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Nor do most human adults. I’m not being cheeky here because this is an extremely important discussion We need to make a distinction between levels of capabilit

Nor do most human adults. I’m not being cheeky here because this is an extremely important discussion We need to make a distinction between levels of capabilities for independent agents with the capacity to take in information and produce a set of actions 1. Entry level action: Enough capacity to execute a task or set of tasks by implementing written instructions prepared by an expert (machines can do almost 100% of these tasks at this point) 2. Intermediate capacity: Determine what needs to be done from vague requirements, defining tasks with no intermediate specifications and completing those tasks (Current state of GPTs) 3. Expert capacity: Recognizing the context of the situation, Knowing how to define the problem in a way that is appropriate for context, evaluating the options and resources, setting up structures to granularity define the set of resources needed (GPTs can do this in limited and narrow cases) Most humans only act at the first level. This is especially true in work contexts, and almost nobody would be hired if all jobs required level 2 or 3 capacity What I’ve seen over 15 years of being in AI (and leadership generally) is that - as expected - the goalposts for what counts as “AI” always move up the expert chain with no relation to the existing distribution of capabilities of existing agents (humans) This author is measuring GPTs on being consistent and pervasive with superhuman behaviors - but compared to what we measure as the average human capacity these systems are already superhuman. We’re already well past the point that ChatGPT is a more coherent “thinker” than all but the top 1% of all humans. So what is good enough?

onemoresoop 2y ago
> Nor do most human adults. But that's not the point. LLMS are all the rage nowadays. The point is that they do not think/understand what they do and I agree with that point. They statistically predict text but don't really understand anything, at least the way we do. But hold on to your horse, they're still quite useful and cool but not what they're hyped/marketed as.
- AndrewKemendo 2y ago
  The question is, why does anybody care whether or not they think or understand? It’s an artificial distinction given that the majority of actors don’t think or understand so thinking, and understanding isn’t something that society cares about
  - onemoresoop 2y ago
    >The question is, why does anybody care whether or not they think or understand? I can turn that around and ask you why do you not care to know whether a tool is capable of thinking/understanding/reasoning/generalizing etc especially if it's a tool you want add to your toolbox. And I say that as a person who thinks LLMs/genAI are useful for some tasks even if I know they do not think.
    - AndrewKemendo 2y ago
      Should I be asking if my Totota Tundra is conscious? Absurd. Plenty of thinking people out there that aren’t expected to use those capacities, and we don’t consider that relevant, because it’s more than we’re asking for people to demonstrate generally. Bottom line, if you’re asking if your serviette is conscious, something went very wrong
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - onemoresoop 2y ago
        Consciousness is a completely different matter and not what we were talking about.
deafpolygon 2y ago
Gen AI do not understand or think. Full stop. Is there thinking involved in saying: "2 + 2 = 4"? No. It's a 'fact'. That's how these weights work. It's essentially a very complex SQL query. It's only pulling out what's been put into it (weights). Thinking and understanding allows for creation of new information from unrelated information, or even nothing at all. It allows for chained comprehension: i.e. "apple fell to the ground, why?" Gen AI cannot derive the concept of gravity from an apple falling without being 'trained' to.
Juliate 2y ago
> 1. Entry level action: [...] (machines can do almost 100% of these tasks at this point) Haha, not even close. That's true if you take it in a very specific industrial bubble, where you do not _expect/instruct_ people to raise at others capacities, depending on the situation they face. Which often enough breaks/stops the whole process. > Most humans only act at the first level. Very suspicious classist take. That's different than to say that everyone acts at various levels, depending on the context. Some experts are not capable of doing the most basic of cooking or house cleaning, for instance. > We’re already well past the point that ChatGPT is a more coherent “thinker” than all but the top 1% of all humans. [needs citation]. Especially since the tech leaders in the AI industry seem unable to not reduce the world to a small digital box. They would definitely grow up their thinking with some philosophy and humanities. > So what is good enough? The question is not "what is good enough?", it's "what/who is this good for?". That's the basic question for any tech or tool you design/build/have. So far, but for being a compelling and funny toy, whether in text, image, video, sound generation/manipulation, I'm not seeing real world use-cases where I would trust/relate to it more than to something that a real person had done by themselves. Because on one hand, it's not deterministic. And on the other, it's not accountable.

onemoresoop 2y ago

> Nor do most human adults. But that's not the point. LLMS are all the rage nowadays. The point is that they do not think/understand what they do and I agree with that point. They statistically predict text but don't really understand anything, at least the way we do. But hold on to your horse, they're still quite useful and cool but not what they're hyped/marketed as.

AndrewKemendo 2y ago
The question is, why does anybody care whether or not they think or understand? It’s an artificial distinction given that the majority of actors don’t think or understand so thinking, and understanding isn’t something that society cares about
- onemoresoop 2y ago
  >The question is, why does anybody care whether or not they think or understand? I can turn that around and ask you why do you not care to know whether a tool is capable of thinking/understanding/reasoning/generalizing etc especially if it's a tool you want add to your toolbox. And I say that as a person who thinks LLMs/genAI are useful for some tasks even if I know they do not think.
  - AndrewKemendo 2y ago
    Should I be asking if my Totota Tundra is conscious? Absurd. Plenty of thinking people out there that aren’t expected to use those capacities, and we don’t consider that relevant, because it’s more than we’re asking for people to demonstrate generally. Bottom line, if you’re asking if your serviette is conscious, something went very wrong
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - onemoresoop 2y ago
      Consciousness is a completely different matter and not what we were talking about.

deafpolygon 2y ago

Gen AI do not understand or think. Full stop. Is there thinking involved in saying: "2 + 2 = 4"? No. It's a 'fact'. That's how these weights work. It's essentially a very complex SQL query. It's only pulling out what's been put into it (weights). Thinking and understanding allows for creation of new information from unrelated information, or even nothing at all. It allows for chained comprehension: i.e. "apple fell to the ground, why?" Gen AI cannot derive the concept of gravity from an apple falling without being 'trained' to.

Juliate 2y ago

> 1. Entry level action: [...] (machines can do almost 100% of these tasks at this point) Haha, not even close. That's true if you take it in a very specific industrial bubble, where you do not _expect/instruct_ people to raise at others capacities, depending on the situation they face. Which often enough breaks/stops the whole process. > Most humans only act at the first level. Very suspicious classist take. That's different than to say that everyone acts at various levels, depending on the context. Some experts are not capable of doing the most basic of cooking or house cleaning, for instance. > We’re already well past the point that ChatGPT is a more coherent “thinker” than all but the top 1% of all humans. [needs citation]. Especially since the tech leaders in the AI industry seem unable to not reduce the world to a small digital box. They would definitely grow up their thinking with some philosophy and humanities. > So what is good enough? The question is not "what is good enough?", it's "what/who is this good for?". That's the basic question for any tech or tool you design/build/have. So far, but for being a compelling and funny toy, whether in text, image, video, sound generation/manipulation, I'm not seeing real world use-cases where I would trust/relate to it more than to something that a real person had done by themselves. Because on one hand, it's not deterministic. And on the other, it's not accountable.