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A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

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Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#51

Post by TeMPOraL »

haswell wrote: post #36
ben_w wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To the extent that further improvements to AI remain economically useful, "let's do these other things first" means your economy trails behind those of whoever did work on the AI. To the extent that further improvements to AI are either snake oil or just hard to monopolise on, doing everything else first is of course the best idea. Even though I'm more on the side of finding these things impressive, it's not at all c…

> To the extent that further improvements to AI remain economically useful, "let's do these other things first" means your economy trails behind those of whoever did work on the AI. The major question is: at what point will unaddressed climate change nullify these economic gains and make the fact that anyone worried about them feel silly in retrospect? Or put another way, will we even have the chance collectively enj…

Still, another two big questions are:

- To what extent AI will actually be helpful in solving the climate crisis?

- To what extent the power generation growth fueled by AI will be critical to solving the climate crisis, and conversely, how badly we'll be screwed without it?

"Degrowth" is not an option. It hasn't been for a long time now. We can't just "social solution" our way out this problem anymore.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#52

Post by godelski »

hbartab wrote: post #6

> We certainly need to partner with industry. Because they are so far ahead and are making such giant investments, that is the only possible path. And therein lies the risk: research labs may become wholly dependent on companies whose agendas are fundamentally commercial. In exchange for access to compute and frontier models, labs may cede control over data, methods, and IP—letting private firms quietly extract value…

There's a risk but there's also great reward if it is done properly. The only way to maximize utility of any individual player is to play cooperatively[0]. A single actor might get a momentary advantage by defecting from cooperation, but it decreases their total eventual rewards and frankly it quickly becomes a net negative in many cases.

That said, I'm not very confident such a situation would happen in reality. I'm not confident current industry leaders can see past a quarter and nearly certain they can't see past 4. Current behavior already indicates that they are unwilling to maximize their own profits. A rising tide lifts all ships, but many will forgo the benefit this gives them to set out to explore for new and greater riches and instead are only able to envy the other ships rising with them. It can be easy to lose sight of what you have if you are too busy looking at others.

[0] Simplified example illustrated by Iterative Prisoner's Dilemma: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur3Vf_ibHD0

[0.1] Can explain more if needed but I don't think this is hard to understand.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#53

Post by zzzeek »

> Over the last two years, we’ve more or less run out of benchmarks where AI isn’t better than humans.

this whole "benchmarks" thing is laughable. I've been using Gemini all week to do code assist, review patches, etc. Such impressive text, lists of bullets, suggestions, etc., but then at the same time it makes tons of mistakes, which you then call it on, and it predictably is like "oh sorry! of course!" yes of COURSE. because all it does is guess what word is most likely to come after the previous word. is there a "benchmark" for "doesn't hallucinate made up BS?" because humans can do very well on such a benchmark.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#54

Post by kgwxd »

candiddevmike wrote: post #28
senderista wrote: post #20

Clearly AI is worthy of public investment, but given the capture of this administration by tech interests, how can we be sure that public AI funding isn't just handouts to the president's cronies?

How about we fix global warming and switch 100% to clean energy, and then invest in AI?

AI might be faster path to solving those issues.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#55

Post by grey-area »

ben_w wrote: post #30
candiddevmike wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about we fix global warming and switch 100% to clean energy, and then invest in AI?

To the extent that further improvements to AI remain economically useful, "let's do these other things first" means your economy trails behind those of whoever did work on the AI. To the extent that further improvements to AI are either snake oil or just hard to monopolise on, doing everything else first is of course the best idea. Even though I'm more on the side of finding these things impressive, it's not at all c…

Is generative AI economically useful? More economically useful than switching to renewable energy?

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#57

Post by engineer_22 »

candiddevmike wrote: post #28
senderista wrote: post #20

Clearly AI is worthy of public investment, but given the capture of this administration by tech interests, how can we be sure that public AI funding isn't just handouts to the president's cronies?

How about we fix global warming and switch 100% to clean energy, and then invest in AI?

Let's also cure cancer and stop all wars while we're at it.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#58

Post by Retric »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #51
haswell wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To the extent that further improvements to AI remain economically useful, "let's do these other things first" means your economy trails behind those of whoever did work on the AI. The major question is: at what point will unaddressed climate change nullify these economic gains and make the fact that anyone worried about them feel silly in retrospect? Or put another way, will we even have the chance collectively enj…

Still, another two big questions are: - To what extent AI will actually be helpful in solving the climate crisis? - To what extent the power generation growth fueled by AI will be critical to solving the climate crisis, and conversely, how badly we'll be screwed without it? "Degrowth" is not an option. It hasn't been for a long time now. We can't just "social solution" our way out this problem anymore.

We can very quickly and reasonably cheaply ‘solve’ global warming without AI. Wind, solar, batteries + existing hydro and nuclear can hit a 95% clean electricity grid with capacity to scale in EV’s and heat pumps.

Electricity + home heating + cars is not 100%, but cutting emissions in half means you double the time before reaching any given threshold. For many problems the last 10% is the most challenging but we get 10x as long to solve it and 10x as long to implement mitigation strategies.

That’s what makes climate change critical, the next year is more important than what happens 10 or 20 years from now.

Re: A conversation about AI for science with Jason Pruet

#59

Post by gosub100 »

candiddevmike wrote: post #28
senderista wrote: post #20

Clearly AI is worthy of public investment, but given the capture of this administration by tech interests, how can we be sure that public AI funding isn't just handouts to the president's cronies?

How about we fix global warming and switch 100% to clean energy, and then invest in AI?

what's wrong with global warming? If you're asking me to put animals' lives before my own, I say "no thanks".
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