5 ms·

I think many non technical people have an incorrect understanding of "AI", where they conflate a single example of what neural networks can do, namely chat bots

I think many non technical people have an incorrect understanding of "AI", where they conflate a single example of what neural networks can do, namely chat bots, with an entire field. Even if chat bots have no significant advances in the foreseeable future, "AI" as in large neural networks have already proven themselves to be extremely useful and able to accomplish a lot of things which are almost impossible to do without them.

falloutx 2y ago
I keep seeing this argument that there is value out there, but for normal people all we are seeing is spam, cute ai cat pics on different social medias, can you please give a few examples of fields/problems where AI has been really helpful.
- kalupa 2y ago
  A solution in search of a problem
- JohnFen 2y ago
  I work on ML networks used for industrial control systems that characterize defects in the product and determine what to do about them. Not what normal people think of when they hear "AI", but it's not really much different from what LLMs are built on. We've been selling these systems for a decade or so now.
- Out_of_Characte 2y ago
  Any problem that has a large range of inputs and a large range of outputs with many possible permutations inbetween. Yes, you could use specialised algoritms but why not let the AI design such thing? It might be better than you.
- goodside 2y ago
  Machine translation is valuable and it’s all neural these days.
- scotty79 2y ago
  Protein folding. Drug candidate discovery.
- tarr11 2y ago
  Clinical machine learning for cancer diagnosis is one promising area https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(23)00094-6.pdf https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(23)00094-6.pdf
- NathanKP 2y ago
  Generative AI chat is incredibly useful for learning, especially tasks that require a lot of inline learning such as software engineering. I use generative AI chat constantly, because it is basically a Stack Overflow that is near instant with it's answers and can debug error messages extremely well. I don't even have to leave my code editor if I install the extension in my IDE. And with an IDE extension it can be aware of the actual context of my codebase to the point where it can write code samples that reference my own methods and variables. It's incredibly helpful. I've seen and used a lot of different learning techniques over the years. I started out learning coding from physical books. Then it was online bulletin boards and forums, and Google. But AI agents and chat have replaced almost all of that now. I rarely waste my time on Google anymore when I can get more relevant answers, faster, right in my IDE. Sure there is the occasional hallucination, but its not that much worse than terrible answers on Stack Overflow, or junk blogs and outdated docs that Google surfaces because someone SEOed the hell out of them.
  - Slyfox33 2y ago
    "Occasional hallucination" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.
    - alan-hn 2y ago
      Perhaps if it was a research context sure, but for the most part I've found GPT4 to do a good job on small to medium size chunks of coding
    - rusticpenn 2y ago
      Less hallucination than some of my students in their presentations
  - JohnFen 2y ago
    Honestly, I have found LLMs to be much inferior to my usual methods for this sort of use case. So much so that I've stopped using them. I am fascinated by how different people have such different experiences with these systems. A study into what the difference between the "best thing since sliced bread" camp and the "meh" camp is would be very interesting.
- kylebenzle 2y ago
  You must be kidding, ALL algorithmic trading uses ML models, the VAST MAJORITY of money being made and traded is on the back of ML right now. Are there really people in tech today that don't understand how much ML has taken over? Lol, you might be talking about chatgpt specifically, which is kinda dumb.
  - 11101010001100 2y ago
    Fancy statistics is nothing new.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  >I keep seeing this argument that there is value out there I am sure that every person with significant hearing problems greatly appreciates auto generated subtitles. Surely some people enjoy having access to voice commands. Having translation tools which are reasonably good at inferring context is a great help if you want to communicate with a person who has no shared language. Having the ability to do some automated screening for abnormality can definitely help in manufacturing, same for medical imaging where a computer might point out to a doctor that something warrants a second look can be helpful. Cars being able to detect pedestrians and cyclists, surely has saved many lives already. I could go on, but this is what I mean with people conflating "chat bots", with the entire range of applications for neutral networks. Neural networks are currently the best way for a computer to infer human like knowledge about the real world. To make distinctions and to detect things which might be hard for a human to detect.
timmytokyo 2y ago
I wonder why so many people are confused about what AI is (and what it's capable of). Could it have anything to do with the snake oil being peddled by Sam Altman and the media hype machine surrounding him? It was only a couple years ago when Blake Lemoine was (rightly) ridiculed for seeing sentience in a chat bot. Now everyone is Blake Lemoine. Waiting for the next AI winter to put all this nonsense to rest...
- kylebenzle 2y ago
  I agree. Maybe long covid has taken a toll on people's ability to use logic. But seriously, seeing people's confusion about AI is what it was like watching people in 2001 get excited about bombing Iraq for "getting them back." People in groups are INCREASING and INCREDIBLY dumb.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  Yes, I think so too. People peddling neural networks as being the end of the world mostly just want an advertising machine for their chat bots. Neural networks do not need to prove themselves anymore, for a vast amount of problems they are the single best way to approach them. Even if chat bots never get better from here on, neural networks aren't going away.

falloutx 2y ago

I keep seeing this argument that there is value out there, but for normal people all we are seeing is spam, cute ai cat pics on different social medias, can you please give a few examples of fields/problems where AI has been really helpful.

kalupa 2y ago
A solution in search of a problem
JohnFen 2y ago
I work on ML networks used for industrial control systems that characterize defects in the product and determine what to do about them. Not what normal people think of when they hear "AI", but it's not really much different from what LLMs are built on. We've been selling these systems for a decade or so now.
Out_of_Characte 2y ago
Any problem that has a large range of inputs and a large range of outputs with many possible permutations inbetween. Yes, you could use specialised algoritms but why not let the AI design such thing? It might be better than you.
goodside 2y ago
Machine translation is valuable and it’s all neural these days.
scotty79 2y ago
Protein folding. Drug candidate discovery.
tarr11 2y ago
Clinical machine learning for cancer diagnosis is one promising area https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(23)00094-6.pdf https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(23)00094-6.pdf
NathanKP 2y ago
Generative AI chat is incredibly useful for learning, especially tasks that require a lot of inline learning such as software engineering. I use generative AI chat constantly, because it is basically a Stack Overflow that is near instant with it's answers and can debug error messages extremely well. I don't even have to leave my code editor if I install the extension in my IDE. And with an IDE extension it can be aware of the actual context of my codebase to the point where it can write code samples that reference my own methods and variables. It's incredibly helpful. I've seen and used a lot of different learning techniques over the years. I started out learning coding from physical books. Then it was online bulletin boards and forums, and Google. But AI agents and chat have replaced almost all of that now. I rarely waste my time on Google anymore when I can get more relevant answers, faster, right in my IDE. Sure there is the occasional hallucination, but its not that much worse than terrible answers on Stack Overflow, or junk blogs and outdated docs that Google surfaces because someone SEOed the hell out of them.
- Slyfox33 2y ago
  "Occasional hallucination" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.
  - alan-hn 2y ago
    Perhaps if it was a research context sure, but for the most part I've found GPT4 to do a good job on small to medium size chunks of coding
  - rusticpenn 2y ago
    Less hallucination than some of my students in their presentations
- JohnFen 2y ago
  Honestly, I have found LLMs to be much inferior to my usual methods for this sort of use case. So much so that I've stopped using them. I am fascinated by how different people have such different experiences with these systems. A study into what the difference between the "best thing since sliced bread" camp and the "meh" camp is would be very interesting.
kylebenzle 2y ago
You must be kidding, ALL algorithmic trading uses ML models, the VAST MAJORITY of money being made and traded is on the back of ML right now. Are there really people in tech today that don't understand how much ML has taken over? Lol, you might be talking about chatgpt specifically, which is kinda dumb.
- 11101010001100 2y ago
  Fancy statistics is nothing new.
constantcrying 2y ago
>I keep seeing this argument that there is value out there I am sure that every person with significant hearing problems greatly appreciates auto generated subtitles. Surely some people enjoy having access to voice commands. Having translation tools which are reasonably good at inferring context is a great help if you want to communicate with a person who has no shared language. Having the ability to do some automated screening for abnormality can definitely help in manufacturing, same for medical imaging where a computer might point out to a doctor that something warrants a second look can be helpful. Cars being able to detect pedestrians and cyclists, surely has saved many lives already. I could go on, but this is what I mean with people conflating "chat bots", with the entire range of applications for neutral networks. Neural networks are currently the best way for a computer to infer human like knowledge about the real world. To make distinctions and to detect things which might be hard for a human to detect.

timmytokyo 2y ago

I wonder why so many people are confused about what AI is (and what it's capable of). Could it have anything to do with the snake oil being peddled by Sam Altman and the media hype machine surrounding him? It was only a couple years ago when Blake Lemoine was (rightly) ridiculed for seeing sentience in a chat bot. Now everyone is Blake Lemoine. Waiting for the next AI winter to put all this nonsense to rest...

kylebenzle 2y ago
I agree. Maybe long covid has taken a toll on people's ability to use logic. But seriously, seeing people's confusion about AI is what it was like watching people in 2001 get excited about bombing Iraq for "getting them back." People in groups are INCREASING and INCREDIBLY dumb.
constantcrying 2y ago
Yes, I think so too. People peddling neural networks as being the end of the world mostly just want an advertising machine for their chat bots. Neural networks do not need to prove themselves anymore, for a vast amount of problems they are the single best way to approach them. Even if chat bots never get better from here on, neural networks aren't going away.