3 ms·

It's a valid term that is worth introducing to the layperson IMO. Let them know how the magic works, and how it doesn't.

adastra22 1y ago
Machine learning is only part of how an LLM agent works though. An essential part, but only a part.
- sdenton4 1y ago
  I see a fair amount of bullshit in the LLM space though, where even cursory consideration would connect the methods back to well-known principles in ML (and even statistics!) to measure model quality and progress. There's a lot of 'woo, it's new! we don't know how to measure it exactly but we think it's groundbreaking!' which is simply wrong. From where I sit, the generative models provide more flexibility but tend to underperform on any particular task relative to a targeted machine learning effort, once you actually do the work on comparative evaluation.
  - adastra22 1y ago
    I think we have a vocabulary problem here, because I am having a hard time understanding what you are trying to say. You appear to be comparing apples to oranges. A generation task is not a categorization task. Machine learning solves categorization problems. Generative AI uses model trained by machine learning methods, but in a very different architecture to solve generative problems. Completely different and incomparable application domain.
    - sdenton4 1y ago
      And yet, people very often find themselves using generative models for categorization and information retrieval tasks...
    - ainch 1y ago
      I think you're overstating the distinction between ML and generation - plenty of ML methods involve generative models. Even basic linear regression with a squared loss can also be framed as a generative model derived by assuming Gaussian noise. Probabilistic PCA, HMMs, GMMs etc... generation has been a core part of ML for over 20 years.
IshKebab 1y ago
How does "it's called machine learning not AI" help anyone know how it works? It's just a fancier sounding name.
- hnuser123456 1y ago
  Because if they're curious, they can look up (or ask an "AI") about machine learning, rather than just AI, and learn more about the capabilities and difficulties and mechanics of how it works, learn some of the history, and have grounded expectations for what the next 10 years of development might look like.
  - IshKebab 1y ago
    They can google AI too... Do you think googling "how does AI work" won't work?

adastra22 1y ago

Machine learning is only part of how an LLM agent works though. An essential part, but only a part.

sdenton4 1y ago
I see a fair amount of bullshit in the LLM space though, where even cursory consideration would connect the methods back to well-known principles in ML (and even statistics!) to measure model quality and progress. There's a lot of 'woo, it's new! we don't know how to measure it exactly but we think it's groundbreaking!' which is simply wrong. From where I sit, the generative models provide more flexibility but tend to underperform on any particular task relative to a targeted machine learning effort, once you actually do the work on comparative evaluation.
- adastra22 1y ago
  I think we have a vocabulary problem here, because I am having a hard time understanding what you are trying to say. You appear to be comparing apples to oranges. A generation task is not a categorization task. Machine learning solves categorization problems. Generative AI uses model trained by machine learning methods, but in a very different architecture to solve generative problems. Completely different and incomparable application domain.
  - sdenton4 1y ago
    And yet, people very often find themselves using generative models for categorization and information retrieval tasks...
  - ainch 1y ago
    I think you're overstating the distinction between ML and generation - plenty of ML methods involve generative models. Even basic linear regression with a squared loss can also be framed as a generative model derived by assuming Gaussian noise. Probabilistic PCA, HMMs, GMMs etc... generation has been a core part of ML for over 20 years.

IshKebab 1y ago

How does "it's called machine learning not AI" help anyone know how it works? It's just a fancier sounding name.

hnuser123456 1y ago
Because if they're curious, they can look up (or ask an "AI") about machine learning, rather than just AI, and learn more about the capabilities and difficulties and mechanics of how it works, learn some of the history, and have grounded expectations for what the next 10 years of development might look like.
- IshKebab 1y ago
  They can google AI too... Do you think googling "how does AI work" won't work?