5 ms·

I am reminded of Veritasium: What Everyone Gets Wrong About AI and Learning (original video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xS68sl2D70 https://www.youtube.com/

by btilly 4mo ago

I am reminded of Veritasium: What Everyone Gets Wrong About AI and Learning (original video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xS68sl2D70 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xS68sl2D70) from a year ago. "The world is full of heavy things, and yet most of us aren't ripped." AI is an opportunity. On the one hand, it can be used to let our minds and social lives atrophy. On the other hand, it is an opportunity to help our minds grow. Most people will make the lazy choice. But you can choose to do otherwise. Take, for example, speeches. I do not let AI write my speeches. But my speeches are better for having been critiqued by AI. But the result is still my speech. My thoughts, my ideas, my words, and my meaning. Just improved with rounds of feedback about where it fell flat, where I was likely to lose people, and so on. Feedback that I had to fix. So do not let AI write your speeches. But do use it to push yourself harder.

cstever 4mo ago
>Take, for example, speeches. I do not let AI write my speeches. But my speeches are better for having been critiqued by AI. But the result is still my speech. My thoughts, my ideas, my words, and my meaning. Just improved with rounds of feedback about where it fell flat, where I was likely to lose people, and so on. Feedback that I had to fix. > So do not let AI write your speeches. But do use it to push yourself harder. This used to be the job of our friends, families, and coworkers: To push us harder. I think we are losing something.
- btilly 4mo ago
  Odd. I never had any friends, families, or coworkers who were willing to be available for a dozen rough drafts. I've only had ones who were willing to talk during the idea stage, or after it was closer to a final speech. For me, AI gives me feedback at places that I wouldn't have received it before. It does not replace the human feedback that I still look for.
  - cstever 4mo ago
    Less about the draft/writing and more about human interaction on all levels. I don't see how AI becoming a mentor or a coach to push me harder is helpful in the long run. I would be missing out on opportunity to learn from real life experience. I'd rather listen to my brother or my coworker or whomever human, pick their brain, riff, dig deeper, understand their perspective from life experiences and actual meaningful thought and moral compass than have AI (take intelligence with a grain of salt) influence me.
  - beej71 4mo ago
    I just acted as an amateur editor for my friend's new novel. It took a long time to get through with hundreds or thousands of minor corrections and notes. I'm certain I outperformed an LLM for a lot of that in terms of quality.
    - llbeansandrice 4mo ago
      You don’t need to outperform an LLM tho. The experience of working on it together is incredibly meaningful. I generally reject this litmus test that someone has to be “better” and an LLM in order for the human interaction and effort to be worthwhile. You’re now part of the journey of this novel. They will thank you in the acknowledgements section. It’s this foundation upon which our lives, communities, culture and societies are built. You do not need to be better. This act you did for a friend is not suddenly pointless and meaningless upon the release of the next model.
      - the_af 4mo ago
        > You’re now part of the journey of this novel. They will thank you in the acknowledgements section. It’s this foundation upon which our lives, communities, culture and societies are built. Beautifully said. I think this is what the poem is all about. Some people (bizarrely, in my opinion) sometimes focus on whether AI is good enough or whether it lets them be more productive with their projects, in some mad rush to optimize life. But I think that's a red herring, and I think so does the poem's author.
- elliotbnvl 4mo ago
  Why can’t they continue to do so? If anything an underlying truth about humanity is being exposed: we take the easy way out far more often than we’d like to admit. Perhaps, this truth being made explicit is a wakeup call that will teach us the value of that hard work anew. After all, nothing the author’s written isn’t also true about Google, but nobody realized how bad of a mistake that was.
  - jimbokun 4mo ago
    > Why can’t they continue to do so? Because we are talking to the AIs instead of talking to them. > After all, nothing the author’s written isn’t also true about Google, but nobody realized how bad of a mistake that was. There was plenty written about how Google was making us dumber because we didn't need to remember anything any more.
    - lanfeust6 4mo ago
      > instead of Citation needed. People did not stop talking to family, friends and colleagues just because they're able to leverage LLMs.
      - dragonwriter 4mo ago
        > People did not stop talking to family, friends and colleagues just because they're able to leverage LLMs. Which people? There are clearly people who did—some with catastrophic, newsworthy results, but presumably more without.
      - jimbokun 4mo ago
        No, they stopped talking to family, friends and colleagues because they got addicted to social media algorithms.
        lanfeust6 4mo ago
        and other forms of multi-media before that.
- vitally3643 4mo ago
  > This used to be the job of our friends, families, and coworkers: To push us harder. I think we are losing something. No, and if you think that, your friends, family, and coworkers probably don't like you that much. You can push yourself harder for someone else, but it is and has always been something you do. Making it everyone else's problem to improve you makes you a codependent asshole. You can and should find purpose and meaning, even motivation and inspiration in others. It is not anyone's "job" to make you a better person. That's precisely the kind of thinking that's landed us in the mess we're in. Abdication of personal responsibility. Shifting blame and responsibility from yourself onto anyone nearby. It is your job to make yourself a better person for the people around you. Not the other way around.
  - itsalwaysgood 4mo ago
    This is good stuff. At the end of the day, we all have finite time. How we choose to spend that time is a personal matter. Some say we're losing our humanity: that can be seen as good or bad, depending on whether or not you think you are more useful than someone else.
  - Arainach 4mo ago
    There's no abdication of personal responsibility. To be the kind of person who wants to constantly improve, it is incredibly important to surround yourself with similar people. You will always grow faster spending time with someone who says "couldn't you also try X" than someone who always says "that's good enough, why don't you relax and watch some TV".
  - cstever 4mo ago
    It's not about making them be responsible for me or offloading my problems or them making me better. It's about community. And real people often like to help. If your circle doesn't, find someone who does. Find a community. I enjoy helping people be better, to reach new heights in their personal lives. It's about relationships. My thoughts aren't about "abdication of personal responsibility" or "Shifting blame". It's about humanity and people and community.
  - inanutshellus 4mo ago
- lanfeust6 4mo ago
  You could make the same argument for the internet pre-LLM; it could be relied upon over immediate connections. It's also reminiscent of Socrates's skepticism of written text over oral tradition. Speeches haven't gone away, videos are more popular than ever, and consulting within our social circle will continue on. I think there's something to be said about there being an isolationist phenomenon in society that might be contributing in part to low fertility, but that significantly pre-dates LLMs. It's easy and convenient for us to be alone - people create friction. We've been entertained by the TV set for a century now. That said, we remain social creatures and enduringly have a need to be with others, at least to some extent.
- Aurornis 4mo ago
  It’s not mutually exclusive. LLMs aren’t doing the same job as social encouragement to do better. There’s also limit to how much you can expect coworkers, friends, and family to review your work. An LLM can act as a rubber duck debug partner or a reviewer hundreds of times per time. You cannot have friends and family at your service all day.
- revolvingthrow 4mo ago
  I’m not meeting with friends to work on our speeches, I’m meeting friends to do friends stuff. Go join toastmasters if you want to do work stuff as a fun pasttime.
chasebank 4mo ago
Every new technology promises to fundamentally change learning, education, personal growth and ends up being used in the laziest way by 99% of people. Radio, TV, internet, now AI. Eating right and exercise or GLP1? I agree with the sentiment, however, by definition most people will not follow your advice.
quadrature 4mo ago
> Most people will make the lazy choice. But you can choose to do otherwise I'd like for it to be a choice. AI is injected into search now, when you install vscode they have a prompt input sitting there and they nudge you to use it. Of course you can opt out of this stuff but it has become the default. As someone teaching their nephew how to code i really want him to struggle and exercise his problem solving skills instead of having every touchpoint offer him an instant answer.
the_af 4mo ago
> So do not let AI write your speeches. But do use it to push yourself harder. Isn't the point of the poem that you should, instead, ask a human? You'll get sidetracked and drawn into unrelated conversations, sure, but that's what it means to be human. Trying to optimize these distractions away means you deprive yourself from human interactions. And why optimize anyway, what's the end goal? That's my take from the poem, anyway.
- runarberg 4mo ago
  That was what I was thinking when the conversation went to Derek of Veritasium. This poem was centered around humanity and our shared experiences as humans. Derek is consistently obsessed with technology, and will center every conversation around how technology will enhance the human experience (by which he probably means capitalism to be honest). Taking the conversation to Derek of Veritasium feels like after having watched Koyaanisqatsi your mind goes to James Burke and how the invention of the plow has improved how we experience human society.
  - btilly 4mo ago
    If that is what you think of Derek, then you really don't understand Derek. The video that I linked to is over an hour on why new technologies never transform education. He has a number of videos that critique what capitalism has lead big industries to. For example he has one on Monsanto's war on farming, another on how forever chemicals are poisoning us, and a third on how short-sightedness on protecting the health of rubber trees could be an existential threat to civilization. Your model of him says that he should have done none of those things. The fact that he did is strong evidence that you've got a cardboard cutout that you're using as a strawman. Because it's a convenient punching bag. And not because it matches a real human very well.
    - runarberg 4mo ago
      James Burke would also criticize technology. But compared to Koyaanisqatsi James Burke’s critiques feel very tame indeed. While James Burke would critique bad implementations of technology, or point at a place where technology was detrimental, Koyaanisqatsi would say: “humanity has lost its way in pursuit of technology”. Reading this poem I saw a similar critique of AI as Koyaanisqatsi critiqued technology. And any advocate of this technology for whichever purpose, even the ones who occupationally critique some aspect of it, feel very tame in comparison, and off the mark. I put my views of Derik in parentheses on purpose. I wanted to share my bias towards him, while also saying: “This is besides the point”.
deleted 4mo ago
[deleted]
ignu 4mo ago
That's exactly how I used "AI"... to augment my thinking and writing process. On it's face, it seemed insane to not utilize this instant resource. After a year I could no longer write for shit. Now we're getting studies coining words like "deskilling" and "cognitive surrender", and I felt both acutely and personally despite guardrails I thought could keep me from those traps. Now I don't even write near a computer.
kingleopold 4mo ago
PE channel as quote is great work from you,
keybored 4mo ago
> AI is an opportunity. On the one hand, it can be used to let our minds and social lives atrophy. On the other hand, it is an opportunity to help our minds grow. Most people will make the lazy choice. But you can choose to do otherwise. Something that has a worse outcome for most people is worse for society. Yeah it might be some antisocial hustler opportunity to get a leg up on everyone else. Huzzah. Can SV Tech just make something that makes things better for society overall? No, impossible.
archagon 4mo ago
I mean, AI is necessarily pushing your speech towards its baked-in human soup average of what a speech should sound like. That's not a good thing unless you're doing a corporate presentation. Personally, I find the idea of sounding even slightly more like ChatGPT repulsive. Would much rather just leave the gnarly bits in.

by btilly 4mo ago

cstever 4mo ago

>Take, for example, speeches. I do not let AI write my speeches. But my speeches are better for having been critiqued by AI. But the result is still my speech. My thoughts, my ideas, my words, and my meaning. Just improved with rounds of feedback about where it fell flat, where I was likely to lose people, and so on. Feedback that I had to fix. > So do not let AI write your speeches. But do use it to push yourself harder. This used to be the job of our friends, families, and coworkers: To push us harder. I think we are losing something.

btilly 4mo ago
Odd. I never had any friends, families, or coworkers who were willing to be available for a dozen rough drafts. I've only had ones who were willing to talk during the idea stage, or after it was closer to a final speech. For me, AI gives me feedback at places that I wouldn't have received it before. It does not replace the human feedback that I still look for.
- cstever 4mo ago
  Less about the draft/writing and more about human interaction on all levels. I don't see how AI becoming a mentor or a coach to push me harder is helpful in the long run. I would be missing out on opportunity to learn from real life experience. I'd rather listen to my brother or my coworker or whomever human, pick their brain, riff, dig deeper, understand their perspective from life experiences and actual meaningful thought and moral compass than have AI (take intelligence with a grain of salt) influence me.
- beej71 4mo ago
  I just acted as an amateur editor for my friend's new novel. It took a long time to get through with hundreds or thousands of minor corrections and notes. I'm certain I outperformed an LLM for a lot of that in terms of quality.
  - llbeansandrice 4mo ago
    You don’t need to outperform an LLM tho. The experience of working on it together is incredibly meaningful. I generally reject this litmus test that someone has to be “better” and an LLM in order for the human interaction and effort to be worthwhile. You’re now part of the journey of this novel. They will thank you in the acknowledgements section. It’s this foundation upon which our lives, communities, culture and societies are built. You do not need to be better. This act you did for a friend is not suddenly pointless and meaningless upon the release of the next model.
    - the_af 4mo ago
      > You’re now part of the journey of this novel. They will thank you in the acknowledgements section. It’s this foundation upon which our lives, communities, culture and societies are built. Beautifully said. I think this is what the poem is all about. Some people (bizarrely, in my opinion) sometimes focus on whether AI is good enough or whether it lets them be more productive with their projects, in some mad rush to optimize life. But I think that's a red herring, and I think so does the poem's author.
elliotbnvl 4mo ago
Why can’t they continue to do so? If anything an underlying truth about humanity is being exposed: we take the easy way out far more often than we’d like to admit. Perhaps, this truth being made explicit is a wakeup call that will teach us the value of that hard work anew. After all, nothing the author’s written isn’t also true about Google, but nobody realized how bad of a mistake that was.
- jimbokun 4mo ago
  > Why can’t they continue to do so? Because we are talking to the AIs instead of talking to them. > After all, nothing the author’s written isn’t also true about Google, but nobody realized how bad of a mistake that was. There was plenty written about how Google was making us dumber because we didn't need to remember anything any more.
  - lanfeust6 4mo ago
    > instead of Citation needed. People did not stop talking to family, friends and colleagues just because they're able to leverage LLMs.
    - dragonwriter 4mo ago
      > People did not stop talking to family, friends and colleagues just because they're able to leverage LLMs. Which people? There are clearly people who did—some with catastrophic, newsworthy results, but presumably more without.
    - jimbokun 4mo ago
      No, they stopped talking to family, friends and colleagues because they got addicted to social media algorithms.
      - lanfeust6 4mo ago
        and other forms of multi-media before that.
vitally3643 4mo ago
> This used to be the job of our friends, families, and coworkers: To push us harder. I think we are losing something. No, and if you think that, your friends, family, and coworkers probably don't like you that much. You can push yourself harder for someone else, but it is and has always been something you do. Making it everyone else's problem to improve you makes you a codependent asshole. You can and should find purpose and meaning, even motivation and inspiration in others. It is not anyone's "job" to make you a better person. That's precisely the kind of thinking that's landed us in the mess we're in. Abdication of personal responsibility. Shifting blame and responsibility from yourself onto anyone nearby. It is your job to make yourself a better person for the people around you. Not the other way around.
- itsalwaysgood 4mo ago
  This is good stuff. At the end of the day, we all have finite time. How we choose to spend that time is a personal matter. Some say we're losing our humanity: that can be seen as good or bad, depending on whether or not you think you are more useful than someone else.
- Arainach 4mo ago
  There's no abdication of personal responsibility. To be the kind of person who wants to constantly improve, it is incredibly important to surround yourself with similar people. You will always grow faster spending time with someone who says "couldn't you also try X" than someone who always says "that's good enough, why don't you relax and watch some TV".
- cstever 4mo ago
  It's not about making them be responsible for me or offloading my problems or them making me better. It's about community. And real people often like to help. If your circle doesn't, find someone who does. Find a community. I enjoy helping people be better, to reach new heights in their personal lives. It's about relationships. My thoughts aren't about "abdication of personal responsibility" or "Shifting blame". It's about humanity and people and community.
- inanutshellus 4mo ago
lanfeust6 4mo ago
You could make the same argument for the internet pre-LLM; it could be relied upon over immediate connections. It's also reminiscent of Socrates's skepticism of written text over oral tradition. Speeches haven't gone away, videos are more popular than ever, and consulting within our social circle will continue on. I think there's something to be said about there being an isolationist phenomenon in society that might be contributing in part to low fertility, but that significantly pre-dates LLMs. It's easy and convenient for us to be alone - people create friction. We've been entertained by the TV set for a century now. That said, we remain social creatures and enduringly have a need to be with others, at least to some extent.
Aurornis 4mo ago
It’s not mutually exclusive. LLMs aren’t doing the same job as social encouragement to do better. There’s also limit to how much you can expect coworkers, friends, and family to review your work. An LLM can act as a rubber duck debug partner or a reviewer hundreds of times per time. You cannot have friends and family at your service all day.
revolvingthrow 4mo ago
I’m not meeting with friends to work on our speeches, I’m meeting friends to do friends stuff. Go join toastmasters if you want to do work stuff as a fun pasttime.

chasebank 4mo ago

Every new technology promises to fundamentally change learning, education, personal growth and ends up being used in the laziest way by 99% of people. Radio, TV, internet, now AI. Eating right and exercise or GLP1? I agree with the sentiment, however, by definition most people will not follow your advice.

quadrature 4mo ago

> Most people will make the lazy choice. But you can choose to do otherwise I'd like for it to be a choice. AI is injected into search now, when you install vscode they have a prompt input sitting there and they nudge you to use it. Of course you can opt out of this stuff but it has become the default. As someone teaching their nephew how to code i really want him to struggle and exercise his problem solving skills instead of having every touchpoint offer him an instant answer.

the_af 4mo ago

> So do not let AI write your speeches. But do use it to push yourself harder. Isn't the point of the poem that you should, instead, ask a human? You'll get sidetracked and drawn into unrelated conversations, sure, but that's what it means to be human. Trying to optimize these distractions away means you deprive yourself from human interactions. And why optimize anyway, what's the end goal? That's my take from the poem, anyway.

runarberg 4mo ago
That was what I was thinking when the conversation went to Derek of Veritasium. This poem was centered around humanity and our shared experiences as humans. Derek is consistently obsessed with technology, and will center every conversation around how technology will enhance the human experience (by which he probably means capitalism to be honest). Taking the conversation to Derek of Veritasium feels like after having watched Koyaanisqatsi your mind goes to James Burke and how the invention of the plow has improved how we experience human society.
- btilly 4mo ago
  If that is what you think of Derek, then you really don't understand Derek. The video that I linked to is over an hour on why new technologies never transform education. He has a number of videos that critique what capitalism has lead big industries to. For example he has one on Monsanto's war on farming, another on how forever chemicals are poisoning us, and a third on how short-sightedness on protecting the health of rubber trees could be an existential threat to civilization. Your model of him says that he should have done none of those things. The fact that he did is strong evidence that you've got a cardboard cutout that you're using as a strawman. Because it's a convenient punching bag. And not because it matches a real human very well.
  - runarberg 4mo ago
    James Burke would also criticize technology. But compared to Koyaanisqatsi James Burke’s critiques feel very tame indeed. While James Burke would critique bad implementations of technology, or point at a place where technology was detrimental, Koyaanisqatsi would say: “humanity has lost its way in pursuit of technology”. Reading this poem I saw a similar critique of AI as Koyaanisqatsi critiqued technology. And any advocate of this technology for whichever purpose, even the ones who occupationally critique some aspect of it, feel very tame in comparison, and off the mark. I put my views of Derik in parentheses on purpose. I wanted to share my bias towards him, while also saying: “This is besides the point”.

deleted 4mo ago

[deleted]

ignu 4mo ago

That's exactly how I used "AI"... to augment my thinking and writing process. On it's face, it seemed insane to not utilize this instant resource. After a year I could no longer write for shit. Now we're getting studies coining words like "deskilling" and "cognitive surrender", and I felt both acutely and personally despite guardrails I thought could keep me from those traps. Now I don't even write near a computer.

kingleopold 4mo ago

PE channel as quote is great work from you,

keybored 4mo ago

> AI is an opportunity. On the one hand, it can be used to let our minds and social lives atrophy. On the other hand, it is an opportunity to help our minds grow. Most people will make the lazy choice. But you can choose to do otherwise. Something that has a worse outcome for most people is worse for society. Yeah it might be some antisocial hustler opportunity to get a leg up on everyone else. Huzzah. Can SV Tech just make something that makes things better for society overall? No, impossible.

archagon 4mo ago

I mean, AI is necessarily pushing your speech towards its baked-in human soup average of what a speech should sound like. That's not a good thing unless you're doing a corporate presentation. Personally, I find the idea of sounding even slightly more like ChatGPT repulsive. Would much rather just leave the gnarly bits in.