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Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

nytimes.com

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Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#31

Post by bartwr »

I love using AI tools and they are changing my work and life in amazing ways. I cannot imagine going back. And yet, I am more concerned about the social damage due to their widespread use and the amounts of slop they generate. Just this week: - There was an article about a news company faking polls by asking LLMs for answers. - My wife told me that she stopped watching any funny pet videos because 99% now is AI slop - start normal, but then turn into someone's slop idea. - A friend told me their big tech company uses AI-generated metrics as part of performance evaluation. Nobody checks them. - Another friend told me their big tech company requires engineers to use AI-generated commit messages with terrible signal-to-noise ratio and making version control and history useless for engineers. But directors and PMs love them, they are so descriptive! - My neighbor uses LLMs to create some neighbor meeting plans/agendas, plausibly looking PDFs citing contractors etc. It's impossible to read through it, mixed hallucinations and real information, all wrapped in thousands of slop words. What is real and what made up? I'll spend 10x more time double guessing. - Encountering more and more articles and general "content" that is AI generated and looks ok at the first glance, but slop upon inspections. Why would I read LLMs output on a webpage with ads, if I can ask it myself and get better, personal answers and style?

And I am not even talking here about other ethical issues, training data, less junior job positions, job replacement of journalists with LLM-equipeed contractors, etc.

LLMs make my personal and work life so much better, but social life unbearable. Is it worth the trade-off? I guess it doesn't matter at this point.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#32

Post by bombcar »

9rx wrote: post #22
bad_haircut72 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah "start a business with AI" is the new "learn to code". Like what does that even mean, do you just go to Claude "hey what business should I start?" If starting a business was so easy, almost all of us who work salary would go do it. This advice is like, if your local football club gets shut down, just work hard enough to make into Manchester United

> If starting a business was so easy, almost all of us who work salary would go do it. Would we? Starting a business is easy. Building a profitable business isn't even that hard. Wanting pleasure in our work is what stops us. Running a business generally isn't much fun. We work salary because it means we can focus on the enjoyable parts of the business, letting someone else deal with the crap.

Starting and running a business is an entirely different skillset from "doing the work" - even someone who could easily "be on their own" (think: plumbers, doctors, etc) really often prefer the salaried position where they don't have to think about "the business".

It's an older book, but The E-Myth Revisited is worth a read for everyone, a business is not a job. It's related, but it's not the same.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#33

Post by bogzz »

richwater wrote: post #8

AI is just another disruptive technology like the loom, the steam engine or the airplane. It will take time to adjust and some industries will go away and others will pop up. I think a lot of people are conflating two ongoing things: the emergence of AI and stagnant (if not recessionary) economies across the globe. It appears as if AI is resulting in so much more negative externalities but in reality if not for AI, w…

The loom, the steam engine, or the airplane did not cause "captains of industry" to publicly salivate over anticipating being able to fire their knowledge workers who invested time, money, and effort into becoming qualified for the jobs they're now constantly in fear of losing.

The social contract is being broken. Being broken just on paper, just on the hopes that it can be broken for good.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#34

Post by arctic-true »

richwater wrote: post #8

AI is just another disruptive technology like the loom, the steam engine or the airplane. It will take time to adjust and some industries will go away and others will pop up. I think a lot of people are conflating two ongoing things: the emergence of AI and stagnant (if not recessionary) economies across the globe. It appears as if AI is resulting in so much more negative externalities but in reality if not for AI, w…

This is an underappreciated point. The economy would likely be in freefall without AI.

Yes, things look bleak for current college grads. The bitter pill to swallow is that they began college in the boom times of 2021-22, and they saw the college grads of those years walking straight off campus into high-paying jobs which don’t exist anymore. They only existed because of the obscene gobs of money whizzing around the economy post-COVID. Whether the shrinkage is due in part or in whole to AI is in the eye of the beholder. But if we had fallen into a broad-based recession, the numbers would look a lot bleaker. Plenty of companies that could automate away entry level positions with current tech haven’t done so, whether due to organizational inertia or ignorance or whatever. That organizational inertia would’ve been much more easily overcome by a market collapse.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#35

Post by kylehotchkiss »

aurareturn wrote: post #2

If I'm Gen Z, especially someone who is graduating or just graduated, I'd be very angry at AI too. Even in our own organization, we've almost stopped hiring juniors and interns completely. We just leverage AI more and more. So I can understand how most Gen Zs feel threatened by AI. There are basically 2 groups who are loving AI: * Seniors who have deep knowledge so AI is just there to help make them accomplish their…

Local models are going to be pretty useful by the time the current companies have to face their finances. The cost of entry will be higher end hardware though.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#36

Post by mothballed »

therobots927 wrote: post #7

Yeah well maybe that has something to do with entry level jobs drying up, ostensibly due to AI. I don’t even think that’s actually the case - we’re in a soft recession. AI has nothing to do with it. But that’s not what kids are being told. Great marketing campaign guys. Just wait. If you think sentiment around AI is negative now you haven’t seen shit .

I believe someday we will wake up and find out our children are setting sail for the new America. Wherever that may be. The capital holders have consolidated their power intertwined with government and are pulling up the ladders. This is why many Europeans set sail for America in the first place, and the cycle has completed itself, and we have become what we escaped. I do not think you can vote your way out of that.

Maybe there is some place left that needs young people badly enough that they are willing to open up opportunities, or someplace left ripe and weak enough that the youth will take it over by force.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#38

Post by harmonic18374 »

justonepost2 wrote: post #4

We are, in the best case scenario, minting a lost generation in real time. This will become increasingly clear over the next 2 years. Meanwhile, simonw and his retiree friends are having the "time of their lives", so that's good I guess :)

Is that an actual quote from simonw? He seems an unbiased observer and reporter of progress, I'd be sad to see him cheering this stuff on so callously.

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#39

Post by coffeebeqn »

dlev_pika wrote: post #11

It’s possible they do not appreciate how AI will help some rich fucks siphoning all the money out of the economy and into their bank accounts.

What exactly is the bull case for your average Joe to be excited about for AI?

Re: Study found that young adults have grown less hopeful and more angry about AI

#40

Post by daemonologist »

parliament32 wrote: post #20
aurareturn wrote: post #2

If I'm Gen Z, especially someone who is graduating or just graduated, I'd be very angry at AI too. Even in our own organization, we've almost stopped hiring juniors and interns completely. We just leverage AI more and more. So I can understand how most Gen Zs feel threatened by AI. There are basically 2 groups who are loving AI: * Seniors who have deep knowledge so AI is just there to help make them accomplish their…

How could your "business" ever make money if any idiot with a $20 CC subscription can recreate it in a weekend? And no, "I can prompt better than them" is not a differentiator.

The idea is the opposite - "nobody" can make money selling software anymore, because software can be cheaply created by an LLM, so you want to start a business that previously would have had to buy software/software engineers in order to support some other product.

However, even if that holds true (which is a big if - right now I wouldn't want to run a business backed by vibe software), and even if there are enough such business ideas to go around, there's going to be quite a lot of turmoil in the meantime.

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