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People will say it's marketing but I find Occam's Razor highly favors the theory "they are true believers in AGI/ASI" This seems especially true for Anthropic

People will say it's marketing but I find Occam's Razor highly favors the theory "they are true believers in AGI/ASI" This seems especially true for Anthropic employees.

moshun 14d ago
Wouldn’t Occam’s razor say that the people speaking are highly motivated to continue being paid? Relying on their fear of future outcomes seems to be misplaced to judge the honesty of their statements.
- howunfortunate 14d ago
  > continue being paid What I mean by Occam's Razor: There are many assumptions that need to be true to link "they say they're terrified of AI" to "they get paid more / longer", in both their own minds and everyone else's. It's a bit of 4D chess that could go their way, but also could go 100 different ways. In contrast, linking "they say it" to "they believe it" is simple.
  - layer8 14d ago
    Justifying “they believe it” isn’t so simple, however.
  - bheadmaster 13d ago
    Occam's razor is about minimizing the number of assumptions needed for a conclusion. In this case, "they believe it" is the same number of assumptions as "they get paid" - just one.
    - howunfortunate 13d ago
      Saying "I'm terrified of my job" does not normally lead fo getting paid more. Those links are the extra assumptions.
      - bheadmaster 13d ago
        An assumption is something that we can't know, yet assume is true for the sake of coming up with a theory. What we're assuming here is their intention. The implication (or as you said, "the links"), that talking about how dangerous their product is leads to more money, is true regardless of their intention. They create hype, they get money, that's not an assumption, that's an observation. The question is only if their intention was to make money, or are they speaking from the heart. That's the assumption we choose.
        howunfortunate 13d ago
        > They create hype, they get money, that's not an assumption, that's an observation. Because we can't observe the counterfactual world, this actually is just an assumption. Diving their intention also still requires many assumptions about their intermediate beliefs that I find dubious
        deleted 13d ago
        [deleted]
        bheadmaster 13d ago
        > Because we can't observe the counterfactual world, this actually is just an assumption. If you discard all empirical claims categorically due to "inability to observe the counterfactual world", your own reasoning falls apart. Why would you assume people mean what they say? > Diving their intention also still requires many assumptions about their intermediate beliefs that I find dubious You're assuming CEOs of multi-billion dollar companies are honest. I find that dubious.
- talon8635 14d ago
  Occam’s razor doesn’t often explain not taking people for their worst and assuming a conspiracy theory
- ares623 13d ago
  I think it goes beyond money now. A future where AI does not destroy the world means a world where the people who work at these companies are just like everyone else.
chrisXOXO 14d ago
Genuinely, what makes people not believe in coming AGI? I read quite a lot on hackernews but never encounter a strong post/comment against it, apart from the „what is marketing“ discussion. Maybe people don’t bother because everyone is in their trenches, tough I don’t understand how people do not see the AGI coming. What kind of doom, if any, will befall is something different of course. I don’t want to believe there will be AGI in the next 5 years, but it sure is hard not to!
- Yossarrian22 14d ago
  What does AGI mean is probably the sticking point for most. I'm inclined to call it AGI if they can create something currently matching SOTA where there is no difference between training and inference time, i.e. it can continuously learn. Without the model collapsing.
- jltsiren 14d ago
  I think it's because people have different ideas of AGI. Some only expect general intelligence, while others also require weird speculative ideas, such as rapid self-improvement. Right now, what seems to be missing from general intelligence is mostly the ability to learn from experience and continue operating in a useful way well beyond context window size. That might already be technically feasible, but probably not in a cost-effective way.
- afavour 14d ago
  I don’t believe AI progress is a linear line that ends in “AGI”. I think the current way we create LLMs will be improved, and improved, and improved. But an LLM at its core is a predictive chain, not general intelligence.
  - talon8635 14d ago
    Well, we can’t even clearly define consciousness, so who’s to say complex large-input statistical computation isn’t it? I have no idea. Anyone claiming to is hubristic.
    - 14d ago

People will say it's marketing but I find Occam's Razor highly favors the theory "they are true believers in AGI/ASI" This seems especially true for Anthropic employees.

moshun 14d ago

Wouldn’t Occam’s razor say that the people speaking are highly motivated to continue being paid? Relying on their fear of future outcomes seems to be misplaced to judge the honesty of their statements.

howunfortunate 14d ago
> continue being paid What I mean by Occam's Razor: There are many assumptions that need to be true to link "they say they're terrified of AI" to "they get paid more / longer", in both their own minds and everyone else's. It's a bit of 4D chess that could go their way, but also could go 100 different ways. In contrast, linking "they say it" to "they believe it" is simple.
- layer8 14d ago
  Justifying “they believe it” isn’t so simple, however.
- bheadmaster 13d ago
  Occam's razor is about minimizing the number of assumptions needed for a conclusion. In this case, "they believe it" is the same number of assumptions as "they get paid" - just one.
  - howunfortunate 13d ago
    Saying "I'm terrified of my job" does not normally lead fo getting paid more. Those links are the extra assumptions.
    - bheadmaster 13d ago
      An assumption is something that we can't know, yet assume is true for the sake of coming up with a theory. What we're assuming here is their intention. The implication (or as you said, "the links"), that talking about how dangerous their product is leads to more money, is true regardless of their intention. They create hype, they get money, that's not an assumption, that's an observation. The question is only if their intention was to make money, or are they speaking from the heart. That's the assumption we choose.
      - howunfortunate 13d ago
        > They create hype, they get money, that's not an assumption, that's an observation. Because we can't observe the counterfactual world, this actually is just an assumption. Diving their intention also still requires many assumptions about their intermediate beliefs that I find dubious
        deleted 13d ago
        [deleted]
        bheadmaster 13d ago
        > Because we can't observe the counterfactual world, this actually is just an assumption. If you discard all empirical claims categorically due to "inability to observe the counterfactual world", your own reasoning falls apart. Why would you assume people mean what they say? > Diving their intention also still requires many assumptions about their intermediate beliefs that I find dubious You're assuming CEOs of multi-billion dollar companies are honest. I find that dubious.
talon8635 14d ago
Occam’s razor doesn’t often explain not taking people for their worst and assuming a conspiracy theory
ares623 13d ago
I think it goes beyond money now. A future where AI does not destroy the world means a world where the people who work at these companies are just like everyone else.

chrisXOXO 14d ago

Genuinely, what makes people not believe in coming AGI? I read quite a lot on hackernews but never encounter a strong post/comment against it, apart from the „what is marketing“ discussion. Maybe people don’t bother because everyone is in their trenches, tough I don’t understand how people do not see the AGI coming. What kind of doom, if any, will befall is something different of course. I don’t want to believe there will be AGI in the next 5 years, but it sure is hard not to!

Yossarrian22 14d ago
What does AGI mean is probably the sticking point for most. I'm inclined to call it AGI if they can create something currently matching SOTA where there is no difference between training and inference time, i.e. it can continuously learn. Without the model collapsing.
jltsiren 14d ago
I think it's because people have different ideas of AGI. Some only expect general intelligence, while others also require weird speculative ideas, such as rapid self-improvement. Right now, what seems to be missing from general intelligence is mostly the ability to learn from experience and continue operating in a useful way well beyond context window size. That might already be technically feasible, but probably not in a cost-effective way.
afavour 14d ago
I don’t believe AI progress is a linear line that ends in “AGI”. I think the current way we create LLMs will be improved, and improved, and improved. But an LLM at its core is a predictive chain, not general intelligence.
- talon8635 14d ago
  Well, we can’t even clearly define consciousness, so who’s to say complex large-input statistical computation isn’t it? I have no idea. Anyone claiming to is hubristic.
  - 14d ago