Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
Have you somehow sourced unsubsidized inference? Isn't all of this built on the false economy of a handful of very large vendors trying to capture you?
We have unsubsidized inference at home!
Shunning AI is the human choice
371–380 of 572 posts
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#372These people are going to have a really hard time coming to grips with reality in the next few years. AI is here to stay, and it's expanding very rapidly. If you can't fight them, join them.
Tech people had a really good thing going for a lot of years. It peaked right after COVID when it seemed like anyone could get a job and a raise in tech by doing some interview practice and learning how to say the right things. Things even started getting weird for a while when this combined with remote work and being overemployed (multiple remote jobs) entered the common vernacular, even if it wasn’t common. When I…
> Even veteran developers are angry that the talents they’ve been building for years have become a little less unique almost overnight. I believe there is still a lot of value to experienced human developers, but there’s no denying that the barrier to entry has fallen significantly
The barrier to entry was always low. You only need a book and a computing device that allows to run code you’ve edited. The rest is just technical skills, theoretical knowledge and practical experience (gained over time). What was always hard is systematic problem solving, which is a mindset thing. And LLM can’t help you there.
I don’t consider my talents unique. My only value as a developer was always problem solving. Anything else has been automated for ages.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#373Counterpoint: Work sucks. Of the billions of workers on the planet, the number of them who love their job and would truly be doing it even if they didn't need to in order to survive is probably in the low single digits. Hating work is good, wanting it to all be automated is good. It is a pro-human flourishing stance, whereas keeping the majority of humanity laboring in jobs they dislike just to survive is against hum…
That's not the future envisioned by AI pushers.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#374Counterpoint: Work sucks. Of the billions of workers on the planet, the number of them who love their job and would truly be doing it even if they didn't need to in order to survive is probably in the low single digits. Hating work is good, wanting it to all be automated is good. It is a pro-human flourishing stance, whereas keeping the majority of humanity laboring in jobs they dislike just to survive is against hum…
It's highly cynical, but people need to work. It provides structure and most people don't do well with unstructured time.
Also, I find it odd that of all the automation being attempted with LLMs, we're automating the ones that actually are interesting, not the ones that are dangerous or truly rote, yet highly mechanical.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#375Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t think it’s only that. I personally hate AI not because of CEOs and co, but because the tech is intrinsically born out of theft, and is still, to this day, evolving thanks to theft. And that’s even before the ecological considerations.
but because the tech is intrinsically born out of theft Two thoughts: A. That's only true (to any extent) if you hold the extremely myopic view that 'AI == Generative AI'. For my part I'd posit that "AI" at large is not "intrinsically born out of theft". Not unless you think that linear regression, or a genetic algorithm, etc., inherently involve theft somehow. B. It's an open question whether or not copyright infrin…
I think it should be fairly obvious by now which form of AI people refer to when they talk specifically about theft. It gets a bit old and repetitive to expand the shorthand in every conversation possible. If people are genuinely curious about other forms of AI, that information is readily available.
When Tesla FSD was in the zeitgeist, theft never entered the discussion, because it was clear that form of AI was not predicated upon theft.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#376Earlier quoted context omitted.
AI as a tech is fine. But disliking it and the social/economic effects around it is fine too, people should be allowed to feel however they want to feel about certain techs and situations. To recommend people to suck it up is not the answer I wish in the society I want to live in.
I would not recommend that people "suck it up", but I think people have to come to terms with the fact that AI is a legitimate technology that is going to transform the way people live and work. That is just a fact of life, as surely true about AI as it was true about the internet, or smart phones, or cars, or radio, or the train. You can close your eyes and pretend that it is not coming, or you can organize politica…
This is the central problem with the dismissals of the tech's capability. Public discourse needs to shift to planning for the economic impact in particular, but the kind of High Brazilism from the naysayers who insist it's a proof of psychosis to even mention AI's potential, makes the inertia in policymakers much easier for them to maintain. Waiting for the financial effects to arrive and then improvising policy is the stupidest way of handling an upheaval on this scale - even if the precise form of those shocks can't be anticipated.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#377These people are going to have a really hard time coming to grips with reality in the next few years. AI is here to stay, and it's expanding very rapidly. If you can't fight them, join them.
Tech people had a really good thing going for a lot of years. It peaked right after COVID when it seemed like anyone could get a job and a raise in tech by doing some interview practice and learning how to say the right things. Things even started getting weird for a while when this combined with remote work and being overemployed (multiple remote jobs) entered the common vernacular, even if it wasn’t common. When I…
> but there’s no denying that the barrier to entry has fallen significantly.
The barrier to entry to make slop is lower, but it's gotten much higher for developing the skill of programming. There was already an issue with a lack of mentorship and path for juniors when agile attempted to turn software engineers into assembly line workers, among other issues with the industry becoming hyper short-term focused.
Now you have educational barriers where students are competing with other students that are cheating with LLMs. There are psychological barriers with learned helplessness. The 100k lines of vibecoded slop produced hits a wall but they've gained no understanding of the code in the process or ability to make changes themselves. At the first job juniors and interns get they're being told not to take the time to learn and understand the problem they're working and instead they need to hit the LLM slot machine or risk getting fired.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#378Earlier quoted context omitted.
Plenty of people don't like cars to this day.
Do most people hate because they view it as less efficient means of transportation then by horse? Or that cars replaced their job as a horse keeper?
I don't think it's self-evident that we've gained by switching from horses to cars. For most of the trips one makes in their daily life, the ubiquity of cars just means that you now have to travel greater distances. Plus the environmental devastation that cars have wrought. Are we really better off?
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#379Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t think it’s only that. I personally hate AI not because of CEOs and co, but because the tech is intrinsically born out of theft, and is still, to this day, evolving thanks to theft. And that’s even before the ecological considerations.
The ecological considerations are wildly overstated. Data centres in general != AI, and other industries, including meat production and (ironically) paper for print all use far more water and create more damage. This might change in the future if the planned insanely huge data centres get built and used. But today the situation is clear - AI isn't any more ecologically damaging than other popular data centred activit…
Also, I just listened to the latest Volts podcast and they make the claim that data centers will actually lower the cost of electricity fairly soon (~2030). Very counterintuitive but it does make sense. We'll find out soon enough.
Re: Shunning AI is the human choice
#380Earlier quoted context omitted.
Swords, bows and arrows, castles were all here to stay. Technologies fade away when they are no longer useful, cost/benefit ratio is too high or something better comes along. It is question of when.
So you’re saying today’s models are sticks and stones and you’re looking forward to the nuclear submarine equivalent models?
Building on that futurism.
We might design organic brain extensions, so people just become smarter, making LLMs obsolete. (Brain-Bluetooth interface for additional cost)