3 ms·

Are we in a bubble that's going to pop and take a large part of the economy with it? Almost certainly. Does it mean that the AI is a scam? Not really. After all

by usrnm 1y ago

Are we in a bubble that's going to pop and take a large part of the economy with it? Almost certainly. Does it mean that the AI is a scam? Not really. After all, the Internet did not disappear after the dotcom burst, and, actually, almost everything we were promised by the dotcoms became reality at some point.

Palomides 1y ago
"doing everything on the internet" definitely worked out, but I don't see why that implies "GPU accelerated LLMs will replace large swathes of human labor" will also be true
- usrnm 1y ago
  That's not what I'm saying. What dotcoms prove is that some technology can be a bubble and a real technological revolution at the same time, there is no contradiction here. "AI is a bubble and I probably shouldn't invest all my savings in NVDA" is a valid point, "AI is a bubble and therefore stupid and will never work" is not
- cmrdporcupine 1y ago
  If there's anything that can be reliably predicated to be true over multiple decades it's that capitalism will continually seek to reduce labour costs and automate everything. You can bet that even if the specific forms attempted in this interval don't take hold, they will eventually. You and I are too expensive, and have had too much power.
  - andsoitis 1y ago
    > If there's anything that can be reliably predicated to be true over multiple decades it's that capitalism will continually seek to reduce labour costs and automate everything. what about improved life quality? what about an explosion of types of jobs? > You and I are too expensive, and have had too much power. do you think the average citizen (or the collective) have MORE power or LESS power than 100 years ago, than 200 years ago?
    - miltonlost 1y ago
      What about productivity gains going to the top 1%? What about income inequality? Capitalism is not labor friendly in the slightest.
    - cmrdporcupine 1y ago
      I never said anything about life quality, only that automation is an inevitability. What I said vs what you imagined I said are two different things.
      - andsoitis 1y ago
        Fair enough. Maybe I read too much between the lines. Apologies.
    - queenkjuul 1y ago
      Than 100 years ago? Very much might be less, honestly, given modern police, media, and surveillance power and the decimation of labor unions since then.
- illiac786 1y ago
  I disagree on the “doing everything on the internet”. Social network is something we definitely “do” on the internet nowadays but I wouldn’t say that this “worked out”, and we’re only now starting to grasp how badly it’s working. But agreed on the overall meaning of the comment, LLMs promises are still exaggerated.
qsort 1y ago
See, the problem when making predictions is that the timeframe is effectively the prediction. I don't know what will happen. When I saw GPT-3 I thought it was hot garbage and never took it seriously. As a result I now have large error bars about what the future holds. What we got from the Internet was some version of the original promises, on a significantly longer timescale, mostly enabled by technology that didn't exist at the time those promises were made. "Directionally correct" is a euphemism for "wrong".
skeezyboy 1y ago
> almost everything we were promised by the dotcoms became reality at some point. remember the blockchain bubble? used much blockchain lately? are blockchains changing anything?
- tim333 1y ago
  I'm not sure most people took the blockchain hype seriously, and the basic number goes up feature of bitcoin continues.
topaz0 1y ago
Worth noting that the essay acknowledges that there are ways that people use this stuff and actually like it. Saying it's a scam is about those uses being orders of magnitude less valuable than the companies involved (and credulous media) claim, and even orders of magnitude less than the amount of money that they are actively investing in this stuff. Saying it's a bubble is not a claim that it will go away entirely and never be seen again, it's a claim that reality will eventually manifest and result in massive upheaval as companies go bankrupt, valuations plummet, and associated downstream effects.

by usrnm 1y ago

Palomides 1y ago

"doing everything on the internet" definitely worked out, but I don't see why that implies "GPU accelerated LLMs will replace large swathes of human labor" will also be true

usrnm 1y ago
That's not what I'm saying. What dotcoms prove is that some technology can be a bubble and a real technological revolution at the same time, there is no contradiction here. "AI is a bubble and I probably shouldn't invest all my savings in NVDA" is a valid point, "AI is a bubble and therefore stupid and will never work" is not
cmrdporcupine 1y ago
If there's anything that can be reliably predicated to be true over multiple decades it's that capitalism will continually seek to reduce labour costs and automate everything. You can bet that even if the specific forms attempted in this interval don't take hold, they will eventually. You and I are too expensive, and have had too much power.
- andsoitis 1y ago
  > If there's anything that can be reliably predicated to be true over multiple decades it's that capitalism will continually seek to reduce labour costs and automate everything. what about improved life quality? what about an explosion of types of jobs? > You and I are too expensive, and have had too much power. do you think the average citizen (or the collective) have MORE power or LESS power than 100 years ago, than 200 years ago?
  - miltonlost 1y ago
    What about productivity gains going to the top 1%? What about income inequality? Capitalism is not labor friendly in the slightest.
  - cmrdporcupine 1y ago
    I never said anything about life quality, only that automation is an inevitability. What I said vs what you imagined I said are two different things.
    - andsoitis 1y ago
      Fair enough. Maybe I read too much between the lines. Apologies.
  - queenkjuul 1y ago
    Than 100 years ago? Very much might be less, honestly, given modern police, media, and surveillance power and the decimation of labor unions since then.
illiac786 1y ago
I disagree on the “doing everything on the internet”. Social network is something we definitely “do” on the internet nowadays but I wouldn’t say that this “worked out”, and we’re only now starting to grasp how badly it’s working. But agreed on the overall meaning of the comment, LLMs promises are still exaggerated.

qsort 1y ago

See, the problem when making predictions is that the timeframe is effectively the prediction. I don't know what will happen. When I saw GPT-3 I thought it was hot garbage and never took it seriously. As a result I now have large error bars about what the future holds. What we got from the Internet was some version of the original promises, on a significantly longer timescale, mostly enabled by technology that didn't exist at the time those promises were made. "Directionally correct" is a euphemism for "wrong".

skeezyboy 1y ago

> almost everything we were promised by the dotcoms became reality at some point. remember the blockchain bubble? used much blockchain lately? are blockchains changing anything?

tim333 1y ago
I'm not sure most people took the blockchain hype seriously, and the basic number goes up feature of bitcoin continues.

topaz0 1y ago

Worth noting that the essay acknowledges that there are ways that people use this stuff and actually like it. Saying it's a scam is about those uses being orders of magnitude less valuable than the companies involved (and credulous media) claim, and even orders of magnitude less than the amount of money that they are actively investing in this stuff. Saying it's a bubble is not a claim that it will go away entirely and never be seen again, it's a claim that reality will eventually manifest and result in massive upheaval as companies go bankrupt, valuations plummet, and associated downstream effects.