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ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

biblioracle.substack.com

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Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#21

Post by jamil7 »

simonw wrote: post #3

The original story here was published on December 11th 2022, just 12 days after the launch of ChatGPT (running on GPT-3.5). I feel most of this document (the bit that evaluates examples of ChatGPT output) is more of historic interest than a useful critique of the state of LLMs in 2025.

I feel very differently about the article. What I took away from it was the authors long-held critique of how high school literature and writing is taught and evaluated. Or how teaching in general has become increasingly outcome focused rather than process driven. ChatGPT is used to illustrate this but I feel like the article could have been written using another example like plagiarism or paying someone to write for you or any current LLM.

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#22

Post by eru »

bulatb wrote: post #8
knowknow wrote: post #6

It’s always baffling how people take a technology that wasn’t even thought as feasible a decade ago and try to dismiss it as trivial and stagnant. It’s pretty clear that LLMs have improved rapidly and have successfully become better writers than the majority of people alive. To try and present this as just random pattern matching seems as just a way to assuage fears of being replaced. It’s also amusing that people mi…

You can't interrogate your qualia. A lot of people think (or really, feel) that makes them magic. It doesn't. But if you feel they're magic, you'll never believe that a "random" mechanical process, which you think you can interrogate, could ever really have that spark.

Well, it doesn't matter whether the AI has qualia, as long as it produces the right output.

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#23

Post by amanaplanacanal »

baq wrote: post #18
bulatb wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't interrogate your qualia. A lot of people think (or really, feel) that makes them magic. It doesn't. But if you feel they're magic, you'll never believe that a "random" mechanical process, which you think you can interrogate, could ever really have that spark.

I subscribe to the ‘qualia is atoms in a trenchcoat’ school of philosophy personally, but I understand that it might be hard to accept and even harder to not be depressed about it.

Well sure. As best we can tell the whole universe is a mechanical cause and effect chain, and the illusion of free will is just that, an illusion.

Or possibly... There is something else going on, and we just haven't figured it what it is yet. I'm not betting either way at this point.

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#24

Post by [deleted] »

CarRamrod wrote: post #11
bulatb wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't interrogate your qualia. A lot of people think (or really, feel) that makes them magic. It doesn't. But if you feel they're magic, you'll never believe that a "random" mechanical process, which you think you can interrogate, could ever really have that spark.

Define 'magic'.

[deleted]

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#26

Post by globnomulous »

knowknow wrote: post #6

It’s always baffling how people take a technology that wasn’t even thought as feasible a decade ago and try to dismiss it as trivial and stagnant. It’s pretty clear that LLMs have improved rapidly and have successfully become better writers than the majority of people alive. To try and present this as just random pattern matching seems as just a way to assuage fears of being replaced. It’s also amusing that people mi…

> To try and present this as just random pattern matching seems as just a way to assuage fears of being replaced.

LLMs are token predictors. That's all they do. This certainly isn't "random," but insisting that that's what the technology does isn't some sad psychological defense mechanism. It's a statement of fact.

> as if human reasoning isn’t built upon recognizing patterns in past experiences.

Everybody will be relieved to know you've finally solved this philosophical problem and answered the related scientific questions. Please make sure you cc psychology, behavioral economics, and neuroscience when you share the news with philosophy.

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#27

Post by OgsyedIE »

If this argument is true it implies an unintended but very bleak corollary about what things aren't really worth preserving, if you start to think about what things aren't thriving in the economy with competition from LLMs. Trusted phone communication, visual art, rule of law, academic peer review, the news, search engines, question and answer platforms, etc

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#28

Post by pona-a »

> Giving 10 month old children permanent crutches may harm the development of walking, but since the crutches make unassisted walking obsolete, maybe it wasn't worth it anyway?

LLMs are a language calculator, yes, but don't share much with their analog. Natural language isn't a translation from input to output, it's a manifestation of thought.

If deaf children not taught sign language suffer from non-language learning disabilities, it's not a far stretch to say failing to practice quality writing will have a similar effect. But even with direct translation, if a school "translated" Shakespeare to a lower reading level to account for the class's lower literacy, it may still affect their development. If you had ChatGPT do every exercise in CS, you wouldn't have learned much from just the explanations.

Re: ChatGPT can't kill anything worth preserving

#29

Post by raducu »

globnomulous wrote: post #26
knowknow wrote: post #6

It’s always baffling how people take a technology that wasn’t even thought as feasible a decade ago and try to dismiss it as trivial and stagnant. It’s pretty clear that LLMs have improved rapidly and have successfully become better writers than the majority of people alive. To try and present this as just random pattern matching seems as just a way to assuage fears of being replaced. It’s also amusing that people mi…

> To try and present this as just random pattern matching seems as just a way to assuage fears of being replaced. LLMs are token predictors. That's all they do. This certainly isn't "random," but insisting that that's what the technology does isn't some sad psychological defense mechanism. It's a statement of fact. > as if human reasoning isn’t built upon recognizing patterns in past experiences. Everybody will be re…

> LLMs are token predictors.

And neural nets are "just" matrix multiplications, human brains are "just" chemical reactions

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