Live data from Hacker News

Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

businessinsider.com

241–250 of 575 posts

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#241
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Would you prefer the harsh unpopular truth of Erich Schmidt, or a sweet lie of Wozniak? What Erich Schmidt is doing is not about describing hard reality. He is trying to make a particular version of the future come true by painting it as inevitable. It's literally a propaganda technique.

"The future is already here—it’s just not very evenly distributed." AI has made my life so much easier. If I need to change non-standard lightbulbs (e.g., G9, MR11, A19), I'm taking a picture and asking my AI what kind are they. If I need to create the first pass of test scripts, I ask my AI. It's reduced technical debt and let me focus on the things I care about.

"AI has had a limited improvement over my life, so I'm happy fucking over the rest of the world by polluting water, using huge amounts of energy, and reinforcing class hierarchies, just so that I can change a lightbulb a bit easier" is peak tech-bro

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#242

I cannot stress how much the deep internal Apple loyalists loathe Woz. I personally find him one of the best parts of (old) Apple, and it’s a shame the company internally continues to think of him as a loose cannon.

I worked at apple a couple decades ago. He isn't loathed so much as acknowledged as being uncontrollable. Internally at Apple it is very strict in terms of what you can say and do, like being in a communist country where you never go against Dear Leader. Woz speaks his mind and that is ultimately why he left early on. He also has a conscience and cares about people, something Apple does a great job of pretending to d…

I worked there just shy of 20 years, and I agree “uncontrollable” is a good way to frame it.

To be clear I think Woz is great, I was just referring to listening to years of behind his back comments made by leaders at the company who look down on him for being too open, which as you know is not “allowed”.

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#243

The man is hailed as a brilliant nerd in our circles. I didn't realize he's a great public speaker. He really read the room. The "McKenzie"-style lady and Schmidt from Google (who really seemed to resent the pushback and chided graduates), can go to hell. I'm happy that someone is telling the young people who are likely to suffer because of this tech that they matter. I can't imagine how much angst much exist after t…

* * *

[dead]

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#244
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire commencement program is here. Woz speaks at around the 42-minute mark. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4sSfADusN40

This one looks completely different from the short as well. There are now 3 known versions of this same line and all are different. Is it possible he gave the same speech to multiple audiences on that day?

There're like 3 commencements

1st of May, 7pm - https://youtu.be/LHEW8Da5550?t=2757

2nd of May, 10am - https://youtu.be/4sSfADusN40?t=2586

2nd of May, 3pm - https://youtu.be/-bn3ydOuMm4?t=2855

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#245
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Would you prefer the harsh unpopular truth of Erich Schmidt, or a sweet lie of Wozniak? What Erich Schmidt is doing is not about describing hard reality. He is trying to make a particular version of the future come true by painting it as inevitable. It's literally a propaganda technique.

"The future is already here—it’s just not very evenly distributed." AI has made my life so much easier. If I need to change non-standard lightbulbs (e.g., G9, MR11, A19), I'm taking a picture and asking my AI what kind are they. If I need to create the first pass of test scripts, I ask my AI. It's reduced technical debt and let me focus on the things I care about.

> It's reduced technical debt

I think that's a misunderstanding of the phrase.

AI may have reduced your immediate technical burden.

However AI, if not carefully used, increases technical debt because it builds up a vast heap of code and business logic that nobody understands. The agent that created it forgets about it once it's out of its context window, the programmer that scripted it just knows it passed some tests.

In two, five, ten years from now trying to maintain that vibe-coded slop will be a battle between various agents making conflicting changes and some poor human trying to get it into a shippable state.

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#246

The man is hailed as a brilliant nerd in our circles. I didn't realize he's a great public speaker. He really read the room. The "McKenzie"-style lady and Schmidt from Google (who really seemed to resent the pushback and chided graduates), can go to hell. I'm happy that someone is telling the young people who are likely to suffer because of this tech that they matter. I can't imagine how much angst much exist after t…

I also saw video of some school president being booed so badly that he never actually gave the speech, while some other admin had to come hold his hand and yell at the tuition paying students.

Ah, here it is. It was CalArts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0vTVWyY47s

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* * *

As much as it costs Woz nothing to be AI sceptic, Erich Schmidt has to loose much if AI investments don't deliver. https://www.cnbc.com/2025/01/21/eric-schmidts-family-office-...

Only correcting this because I’ve seen three people make the mistake now - it’s Eric, not Erich.

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#248
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Would you prefer the harsh unpopular truth of Erich Schmidt, or a sweet lie of Wozniak? What Erich Schmidt is doing is not about describing hard reality. He is trying to make a particular version of the future come true by painting it as inevitable. It's literally a propaganda technique.

"The future is already here—it’s just not very evenly distributed." AI has made my life so much easier. If I need to change non-standard lightbulbs (e.g., G9, MR11, A19), I'm taking a picture and asking my AI what kind are they. If I need to create the first pass of test scripts, I ask my AI. It's reduced technical debt and let me focus on the things I care about.

I've been making some good use of this stuff, but identifying light bulbs, really? That wasn't exactly difficult in the Before Times.

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#249
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They (we) have to believe human brains still have value and find a way out; for otherwise there'd be no point to try anymore. Our value isn't predicated on our utility. The simple fact that we are sentient beings, capable of joy and suffering, gives us value. This is why we continue to support and care for the elderly and the disabled - we value them regardless of any practical utility we may derive from them. If y…

> Our value isn't predicated on our utility. Yes it is. If human life was inherently valuable then the concept of poverty wouldn't exist because the entity that sees it as valuable would be willing to spend resources on maintaining it. > The solution is to recognize the value inherent in us as humans, and to demand public policies that reflect this fact. Most social programs keep expanding until they become unsustain…

If human lives weren't inherently valuable, the concept of charity wouldn't exist. Where does that leave us? I think probably the line of argument doesn't work in either direction.

Likewise, most of the time you don't have social programs, somebody will introduce social programs. You can't just say "no social programs" and expect this to have no positive consequences... okay this is falling apart a bit, but the point is, what makes 'not expanding UBI' so much harder than 'not introducing UBI'? If you can convince people that introducing UBI will lead to expanding UBI and that that is bad, what's stopping you from just convincing them of the latter?

Re: Steve Wozniak cheered after telling students they have AI – actual intelligence

#250
post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you be sure Eric Schmidt is telling “the truth” and Wozniak is lying? What’s your rationale and on the basis for such a claim?

Economic, market and product results. Schmidt took Google to the moon financially, speareding projects like Chrome and Android that cemented Google as THE tech titan(couch monopoly cough), whereas Woz was a top HW engineer of his time, but Apple would have quickly failed if he was at the helm calling the shots, instead of Jobs. From which would you take advice, the successful entrepreneur/investor, or the nice hacker…

I'm fairly allergic to advice in general, but if I were to take some, I'd take it from the happy extremely rich guy over the ridiculous ultra rich guy.
Post reply on HN