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They made a computer program that can follow instructions in plain english. That's been a goal of computer science since the 60s, and I wasn't sure I was going

They made a computer program that can follow instructions in plain english. That's been a goal of computer science since the 60s, and I wasn't sure I was going to see it in my lifetime. This is more incredible than people give credit.

alexchamberlain 2y ago
I think GenAI is incredible in a lot of ways. I think for me it's frustrating that GenAI is currently being used in a way that largely regurgitates and hallucinates information, rather than aids a computer to follow instructions in plain English. For example, at least earlier versions of GenAI, when you asked it a question, it would make up an answer to that question using the knowledge in the training data. That's why we saw limitations on what events the AI knew about, for example. It would be great to see the AI understand the question, query a knowledge base for the answer and then rephrase that answer in English instead. I believe, though I've mostly kept out of the state of the art here, that's the direction it's going in, and I think if that's the case, the confidence in the AI will go up. If we can in parallel, decrease the horrendous amounts of energy being used to run the models, then maybe some of the detractors will start to turn?
weMadeThat 2y ago
OPINION: why is it incredible? we followed a bunch of lists of laws until we got ELIZA on virtual steroids ... after we cracked some milestones in hardware development. people work towards that. money is put into that. we'd have cancer solved if the same amount of people and money flowed into the entangled fields. next step is digital steroids (signal processing) and the physical level once again. software-wise, the current and next generations of coders won't do anything "incredible" anymore. too few approaches on the playing field, no indie thinkers, and the capital is literally dumb. (enforced) conformity has too many downsides that can only be balanced via variety in the wide wild; but that means cumulative competition, which was handled via sabotage ( a good analogy is doping in sports, US influence and the actually incredible cognitive & logical weakness as well as the cowardice of almost the entire rest of the world ) so I cannot agree, people give too much credit indeed.
- RareBean 2y ago
  Responses like this tickle me because they make clear there’s a batch of human beings who have just a profoundly different experience with LLMs than I do. I see these things and think, this is incredible, machines seem to be approximating or emulating conscious thought. There must be so much we can learn about ourselves, and so much they can do. You see the same thing and say meh, useless pattern matching, what’s the point, spend the money elsewhere. I wonder why we have this different perspective? I’ve seen these two reactions again and again—I suspect they evince two different worldviews, but I don’t know what the correlates are. I don’t think it’s techno optimism/pessimism, because I’m profoundly worried about what happens to us. It’s not purely an age thing—I’m not young. I see it on here all the time so I don’t think it’s field of work. So what is it, I wonder?
  - juliushuijnk 2y ago
    My hypothesis; it's people who believe in a just world. That think value and wisdom need to come from effort and/or pain. Potential litmus test; They like videoclips from Coldplay where every frame is drawn with real crayons. Then it's hard to value a machine that can not feel pain or effort and just generates. It's not fair it didn't have to suffer, and then flip the arrow to say, therefore it's not valuable. Happy to becorrected. I'm also very curious what mental models are behind such big differences in perspectives.
    - RareBean 2y ago
      This is interesting! So to some, perhaps, the creator, intent and process matter as much as—if not more than—the output. The “becoming” over the “being.”
    - chefandy 2y ago
      Nope. There’s a lot— a lot— written on artistic process and intention. What art is and what it means is a deep philosophical topic that has been pulled apart for millennia. The sheer arrogance of nearly the entire tech world reducing the value of the artistic process to a few simple logical business friendly ideas using a few a priori thought experiments while disregarding the existing philosophy on the matter is the sort of thing making the tech industry so deeply unpopular right now.

alexchamberlain 2y ago

I think GenAI is incredible in a lot of ways. I think for me it's frustrating that GenAI is currently being used in a way that largely regurgitates and hallucinates information, rather than aids a computer to follow instructions in plain English. For example, at least earlier versions of GenAI, when you asked it a question, it would make up an answer to that question using the knowledge in the training data. That's why we saw limitations on what events the AI knew about, for example. It would be great to see the AI understand the question, query a knowledge base for the answer and then rephrase that answer in English instead. I believe, though I've mostly kept out of the state of the art here, that's the direction it's going in, and I think if that's the case, the confidence in the AI will go up. If we can in parallel, decrease the horrendous amounts of energy being used to run the models, then maybe some of the detractors will start to turn?

weMadeThat 2y ago

OPINION: why is it incredible? we followed a bunch of lists of laws until we got ELIZA on virtual steroids ... after we cracked some milestones in hardware development. people work towards that. money is put into that. we'd have cancer solved if the same amount of people and money flowed into the entangled fields. next step is digital steroids (signal processing) and the physical level once again. software-wise, the current and next generations of coders won't do anything "incredible" anymore. too few approaches on the playing field, no indie thinkers, and the capital is literally dumb. (enforced) conformity has too many downsides that can only be balanced via variety in the wide wild; but that means cumulative competition, which was handled via sabotage ( a good analogy is doping in sports, US influence and the actually incredible cognitive & logical weakness as well as the cowardice of almost the entire rest of the world ) so I cannot agree, people give too much credit indeed.

RareBean 2y ago
Responses like this tickle me because they make clear there’s a batch of human beings who have just a profoundly different experience with LLMs than I do. I see these things and think, this is incredible, machines seem to be approximating or emulating conscious thought. There must be so much we can learn about ourselves, and so much they can do. You see the same thing and say meh, useless pattern matching, what’s the point, spend the money elsewhere. I wonder why we have this different perspective? I’ve seen these two reactions again and again—I suspect they evince two different worldviews, but I don’t know what the correlates are. I don’t think it’s techno optimism/pessimism, because I’m profoundly worried about what happens to us. It’s not purely an age thing—I’m not young. I see it on here all the time so I don’t think it’s field of work. So what is it, I wonder?
- juliushuijnk 2y ago
  My hypothesis; it's people who believe in a just world. That think value and wisdom need to come from effort and/or pain. Potential litmus test; They like videoclips from Coldplay where every frame is drawn with real crayons. Then it's hard to value a machine that can not feel pain or effort and just generates. It's not fair it didn't have to suffer, and then flip the arrow to say, therefore it's not valuable. Happy to becorrected. I'm also very curious what mental models are behind such big differences in perspectives.
  - RareBean 2y ago
    This is interesting! So to some, perhaps, the creator, intent and process matter as much as—if not more than—the output. The “becoming” over the “being.”
  - chefandy 2y ago
    Nope. There’s a lot— a lot— written on artistic process and intention. What art is and what it means is a deep philosophical topic that has been pulled apart for millennia. The sheer arrogance of nearly the entire tech world reducing the value of the artistic process to a few simple logical business friendly ideas using a few a priori thought experiments while disregarding the existing philosophy on the matter is the sort of thing making the tech industry so deeply unpopular right now.