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The Gentle Singularity

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: The Gentle Singularity

#501

Post by Teever »

psalaun wrote: post #471
Teever wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The industrial revolution brought about the development of fabulous innovations like the mass production of standardized and interchangeable parts which has been instrumental in achieving the level of economic production, scientific advancement and quality of life that we enjoy. But I think that there are limitations on these kinds of techniques and we can see them with the changing economics of our most advanced tec…

You assume there are enough trees on the desertic island to build the ship that will allow us to reach the brave new world full of resources. We don't know that. It seems to be a leap of faith, based on the possibility of numerous successive achievements (IA, then fusion, then robots, then interplanetary mining, etc.) where each new step is always reachable. Like in a video game. Maybe the necessary amount of oil (or…

We have no shortage of energy or matter in the solar system to accomplish these goals.

To unlock these resources we need to turn to self replicating machines that can stand up lunar and asteroid mining to build sufficient orbital manufacturing capacity.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#502

Post by olalonde »

yencabulator wrote: post #500
olalonde wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The optimists got the timeline wrong but they were closer to the truth than those who said it would never happen. I have no idea how close AGI is but there is clearly no AI winter around the corner as some HNers have been predicting[0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23886325

Solving a small subset of the problem != solving the problem. I'll believe self-driving is solved when I can order an automated ride to a BLM/forest service dirt road I only have GPS coordinates for and that has cell service on the hilltop only.

I'm pretty sure that problem is solved from a technical point of view - though it might not be commercially available yet due to economic and regulatory reasons.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#503

Post by satvikpendem »

lmm wrote: post #280
satvikpendem wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet I'd much rather self checkout than have a cashier do it for me.

It's a marginal improvement perhaps, but nothing to write home about. And for other things (e.g. booking travel) the self-service experience can be worse.

Not sure about that, I prefer to know all aspects of booking travel that I would not trust to another agent, human or otherwise. Therefore, I believe your statement applies to some people and not others.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#504

Post by satvikpendem »

libraryatnight wrote: post #274
satvikpendem wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet I'd much rather self checkout than have a cashier do it for me.

The only time, for me, this is true, is when it's empty and I have very few items. If there's a line, I'd rather wait for the cashier. Self-checkout seems to get clogged up with people waiting for the supervising human the busier it is, so to have a human or two (one ringing one bagging) when I've got a cart and there's a line, is advantageous. I'm also pretty anti-social and actually prefer the robotic banter of qui…

For ninety nine out of a hundred scenarios, I've never had to wait for a supervising human at all. Maybe it's where I shop, but generally speaking, I've almost never had a problem with people needing to see my checked out items.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#505

Post by yencabulator »

simmanian wrote: post #18
afavour wrote: post #13

> It’s hard to even imagine today what we will have discovered by 2035; maybe we will go from solving high-energy physics one year to beginning space colonization the next year I heard similar things in my college dorm, amid all the hazy smoke. It’s very difficult to take this stuff seriously. It’s like the initial hype around self driving cars wound up by 1000x. Because we got from 1 to 100 of course we’ll get from…

I find it hard to believe too, but at the same time, Demis Hassabis has also said that AI will help us "colonize the galaxy" in as little as five years [1]. Maybe Sam Altman was emboldened by Hassabis' statement. I would not be opposed to living in a future where I can personally live in space. It would be quite fun. [1] (paywalled) https://fortune.com/2025/06/06/google-deepmind-ceo-demis-has...

https://archive.ph/XlLOK

> “If that all happens, then it should be an era of maximum human flourishing, where we travel to the stars and colonize the galaxy. I think that will begin to happen in 2030.”

You are confusing "era of maximum human flourishing ... begin to happen" with "have colonized galaxy".

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#506

Post by yencabulator »

olalonde wrote: post #502
yencabulator wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solving a small subset of the problem != solving the problem. I'll believe self-driving is solved when I can order an automated ride to a BLM/forest service dirt road I only have GPS coordinates for and that has cell service on the hilltop only.

I'm pretty sure that problem is solved from a technical point of view - though it might not be commercially available yet due to economic and regulatory reasons.

You're trying to move the goalpost from "self-driving" to "self-driving in scenarios where the route has been fully premapped".

Might as well move it to "as long as there's no semi crossing the road" to cover for Tesla.

Centrally-managed clean and rigid setting is not the full extent of the problem domain.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#507

Post by yencabulator »

jfernandez wrote: post #38

What's the goal of posting this right now ? A lot of what's written here seems to be well-trodden ground from the last two years of discussions, is it just to centralize a thesis within one post?

Existential crisis of the financial kind means OpenAI cannot stop the hype or it will go bankrupt. This is just more of the ongoing hype-based marketing.

https://www.wheresyoured.at/openai-is-a-systemic-risk-to-the...

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#508

Post by olalonde »

yencabulator wrote: post #506
olalonde wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that problem is solved from a technical point of view - though it might not be commercially available yet due to economic and regulatory reasons.

You're trying to move the goalpost from "self-driving" to "self-driving in scenarios where the route has been fully premapped". Might as well move it to "as long as there's no semi crossing the road" to cover for Tesla. Centrally-managed clean and rigid setting is not the full extent of the problem domain.

On the contrary, I was saying that self-driving in scenarios where the road has not been fully premapped is solved.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#509

Post by yencabulator »

olalonde wrote: post #508
yencabulator wrote: post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're trying to move the goalpost from "self-driving" to "self-driving in scenarios where the route has been fully premapped". Might as well move it to "as long as there's no semi crossing the road" to cover for Tesla. Centrally-managed clean and rigid setting is not the full extent of the problem domain.

On the contrary, I was saying that self-driving in scenarios where the road has not been fully premapped is solved.

Meanwhile, all the self-driving that's currently happening is within well-controlled small geographic areas and some limited interstates/highways, and based on matching observed surroundings to pre-made very detailed maps. Okay, sure.

As I said, I'll believe it's solved when these limitations are no longer necessary for it to work. You can choose to believe it based on a research project or marketing materials.

Re: The Gentle Singularity

#510

Post by w-hn »

Do these tech overlords find it really hard to resist the “pitching in” part even after they’ve already deployed millions and billions in PR? Maybe just the itching thumb? Yeah, maybe.

> AI driving faster scientific progress and increased productivity will be enormous; the future can be vastly better than the present

And then nothing substantial after this proclamatory hot-take. So let’s just choose to believe le ai propheté.

It’s like quick instructions to PR team style written post (and then asking an LLM to inflate it) from the comforts of a warm and cozy Japanese seat.

Definitely not written by Genini at least. Usually does a better job than this. Well, at least like Zuck he eats his own food that he killed.

Will be looking forward to titles like “The Vehement Duality” &c in the near future.

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