A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
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A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
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Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#2> At some point there might be massive layoffs due to ostensibly competent AI labor coming onto the scene, perhaps because OpenAI will start heavily propagandizing that these mass layoffs must happen. It will be an overreaction/mistake. The companies that act on that will crash and burn, and will be outcompeted by companies that didn't do the stupid.
We're already seeing this with tech doing RIFs and not backfilling domestically for developer roles (the whole, "we're not hiring devs in 202X" schtick), though the not-so-quiet secret is that a lot of those roles just got sent overseas to save on labor costs. The word from my developer friends is that they are sick and tired of having to force a (often junior/outsourced) colleague to explain their PR or code, only to be told "it works" and for management to overrule their concerns; this is embedding AI slopcode into products, which I'm sure won't have any lasting consequences.
My bet is that software devs who've been keeping up with their skills will have another year or two of tough times, then back into a cushy Aeron chair with a sparkling new laptop to do what they do best: write readable, functional, maintainable code, albeit in more targeted ways since - and I hate to be that dinosaur - LLMs produce passable code, provided a competent human is there to smooth out its rougher edges and rewrite it to suit the codebase and style guidelines (if any).
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#3Let's imagine that we all had a trillion dollars. Then we would all sit around and go "well dang, we have everything, what should we do?". I think you'll find that just about everyone would agree, "we oughta see how far that LLM thing can go". We could be in nuclear fallout shelters for decades, and I think you'll still see us trying to push the LLM thing underground, through duress. We dream of this, so the bear case is wrong in spirit. There's no bear case when the spirit of the thing is that strong.
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#4> At some point there might be massive layoffs due to ostensibly competent AI labor coming onto the scene, perhaps because OpenAI will start heavily propagandizing that these mass layoffs must happen. It will be an overreaction/mistake. The companies that act on that will crash and burn, and will be outcompeted by companies that didn't do the stupid. We're already seeing this with tech doing RIFs and not backfilling…
One could argue that's not strictly "AI labor", just cheap (but real) labor using shortcuts because they're not paid enough to give a damn.
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#5I think all these articles begging the question: what's author's credential to claim these things.
Be careful about consuming information from chatters, not doers. There is only knowledge from doing, not from pondering.
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#6Regarding "AGI", is there any evidence of true synthetic a priori knowledge from an LLM?
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#7>At some point there might be massive layoffs due to ostensibly competent AI labor coming onto the scene, perhaps because OpenAI will start heavily propagandizing that these mass layoffs must happen. It will be an overreaction/mistake. The companies that act on that will crash and burn, and will be outcompeted by companies that didn't do the stupid.
(IMO) Apart from programmer assistance (which is already happening), AI agents will find the most use in secretarial, ghostwriting and customer support roles, which generally have a large labor surplus and won't immediately "crash and burn" companies even if there are failures. Perhaps if it's a new startup or a small, unstable business on shaky grounds this could become a "last straw" kind of a factor, but for traditional corporations with good leeway I don't think just a few mistakes about AI deployment can do too much harm. The potential benefits, on the other hand, far outmatch the risk taken.
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#8> At some point there might be massive layoffs due to ostensibly competent AI labor coming onto the scene, perhaps because OpenAI will start heavily propagandizing that these mass layoffs must happen. It will be an overreaction/mistake. The companies that act on that will crash and burn, and will be outcompeted by companies that didn't do the stupid. We're already seeing this with tech doing RIFs and not backfilling…
One could argue that's not strictly "AI labor", just cheap (but real) labor using shortcuts because they're not paid enough to give a damn.
Oh, no, you’re 100% right. One of these days I will pen my essay on the realities of outsourced labor.
Spoiler alert: they are giving just barely enough to not get prematurely fired, because they know if you’re cheap enough to outsource in the first place, you’ll give the contract to whoever is cheapest at renewal anyway.
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#9LLMs seem less hyped than block chains were back in the day
Re: A bear case: My predictions regarding AI progress
#10I think all these articles begging the question: what's author's credential to claim these things. Be careful about consuming information from chatters, not doers. There is only knowledge from doing, not from pondering.
I'm generally more skeptical when reading takes and predictions from people working at AI companies, who have a financial interest in making sure the hype train continues.
To make an analogy - most people who will tell you not to invest in cryptocurrency are not blockchain engineers. But does that make their opinion invalid?