts to automation of labor-intensive production processes. Wages strongly track per capita GDP. The natural instinct to be cynical is misguided when it comes to expectations regarding the impact of automation.
sva_ 2y ago
Not sure if energy use is a sufficient criteria to dismiss some technology. This universe progresses by turning low entropy energy into high entropy energy, which the use of energy is doing. So it seems to be closely tied. Making processes more energy-efficient is only really a good thing as long as it retains its effectiveness.
- lagrange77 2y ago
  > Not sure if energy use is a sufficient criteria to dismiss some technology. This universe progresses by turning low entropy energy into high entropy energy, which the use of energy is doing. What is the connection between those two sentences?
  - sva_ 2y ago
    I think that things like intelligence and productivity are directly related to an increase in entropy. In this universe, we have a budget of entropy, and when it is used up, we're done for. We have to make our mark before that is the case, or the program that runs our simulation will just terminate with no result. It is a very pseudoscientific believe of mine, I guess.
    - namaria 2y ago
      > we have a budget of entropy In closed systems. The Universe doesn't seem to be a closed system.
    - mcguire 2y ago
      ...therefore we should burn through our budget as fast as possible?
smus 2y ago
I currently save so much time a day using chatbots lol
darig 2y ago
[dead]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
williamcotton 2y ago
I'm getting very tired of the claim that LLMs are not useful. I hand-wrote perhaps 10 lines of code in this entire project: https://github.com/williamcotton/guish https://github.com/williamcotton/guish I spent most of the weekend playing with my kids in the pool. Three years ago this would have taken more than a week of my time and I wouldn't have done much else.
- muglug 2y ago
  So three years ago you'd spend less time with your kids in order to write a 2,000-line FOSS app for understanding Bash scripts? I'm not sure that's a good thing.
  - aoeusnth1 2y ago
    Exactly, you agree: the lack of LLMs is not good. LLMs turned a bad outcome into a good one.
    - muglug 2y ago
      It was a glib comment, but I fundamentally reject the premise that we'll have more personal time because of ChatGPT. It's like saying that buying a faster computer that compiles quicker means you can spend more time with your family. Theoretically true, but in practice people who are that way inclined can find myriad other ways to use the new technology to eat up time.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - williamcotton 2y ago
        Let's unravel what you've said here. You're saying that there is no way that I'm not a bad parent because I would have found a way to ignore my family regardless of some time saving device. Glib? That's not glib. That's just being a jerk. And fueled by what, your personal distaste for LLMs? People who are that way inclined?

knowaveragejoe 2y ago

For what it's worth, all of that really useful AI you mention(and then some!) is attracting the kind of investment you want, you just don't hear about it because it's not interesting to the average person.

ETH_start 2y ago

There is reason to be cautious about every kind of endeavor where the potential for enrichment can cloud judgment. However, the possibilities opened up by technologies this radical in the magnitude of the improvements they make in specific fundamental societal functions are enormous, and for that reason, they are on the balance massively beneficial, and that includes chat bots.

piva00 2y ago
> However, the possibilities opened up by technologies this radical in the magnitude of the improvements they make in specific fundamental societal functions are enormous, and for that reason, they are on the balance massively beneficial, and that includes chat bots. The improvements it can be dreamed of to the bottom line of companies by replacing expensive labour are massive, that's why it got US$ 1tn Capex downed into it as noted in another article from Goldman Sachs shared today on HN. It doesn't mean it's massively beneficial to societal functions, a bigger case for that would be a clean, and massively cheap energy source (if fusion turned out to be viable and scalable, for example) but we don't see US$ 1tn poured into the pursuit of that because it does not promise improving companies' bottom line in a short time frame. AI can definitely turn out to be a panacea but more and more grifters are attaching themselves to it, and the companies churning out the most advances of it are not really invested in improving society as a whole, that's the marketing speak used but we in tech have seen those empty promises of utopian changes turning out to be just smoke and mirrors for the surveillance capitalism age to set in.
- TeMPOraL 2y ago
  > AI can definitely turn out to be a panacea but more and more grifters are attaching themselves to it, and the companies churning out the most advances of it are not really invested in improving society as a whole I came to see the "AI hype" not as reminiscent of crypto-hype, but of dot-com boom. Lots of grifters attached themselves to this new Internet thing. Lots of bullshit products was made. Lots of people lost their shirt through this. That had no bearing on how useful the Internet was, and turned out to be. And so today, we also have a lot of AI-grifters, and this also doesn't mean the underlying tech is bogus.
- ETH_start 2y ago
  Reducing the need to expend expensive labor to produce goods/services is massively beneficial. It is the basis of all economic development and wage growth.
  - seadan83 2y ago
    This can also describe the great enshittification race of every good/product/service. The 'wage growth' part does not always follow. Middle-skilled laborers are still be pushed out of the economy. [1] [1] https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/31566/411633-America-s-Forgotten-Middle-Skill-Jobs.PDF https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/31566/... (data is on pages 13, 20, 21 & 23)
    - ETH_start 2y ago
      Wages, after adjusting for inflation, are more than 20x greater today than they were 200 years ago. That's why infant mortality has declined so much. We still have a lot of room for improvement, with the masses still forced to subsist on sub-par products (e.g. ultra-processed foods, products that poison them with microplastics, etc) and long work hours just to afford basics (housing, healthcare, childcare, etc), and the only way to get there is continued economic development, which literally amounts to automation of labor-intensive production processes. Wages strongly track per capita GDP. The natural instinct to be cynical is misguided when it comes to expectations regarding the impact of automation.

sva_ 2y ago

Not sure if energy use is a sufficient criteria to dismiss some technology. This universe progresses by turning low entropy energy into high entropy energy, which the use of energy is doing. So it seems to be closely tied. Making processes more energy-efficient is only really a good thing as long as it retains its effectiveness.

lagrange77 2y ago
> Not sure if energy use is a sufficient criteria to dismiss some technology. This universe progresses by turning low entropy energy into high entropy energy, which the use of energy is doing. What is the connection between those two sentences?
- sva_ 2y ago
  I think that things like intelligence and productivity are directly related to an increase in entropy. In this universe, we have a budget of entropy, and when it is used up, we're done for. We have to make our mark before that is the case, or the program that runs our simulation will just terminate with no result. It is a very pseudoscientific believe of mine, I guess.
  - namaria 2y ago
    > we have a budget of entropy In closed systems. The Universe doesn't seem to be a closed system.
  - mcguire 2y ago
    ...therefore we should burn through our budget as fast as possible?

smus 2y ago

I currently save so much time a day using chatbots lol

darig 2y ago

[dead]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

williamcotton 2y ago

I'm getting very tired of the claim that LLMs are not useful. I hand-wrote perhaps 10 lines of code in this entire project: https://github.com/williamcotton/guish https://github.com/williamcotton/guish I spent most of the weekend playing with my kids in the pool. Three years ago this would have taken more than a week of my time and I wouldn't have done much else.

muglug 2y ago
So three years ago you'd spend less time with your kids in order to write a 2,000-line FOSS app for understanding Bash scripts? I'm not sure that's a good thing.
- aoeusnth1 2y ago
  Exactly, you agree: the lack of LLMs is not good. LLMs turned a bad outcome into a good one.
  - muglug 2y ago
    It was a glib comment, but I fundamentally reject the premise that we'll have more personal time because of ChatGPT. It's like saying that buying a faster computer that compiles quicker means you can spend more time with your family. Theoretically true, but in practice people who are that way inclined can find myriad other ways to use the new technology to eat up time.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - williamcotton 2y ago
      Let's unravel what you've said here. You're saying that there is no way that I'm not a bad parent because I would have found a way to ignore my family regardless of some time saving device. Glib? That's not glib. That's just being a jerk. And fueled by what, your personal distaste for LLMs? People who are that way inclined?