AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions • Hacker News Board

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#201

Post by ACCount37 » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:31 AM UTC

ehnto wrote: post #185

wvbdmp wrote: post #4

Okay, so AI isn’t exceptional, but I’m also not exceptional. I run on the same tech base as any old chimpanzee, but at one point our differences in degree turned into one of us remaining “normal” and the other burning the entire planet. Whether the particular current AI tech is it or not, I have yet to be convinced that the singularity is practically impossible, and as long as things develop in the opposite direction…

I don't think LLMs are building towards an AI singularity at least. I also wonder if we can even power an AI singularity. I guess it depends on what the technology is. But it is taking us more energy than really reasonable (in my opinion) just to produce and run frontier LLMs. LLMs are this really weird blend of stunningly powerful, yet with a very clear inadequacy in terms of sentient behaviour. I think the easiest…

I see no reason why not.

There was a lot of "LLMs are fundamentally incapable of X" going around - where "X" is something that LLMs are promptly demonstrated to be at least somewhat capable of, after a few tweaks or some specialized training.

This pattern has repeated enough times to make me highly skeptical of any such claims.

It's true that LLMs have this jagged capability profile - less so than any AI before them, but much more so than humans. But that just sets up a capability overhang. Because if AI gets to "as good as humans" at its low points, the advantage at its high points is going to be crushing.

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#202

Post by ViscountPenguin » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:43 AM UTC

glitchc wrote: post #194

I think LLMs are absolutely fantastic tools. But I think we keep getting stuck on calling them AI. LLMs are not sentient. We can make great strides if we treat them as the next generation of helpers for all intellectual and creative arts.

I really don't get this argument. I see it all the time, but the term AI has been used for over half a century for algorithms far less sophisticated than modern LLMs.

I don't think erasing history, and saying that nothing Peter Norvig worked on was "AI" makes any sense at all.

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#203

Post by ACCount37 » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:45 AM UTC

ViscountPenguin wrote: post #202

glitchc wrote: post #194

I think LLMs are absolutely fantastic tools. But I think we keep getting stuck on calling them AI. LLMs are not sentient. We can make great strides if we treat them as the next generation of helpers for all intellectual and creative arts.

I really don't get this argument. I see it all the time, but the term AI has been used for over half a century for algorithms far less sophisticated than modern LLMs. I don't think erasing history, and saying that nothing Peter Norvig worked on was "AI" makes any sense at all.

LLMs were the first introduction to AI for a lot of people. And AI effect is as strong as it ever was.

So now, there's a lot of "not ackhtually intelligent" going around!

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#204

Post by bluefirebrand » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:55 AM UTC

chpatrick wrote: post #176

bluefirebrand wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't need to prove all humans are capable of this. We can demonstrate that some humans are, therefore humans must be capable, broadly speaking Until we see an LLM that is capable of this, then they aren't capable of it, period

Sometimes LLMs hallucinate or bullshit, sometimes they don't, sometimes humans hallucinate or bullshit, sometimes they don't. It's not like you can tell a human to stop being delusional on command either. I'm not really seeing the argument.

If a human hallucinates or bullshits in a way that harms you or your company you can take action against them

That's the difference. AI cannot be held responsible for hallucinations that cause harm, therefore it cannot be incentivized to avoid that behavior, therefore it cannot be trusted

Simple as that

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#205

Post by goku12 » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:57 AM UTC

glitchc wrote: post #194

I think LLMs are absolutely fantastic tools. But I think we keep getting stuck on calling them AI. LLMs are not sentient. We can make great strides if we treat them as the next generation of helpers for all intellectual and creative arts.

Intelligence doesn't imply sentience, does it? Is there an issue in calling a non-sentient system intelligent?

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#206

Post by bluefirebrand » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:59 AM UTC

chpatrick wrote: post #173

bluefirebrand wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Humans are also trained on data made by humans Humans invent new data, humans observe things and create new data. That's where all the stuff the LLMs are trained on came from. > That's creativity which is a different question from thinking It's not really though. The process is the same or similar enough don't you think?

I disagree. Creativity is coming up with something out of the blue. Thinking is using what you know to come to a logical conclusion. LLMs so far are not very good at the former but getting pretty damn good at the latter.

I dunno man if you can't see how creativity and thinking are inextricably linked I don't know what to tell you

LLMs aren't good at either, imo. They are rote regurgitation machines, or at best they mildly remix the data they have in a way that might be useful

They don't actually have any intelligence or skills to be creative or logical though

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#207

Post by card_zero » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 5:59 AM UTC

lucumo wrote: post #198

MengerSponge wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OpenAI (and its peer companies) have deliberately muddied the waters of that language. AI is a marketing term that lets them use disparate systems' success to inflate confidence in their promised utility.

Meh. People have been calling much dumber algorithms "AI" for decades. You guys are just pedants.

By the way, don’t call it “AI.” That catchall phrase, which used to cover everything from expert systems and neural networks to robotics and vision systems, is now passe in some circles. The preferred terms now are “knowledge-based systems” and “intelligent systems”, claimed Computerworld magazine in 1991.

https://archive.org/details/computerworld2530unse/page/59/mo...

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#208

Post by heresie-dabord » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:00 AM UTC

jamesjyu wrote: post #125

redwood wrote: post #7

I think the "calculator for words" analogy is a good one. It's imperfect since words are inherently ambiguous but then again so is certain forms of digital numbers (floating point anyone?). Through this lens it's way more normal

I think a better term is "word synthesizer"

What do you think of "plausibility hallucinator"? ^_^

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#209

Post by dybber » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:01 AM UTC

ViscountPenguin wrote: post #202

glitchc wrote: post #194

I think LLMs are absolutely fantastic tools. But I think we keep getting stuck on calling them AI. LLMs are not sentient. We can make great strides if we treat them as the next generation of helpers for all intellectual and creative arts.

I really don't get this argument. I see it all the time, but the term AI has been used for over half a century for algorithms far less sophisticated than modern LLMs. I don't think erasing history, and saying that nothing Peter Norvig worked on was "AI" makes any sense at all.

The issue is that what is considered AI in the general population is a floating definition, with only the newest advances being called AI in media etc. Is internet search AI? Is route planning?

Technology as a term has the same problem, “technology companies” are developing the newest digital technologies.

A spoon or a pencil is also technology according to definition, but a pencil making company is not considered a technology company. There is some quote by Alan Kay about this, but can’t find it now.

I try to avoid both terms as they change meaning depending on the receiver.

Re: AI might yet follow the path of previous technological revolutions

#210

Post by dcanelhas » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:11 AM UTC

marcus_holmes wrote: post #180

wvbdmp wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that the mere theoretical possibility isn’t sufficient for the argument, but you’re missing the much less refutable component: that the inevitability is actively driven by universal incentives of competition. But as I alluded to earlier, we’re working towards plenty of other collapse scenarios, so who knows which we’ll realize first…

None of them. Humans have always believed that we are headed for imminent total disaster. In my youth it was WW3 and the impending nuclear armageddon that was inevitable. Or not, as it turned out. I hear the same language being used now about a whole bunch of other things. Including, of course, the evangelist Rapture that is going to happen any day now, but never does. You can see the same thing at work in discussion…

If you look at timescales large enough you will find that plenty of extinction level events actually do happen (the anthropocene is right here).

We are living in a historically excepcional time of geological, environmental, ecological stability. I think that saying that nothing ever happens is like standing downrange to a stream of projectiles and counting all the near misses as evidence for your future safety. It's a bold call to inaction.