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AI is making us work more

tawandamunongo.dev

11–20 of 270 posts

Re: AI is making us work more

#11
post #4

The page doesn't load, so I'll just add that we need AI that can clean up after AI.. but this might be difficult, because AI accepting AI output as input seems to be more likely to get "infected" and return the same AI crap.

The recursive self improving AI is the pipe dream.

Re: AI is making us work more

#12

when the bottleneck is communication (coordination costs scale polynomial with number of nodes in the graph), the optimal strategy is to have fewer nodes working harder. If AI makes individual nodes more effective, then in terms of people we’re going to eliminate jobs and concentrate effort. The mean job effort (including the unemployed) may be halftime while the median is 996 and the mode is 0. Whether it works is m…

> energy, water, food, shelter becomes too cheap

AI is currently making energy more expensive. Shelter and these other commodities aren't made cheaper if population expands along with any capacity increases (like lanes on a highway). Lots of "ifs" in this statement that don't seem to match with observation of reality. The point of the discussion here is that AI in many ways is making workers less efficient.

Re: AI is making us work more

#13
Page doesn't load for me. I'm in the UK, not sure if geoblocked.

But a response to the title: "_buzzword tech_ is making us work more" - it's rarely the tech making us work more, it's normally the behaviour and attitude of businesses trying to profit from the tech that makes life hard for everyone.

Re: AI is making us work more

#14
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you explain how AI is going to make energy, water, food, and shelter cheaper ?

My follow up would be, "if AI is doing so many 'menial' jobs, even if AI makes everything cheap, how will unemployed people afford anything?"

[deleted]

Re: AI is making us work more

#15

when the bottleneck is communication (coordination costs scale polynomial with number of nodes in the graph), the optimal strategy is to have fewer nodes working harder. If AI makes individual nodes more effective, then in terms of people we’re going to eliminate jobs and concentrate effort. The mean job effort (including the unemployed) may be halftime while the median is 996 and the mode is 0. Whether it works is m…

Could you explain how AI is going to make energy, water, food, and shelter cheaper ?

The only time I've seen "too cheap to meter" actually happen was the city water in Chicago, and even they are adding or have added meters now even though they have effectively infinite fresh water from Lake Michigan.

Cheap raw materials does not affect the cost of everything else that must be done to prepare and deliver the product to the end user.

Re: AI is making us work more

#16

when the bottleneck is communication (coordination costs scale polynomial with number of nodes in the graph), the optimal strategy is to have fewer nodes working harder. If AI makes individual nodes more effective, then in terms of people we’re going to eliminate jobs and concentrate effort. The mean job effort (including the unemployed) may be halftime while the median is 996 and the mode is 0. Whether it works is m…

> if energy, water, food, shelter becomes too cheap to meter due to rapid technology advances

"If", of course, but it's all but certain. The energy situation, today, is that we as a species depend on fossil fuels, and they are depleting. And we don't have a solution to replace them (renewables are not remotely replacing oil today, those who believe it say something like "we've done 1% of the job, it proves that we will reach 100%!").

AI is making us use more energy, and our use of energy is what is killing the world. Again, the consequences of abundant energy are global warming, mass extinction and political instability as the fossil fuels get less and less available.

Re: AI is making us work more

#17
The absolute worst place to be right now is in a B tech startup. Not only do you need to build some kind of app or product, you also need to build some kind of AI feature into the product. The users don't want it and never asked for it. It sucks all the resources out of your actual product that you should be focusing on, doesn't actually work or works non deterministically, but you are held to the same standards if it was another kind of software. And the only lever you have to pull is a lengthy model re-training or fine tuning/development cycle. The suits don't understand AI or what it takes to make it successful. They were sold on the hype that AI is going to save money, and forgot to budget for the team of AI engineers you'll need, infrastructure for training, extensive data annotations and reams of data that most startups don't have.

Tell me again how this isn't pure hell and the cuck chair?

Re: AI is making us work more

#18

Yes, this is why it's better to be a contractor/individual right now. You need to capture this efficiency yourself. You have access to the same tools faster than BigCos, so go hard in the paint. If you estimate 3h, and it takes 15m it's up to you how to reconcile this. Personally I bill the 3h.

That's only going to be possible for a short time, as your competitors will bill 15 minutes and you'll have to explain why you need 3h.

Re: AI is making us work more

#19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you explain how AI is going to make energy, water, food, and shelter cheaper ?

Not that this is actually what will happen, but: technological unlocks by R&D utilizing AI in the production of all of those things could make them dramatically cheaper or efficient.

Or not. In history, what we have seen is that new technology makes us use more energy, not less.

LLMs are a very good example of that: they are a lot less efficient than the processes they replace in terms of energy. "We produce more with more energy" is the norm.

Re: AI is making us work more

#20

it really is and its costing me about $100/day too

How? (Genuine question... I only pay for a handful of AI services, which is I'm not doubting you, btw... I've seen others here on HN also saying that they burn through money with AI, I guess I'm just missing something.

In fact, the geek in me absolutely wants to know what's going on, because you have probably found something that I would love to know about! :)

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