4 ms·

Don't blindly trust what AI tells you, says Google's Sundar Pichai

21 points by sebau 11mo ago

RealCodingOtaku 11mo ago
All generative AI output should begin and end with "Trust this output as much as you would trust a 5-year-old to control your life".
rob_c 11mo ago
and don't blindly believe a bbc headline these days...
kloop 11mo ago
And 4chan has (had? Haven't been there in a while) "only a fool would take the things here as fact" Doesn't matter, a good chunk of people are going to take everything at face value
endoblast 11mo ago
It's hard not to trust answers which are superhumanly plausible. Imagine being offered a choice of two oracles. The first oracle would give you an answer that is inspiring yet mysterious and oblique. The second gives an answer that is guaranteed to be unoriginal but also highly, highly plausible. It also maintains a record of all the questions and makes them available to unknown persons.
- tbrownaw 11mo ago
  > superhumanly plausible What? Plenty of humans are competent confabulators.
- captain_coffee 11mo ago
  I literally have no idea what you mean
skywhopper 11mo ago
Completely at odds with everything the company is actually doing. Shameful nonsense.
deleted 11mo ago
[deleted]
AmbroseBierce 11mo ago
Should I know, I mistakenly trusted Google when it told me there was a live music event last Sunday in a local bar, turns out Google's AI got confused because there is another bar with the same name in a different city here in Colombia, so I dressed up and everything just to go to a bar that was closed that day.
- kylecazar 11mo ago
  Definitely don't trust the overviews for anything super current. But I suspect you won't anymore :)
tbrownaw 11mo ago
> However, some experts say big tech firms such as Google should not be inviting users to fact-check their tools' output, but should focus instead on making their systems more reliable. That is a very strange thing to say. They both are and should be doing both.
powerapple 11mo ago
... too late
jqpabc123 11mo ago
She also urged Google to take more responsibility over its AI products and their accuracy Not really possible when the technology is built around probability. It is simply *not* deterministic. The results are based on a roll of the dice. They lack consistency. Ask the same question in a slightly different way or at different time and get a different answer. And not just different wording but also different meaning. Would you store food in a refrigerator that might *not* keep it from spoiling? Marketing such a product would create a liability issue --- and I expect the same for AI. The fact that we're investing $ trillions in such a product will not end well.
dmvjs 11mo ago
should we blindly trust what he says
- gushie 11mo ago
  Not sure, let me go ask AI
josefritzishere 11mo ago
You can bioil this down to "Don't trust AI."
add-sub-mul-div 11mo ago
If trusting the AI has brought us to this, of what use was the AI?
lefty2 11mo ago
If it's untrustworthy, why do they prevent us from disabling "AI overview"?

21 points by sebau 11mo ago

All generative AI output should begin and end with "Trust this output as much as you would trust a 5-year-old to control your life".

rob_c 11mo ago

and don't blindly believe a bbc headline these days...

kloop 11mo ago

And 4chan has (had? Haven't been there in a while) "only a fool would take the things here as fact" Doesn't matter, a good chunk of people are going to take everything at face value

endoblast 11mo ago

It's hard not to trust answers which are superhumanly plausible. Imagine being offered a choice of two oracles. The first oracle would give you an answer that is inspiring yet mysterious and oblique. The second gives an answer that is guaranteed to be unoriginal but also highly, highly plausible. It also maintains a record of all the questions and makes them available to unknown persons.

tbrownaw 11mo ago
> superhumanly plausible What? Plenty of humans are competent confabulators.
captain_coffee 11mo ago
I literally have no idea what you mean

skywhopper 11mo ago

Completely at odds with everything the company is actually doing. Shameful nonsense.

deleted 11mo ago

[deleted]

AmbroseBierce 11mo ago

Should I know, I mistakenly trusted Google when it told me there was a live music event last Sunday in a local bar, turns out Google's AI got confused because there is another bar with the same name in a different city here in Colombia, so I dressed up and everything just to go to a bar that was closed that day.

kylecazar 11mo ago
Definitely don't trust the overviews for anything super current. But I suspect you won't anymore :)

tbrownaw 11mo ago

> However, some experts say big tech firms such as Google should not be inviting users to fact-check their tools' output, but should focus instead on making their systems more reliable. That is a very strange thing to say. They both are and should be doing both.

powerapple 11mo ago

... too late

jqpabc123 11mo ago

She also urged Google to take more responsibility over its AI products and their accuracy Not really possible when the technology is built around probability. It is simply *not* deterministic. The results are based on a roll of the dice. They lack consistency. Ask the same question in a slightly different way or at different time and get a different answer. And not just different wording but also different meaning. Would you store food in a refrigerator that might *not* keep it from spoiling? Marketing such a product would create a liability issue --- and I expect the same for AI. The fact that we're investing $ trillions in such a product will not end well.

dmvjs 11mo ago

should we blindly trust what he says

gushie 11mo ago
Not sure, let me go ask AI

josefritzishere 11mo ago

You can bioil this down to "Don't trust AI."

add-sub-mul-div 11mo ago

If trusting the AI has brought us to this, of what use was the AI?

lefty2 11mo ago

If it's untrustworthy, why do they prevent us from disabling "AI overview"?