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Problems that attract smart people

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Re: Problems that attract smart people

#71

Post by joefourier »

chatmasta wrote: post #22
Simran-B wrote: post #6

Does enabling to run LLMs at home really strengthen democracy? People may believe that, but it potentially enables AI to run on any device with a low footprint for surveillance purposes as well, and governments don't even have to pay for the development...

Much of the fear of AI is really a fear of concentrated increase in power of those controlling it. Decentralizing models mitigates that risk by spreading the power amongst a more diffuse population. I don't see how it should be any different from the PC revolution. We've all got a 1970s supercomputer in our pocket now, for better or worse. But it's certainly preferable to only the richest and most powerful having one…

Not exactly the point but current smartphones are comparable to 90s supercomputers in terms of FLOPs - an iPhone 14 can hit 2 TFLOPs whereas ASCI Red achieved 2.38 TFLOPs in 1999. Now the comparison is muddied by the fact that supercomputer GFLOPs were fp64 while modern GPUs are optimised for fp32 (with machine learning going for fp16 and now fp8), and the iPhone probably can’t maintain 2 TFLOPs before getting thermally throttled. But otherwise matching the 90s is far more impressive than the 70s.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#72

Post by photochemsyn »

lliamander wrote: post #65
cevn wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, 'smartness' is meaningless. You can accomplish x task with y practice, applies to any task.

Except that smart people need less y to learn almost any x, which is part of what it means to be smart.

That's also a trainable skill, learning how to learn new concepts quickly. Here is where many people report LLMs like ChatGPT are a huge time-saving boost.

This might also be an either-or situation - i.e. some people specialize in the ability to quickly grasp a wide variety of knowledge at a relatively shallow level, others specialize in in-depth knowledge of a particular subject, and it's impossible to be really good at both.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#73

Post by zikduruqe »

cevn wrote: post #55
photochemsyn wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The very premise that 'smartness' is easily quantifiable is also flawed. Attempting to rank all human minds on some hierarchical scale is going to run into the same problems as with human bodies. Is it better to be able to run the fastest, or to lift the heaviest weights, or to have the best hand-eye coordination when it comes to throwing and catching objects? Will specialization in one area of mental skill inevitabl…

Exactly, 'smartness' is meaningless. You can accomplish x task with y practice, applies to any task.

Smart is knowing botanically a tomato is a fruit.

Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#74

Post by wcedmisten »

zikduruqe wrote: post #73
cevn wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, 'smartness' is meaningless. You can accomplish x task with y practice, applies to any task.

Smart is knowing botanically a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad.

Smart is knowing that Frankenstein isn't the monster. Wisdom is knowing that Frankenstein is the monster.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#75

Post by dang »

ckemere wrote: post #28

The premise of this is ridiculous. The smartest people I know personally and that I'm aware of generally are not attracted by AI. Person 1 was interested in fundamental physics (dark matter) but had to leave physics due to lack of job opportunities. Person 2 is Terrence Tao. Person 3 is Ed Witten, etc etc. This reflects the hubris of the tech world that overestimates its own intelligence....

Let's fix this by taking the superlative out of the title. I've done so now.

The trouble with reacting to provocations like this, even if the indignation is genuine (it's basically always genuine) is that it leads to much less interesting discussions.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#76

Post by lliamander »

photochemsyn wrote: post #72
lliamander wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that smart people need less y to learn almost any x, which is part of what it means to be smart.

That's also a trainable skill, learning how to learn new concepts quickly. Here is where many people report LLMs like ChatGPT are a huge time-saving boost. This might also be an either-or situation - i.e. some people specialize in the ability to quickly grasp a wide variety of knowledge at a relatively shallow level, others specialize in in-depth knowledge of a particular subject, and it's impossible to be really goo…

> That's also a trainable skill, learning how to learn new concepts quickly

Maybe to a limited extent, but most of the difference is likely natural ability.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#77

Post by mikhmha »

agentultra wrote: post #38

I wonder how many of the developers in the groups denigrated in the author also thought they were the, "smart ones attracted to interesting problems." You can find interesting problems in many banal situations. You only have to look.

The failed Kwisatz Haderach.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#78

Post by javajosh »

Juliate wrote: post #33

> "the most ambitious challenges attract the smartest people" Whose ambition? Smart how? For what outcome? For who? Would that be even efficient? (there are many other issues to "panic" over other than AI)

It's probably good to go into a post like this with some basic assumptions about the context: works in/around/with SV "good new boys" network, easy 6-figure software jobs and weird jockeying around securing vast sums extracted from inbred billionaire weirdos and distributed for blood by fast-talking VC weirdos.

The outsider perspective on this is to fancy yourself a smart inventor who's going to outwit/outsmart/outplay the competition with your own company, find product market fit. This factory makes software widgets, and striking gold with such ephemeral products is as hard as striking gold with making sounds (which is the magic that the pop music industry makes happen regularly, somehow). (So, smart enough to write and release quality, reliable software to the public, or build a team capable of doing this).

Demand is so high for any software that becomes popular, that proxies for value are accepted with a "we'll worry about profit later" kind of attitude. So this justifies focusing on a hyped technology even if it isn't real. But if the hyped technology is real, even better.

A rational agent, selling their intellectual labor, understanding the current lay of the land, will see that the subject of "improving AI and integrating AI into applications" is going to be in high demand for a period of time, which means higher income.

I can explain why a higher income is desirable, if you like.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#79

Post by fuzzfactor »

ckemere wrote: post #28

The premise of this is ridiculous. The smartest people I know personally and that I'm aware of generally are not attracted by AI. Person 1 was interested in fundamental physics (dark matter) but had to leave physics due to lack of job opportunities. Person 2 is Terrence Tao. Person 3 is Ed Witten, etc etc. This reflects the hubris of the tech world that overestimates its own intelligence....

>Paraphrasing Paul Graham, “the most ambitious challenges attract the smartest people”.

What is said here could almost have the same logical outcome as saying "the most challenging problems have no brilliant solution until one of the smartest people come along".

Nothing about attraction whatsoever, factored out instead.

Still seems pretty sensible when it works.

Now pick 3 top mathematical wizards.

Would it have been possible to achieve that status unless they had already accepted (and overcome!) challenges that were too much for those who came before?

And maybe still have their hands full with remaining challenges which were already accepted before AI came near enough to be considered within reach?

It should be most obvious to those having the best numerical abilty, to figure that more than just 3 of the smartest people will be needed with the growing number of challenges that nobody has even tried to overcome, sometimes not even recognize.

Re: Problems that attract smart people

#80

Post by BiteCode_dev »

lambic2 wrote: post #49
BiteCode_dev wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The washing machine is one of the biggest game changer in the world, allowing people to suddenly have, like a noble used to have, the equivalent of a servant to do a tremendously costly chore. Without the slavery part. I think AI has the same potential: filling administrative work, walking the complexity of an information overloaded world, keeping up to date with laws you can't ignore but have no way to know about, p…

|Amazing, but very basic. After playing around with ChatGPT for a few hours I have a hard time seeing how someone could objectively call it "basic".

The nokia 3310 was amazing.

But compared to what we have today, it's very basic.

Same for chatgpt.

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