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This consistent lack of self-awareness across tech is getting ridiculuous. From Musk to pg's past occasional oblique defenses of Altman. It's gotten to the poin

This consistent lack of self-awareness across tech is getting ridiculuous. From Musk to pg's past occasional oblique defenses of Altman. It's gotten to the point where we need to replace the pledge of allegiance with Upton Sinclair's quote: "Don't expect someone to understand something when their salary depends on them not understanding it." Don't get me wrong what you're saying may be 100% true. But the sentence immediately after your stated your expertise should be, "Don't take my word for it, verify it yourself." There is almost certainly a bunch of ventures that started too early. A bunch that are misguided. A bunch that will contribute a lot of understanding but will disappear having evaporated investor money. But that’s the way new foundational technologies -are- . That isn’t a bubble that’s how new markets behave. This is where you should have checked yourself and realized something was off with what you were saying, as this description fits the dotcom bubble rather well. Your are not providing any specific evidence, just stating an argument from authority.

fnordpiglet 2y ago
Yeah the hucksters are selling hard. I don’t buy their end vision is as easy as they claim it is. But I also don’t deny that at least in Musk there’s been a history of doing amazing things about 5 years later than he claimed he would. I don’t like the man but I am amazed at how he took our inability to dream any more and turned it on its head. You can verify it yourself, but don’t expect the out of the tin stuff with a web UI and a iPhone app to be where the power lies. Those are demo ware. They’re literal toys. The current state of the art use requires a lot of trial and error, struggling with shitty abstractions, lack of knowledge or draw on, and a lot of fumbling with a brand new technique let alone technology. It also requires understanding how generative AI works, loss functions, a fair amount of intuitively understood math, and some really creative ideas. It’s all more or less open source or where it’s not the per api fees are reasonable and there are cloud services you can use. It’s all possible it’s just not -easy- to verify. And - since I’ve done it myself and seen its power first hand in what I do I actually don’t have a lot of drive to convince others. Everyone will see sooner or later as the abstractions and the techniques mature. As such I don’t feel compelled to build a body of evidence in the least. Don’t believe me - ok! Don’t want to really dig in and verify things at the cutting edge of work being done because it’s a lot of work? Ok! But likewise, asserting the contrary without having done that work is just as fallacious, and doesn’t change my first hand experiences in the least.
- sillyfluke 2y ago
  Since my comment was alreadly long I didn't want to add a long parenthesis to elaborate the details with Musk, but I wasn't referring to his concrete accomplishments, which I don't deny and am also irritated when others needlessly deny. I am referring to his ridiculuously and transparently hypocritical 180 change in behavior after he meets with leaders of countries he was criticizing prior to meeting them. He has not tweeted anything remotely negative on China and Israel after meeting Xi and Netanyahu, clearly due to transactional quid pro quo he was able extract from those meetings regarding his business interests. I have no doubt his railing against the Biden admin would have been tempered had they been more accomadating to his business interests. It is abjectly pathetic and spineless behavior.

fnordpiglet 2y ago

Yeah the hucksters are selling hard. I don’t buy their end vision is as easy as they claim it is. But I also don’t deny that at least in Musk there’s been a history of doing amazing things about 5 years later than he claimed he would. I don’t like the man but I am amazed at how he took our inability to dream any more and turned it on its head. You can verify it yourself, but don’t expect the out of the tin stuff with a web UI and a iPhone app to be where the power lies. Those are demo ware. They’re literal toys. The current state of the art use requires a lot of trial and error, struggling with shitty abstractions, lack of knowledge or draw on, and a lot of fumbling with a brand new technique let alone technology. It also requires understanding how generative AI works, loss functions, a fair amount of intuitively understood math, and some really creative ideas. It’s all more or less open source or where it’s not the per api fees are reasonable and there are cloud services you can use. It’s all possible it’s just not -easy- to verify. And - since I’ve done it myself and seen its power first hand in what I do I actually don’t have a lot of drive to convince others. Everyone will see sooner or later as the abstractions and the techniques mature. As such I don’t feel compelled to build a body of evidence in the least. Don’t believe me - ok! Don’t want to really dig in and verify things at the cutting edge of work being done because it’s a lot of work? Ok! But likewise, asserting the contrary without having done that work is just as fallacious, and doesn’t change my first hand experiences in the least.

sillyfluke 2y ago
Since my comment was alreadly long I didn't want to add a long parenthesis to elaborate the details with Musk, but I wasn't referring to his concrete accomplishments, which I don't deny and am also irritated when others needlessly deny. I am referring to his ridiculuously and transparently hypocritical 180 change in behavior after he meets with leaders of countries he was criticizing prior to meeting them. He has not tweeted anything remotely negative on China and Israel after meeting Xi and Netanyahu, clearly due to transactional quid pro quo he was able extract from those meetings regarding his business interests. I have no doubt his railing against the Biden admin would have been tempered had they been more accomadating to his business interests. It is abjectly pathetic and spineless behavior.