xAI • Hacker News Board

Re: xAI

#151

Post by PeterStuer » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:45 PM UTC

bo1024 wrote: post #84

PeterStuer wrote: post #68

I remember grasping the 'true nature of the universe' some night in a bar called 'the professor' in the late 80's. No, I'm not joking or being sarcastic. I wasn't on any substances besides a mild dose of alcohol. I just whish I could remember/ relive it rather than the tenuous grip of that moment I still preserve.

> And then one day, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl, sitting on her own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth suddenly realised what it was that had been going wrong all this time and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no-one would have to…

Sure dude.

To be explicit. I'm not claiming what I felt/experienced was 'the thruth' or even 'real'. Just think it was for me the most 'clear' vision in my life, and that I feel a mild sadness it was so fleeting.

Re: xAI

#152

Post by kstrauser » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:45 PM UTC

jchw wrote: post #131

miqueturner wrote: post #104

Why are there no women involved? (Please not trolling, I am curious.)

Not really sure why this stands out to so many people. I believe the percentage of programmers who are women is something like 5-8%. Even being kind of generous, out of 12 people that would still not make an entire person. Demographics might differ for AI researchers or other STEM fields adjacent but in general it seems odd to be surprised when it's literally how things have been for at least decades. Not saying this…

For me, it’s because the idea of “understanding the true nature” of anything, with no perspective from half the planet’s population, is ludicrous.

Re: xAI

#153

Post by andreygrehov » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:47 PM UTC

sterlind wrote: post #145

andreygrehov wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you believe that one cannot disagree with Musk?

his conduct at Twitter, primarily, as he rapidly abandoned his promises of free-speech absolutism and started to micromanage its moderation to benefit himself.

> he rapidly abandoned his promises of free-speech

Hm, I don't think that's true. How does that manifest itself?

> started to micromanage its moderation to benefit himself

Has anyone been banned from the platform?

+ we are talking about Twitter, right? Elon uses Twitter for fun, it's pretty obvious from many of his troll tweets.

Do you have any evidence that people cannot disagree with him when working directly in a professional environment (eg office, zoom call, etc)?

Re: xAI

#154

Post by 3cats-in-a-coat » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:48 PM UTC

haswell wrote: post #19

It has been the collective goal of the many fields of science, throughout the history of humankind, to understand the true nature of the universe. There's something that feels incredibly ostentatious about the opening sentence " The goal of xAI is to understand the true nature of the universe. ". Not because I think it's a bad goal, or a goal that no company can claim, but because of the broader context around AI and…

- Tesla was launched to transition the world to sustainable energy (not that electric cars do that up close, but never mind).

- SpaceX was launched to make us a multiplanetary species.

- Twitter was bought to fight the woke mind virus that is destroying the world.

- And now xAI will understand the Universe.

One of the clear rules of PR for Musk is that whatever he says it must involve at least one whole planet, ideally multiple planets, galaxies, or ideally, the whole Universe. What is delivered is another story entirely.

Re: xAI

#155

Post by jowea » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:48 PM UTC

david927 wrote: post #23

duxup wrote: post #14

I can’t tell what this company does. Does anyone know?

The goal of xAI is to understand the true nature of the universe.

They found a way to make philosophy profitable?

Re: xAI

#156

Post by esalman » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:50 PM UTC

coffeebeqn wrote: post #43

esalman wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Musk tried but probably couldn't make it in Texas.

All hat but no cattle?

It's just that liberals and conservatives alike are both opposed to his projects that have anything to do with transportation around here.

Re: xAI

#157

Post by raydev » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:51 PM UTC

renewiltord wrote: post #50

esalman wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Musk tried but probably couldn't make it in Texas.

The Texas stuff is working really well. And if I recall, he was expanding California investment at the time he was moving the HQ of Tesla. And Tesla's engineering hub is here in Palo Alto. Overall, I'd say everything there is chugging along.

If it were truly working well, I'd expect Musk's brand new company to HQ there.

Re: xAI

#158

Post by jimlongton » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:52 PM UTC

paxys wrote: post #9

> We are actively recruiting experienced engineers and researchers to join our team as members of our technical staff in the Bay Area. It's funny that after all the talk of remote work, tech globalization and the SF/Silicon Valley exodus in the last few years (including much of it from Musk himself), we end up with pretty much all mainstream AI companies – OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Nvidia, Scale AI, Midjourney, and…

> The technological center of world continues to be a hundred square miles in Northern California

If your definition excludes the likes of the entire semiconductor industry for example.

Re: xAI

#159

Post by cma » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:54 PM UTC

kklisura wrote: post #47

Huh. I thought _understanding universe_ would require research in quantum mechanics, string theory, astrophysics… you know - physics. Not _AI_.

AI may start contributing new math and science fairly soon.

Re: xAI

#160

Post by jchw » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 5:55 PM UTC

kstrauser wrote: post #152

jchw wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really sure why this stands out to so many people. I believe the percentage of programmers who are women is something like 5-8%. Even being kind of generous, out of 12 people that would still not make an entire person. Demographics might differ for AI researchers or other STEM fields adjacent but in general it seems odd to be surprised when it's literally how things have been for at least decades. Not saying this…

For me, it’s because the idea of “understanding the true nature” of anything, with no perspective from half the planet’s population, is ludicrous.

Pretty sure the lofty mission statement is mostly marketing fluff for a run of the mill generative AI company. However, I'm not really sure if what you're saying makes that much sense. The truth is that at just 12 people, what they actually have is the perspective of 12 eight billionths of the people on earth. You can split by all kinds of attributes of people, race, gender, locality, ability, etc. and get a different answer.

I'm not trying to suggest in some roundabout way that this is good or even not bad, but it is rather arbitrary. In truth, "one person" rarely does anything, since in many senses, all of us stand on the shoulders of giants. But, even then, the accomplishments of individual people have been pretty impressive. There are singular people who have discovered the nature of a lot of things despite only having one perspective to bring on their own.