AI is different • Hacker News Board

Re: AI is different

#61

Post by __MatrixMan__ » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:29 AM UTC

skinnymuch wrote: post #41

HDThoreaun wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The french revolution did not go well for the average french person. Not sure guillotines are the solution we need.

How did it not go well for the avg person? The status quo does not go well for the avg person.

Most of the people who died in The Terror were commoners who had merely not been sympathetic enough to the revolution. And then that sloppiness lead to reactionary violence and there was a lot of back and forth until Napoleon took power and was pretty much a king in all but heritage.

Hopefully we can be a bit more precise this time around.

Re: AI is different

#62

Post by __float » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:30 AM UTC

AdieuToLogic wrote: post #50

> Since LLMs and in general deep models are poorly understood ... This is demonstrably wrong. An easy refutation to cite is: https://medium.com/@akshatsanghi22/how-to-build-your-own-lar... As to the rest of this pontification, well... It has almost triple the number of qualifiers (5 if's, 4 could's, and 5 will's) than paragraphs (5).

That doesn't mean we _understand_ them, that just means we can put the blocks together to build one.

Re: AI is different

#63

Post by nikolayasdf123 » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:30 AM UTC

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

> what do displaced humans transition to?

we assume there must be something to transition to. very well, there can be nothing.

we assume people will transition. very well, they may not transition at all and "dissappear" en masse. (same effect as as a war or an empire collapse)

Re: AI is different

#64

Post by 000ooo000 » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:32 AM UTC

drooby wrote: post #53

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

Carpenters, landscapers, roofers, plumbers, electricians, elderly care, nurses, cooks, servers, bakers, musicians, actors, artists... Those jobs are probably still a couple decades plus off from displacement. some possibly never, And we will need them in higher numbers.. and perhaps it's ironic because these are some of the oldest professions. Everything we do is in service of paying for our housing, transportation,…

What this delusion seems to turn a blind eye to is that a good chunk of the population is already in those roles; what happens when the supply of those roles far exceeds the demand, in a relatively short time? Carpenters suddenly abundant, carpenter wages drop, carpenters struggling to live, carpenters forced to tighten spending, carpenters decide children aren't affordable.. now extrapolate that across all of the impacted roles and industries. No doubt someone is already typing "carpenters can retrain too!" OK, so they're back to entry level wages (if anything) for 5+ years? Same story. And retrain to what?

At some point an equilibrium will be reached but there is no guarantee it will be a healthy situation or a smooth ride. This optimism about AI and the rosy world that is just around the corner is incredibly naive.

Re: AI is different

#65

Post by idiotsecant » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:32 AM UTC

drooby wrote: post #53

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

Carpenters, landscapers, roofers, plumbers, electricians, elderly care, nurses, cooks, servers, bakers, musicians, actors, artists... Those jobs are probably still a couple decades plus off from displacement. some possibly never, And we will need them in higher numbers.. and perhaps it's ironic because these are some of the oldest professions. Everything we do is in service of paying for our housing, transportation,…

In your example i think it's a great deal more likely that the Uber driver is paid a tiny stipend to supervise a squad of gardening androids owned at substantial expense by Amazon Yard.

Re: AI is different

#66

Post by ares623 » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:33 AM UTC

mrbungie wrote: post #4

BoorishBears wrote: post #2

I don't get how post GPT-5's launch we're still getting articles where the punchline is "what if these things replace a BUNCH of humans".

People just want to feel special pointing a possibility, so in case it happens, they can then point towards their "insight".

I kind of want to put up a wall of fame/shame of these people to be honest.

Whether they turn out right or wrong, they undoubtedly cheered on the prospect of millions of people suffering just so they can sound good at the family dinner.

I wouldn’t want to work for or with these people.

Re: AI is different

#67

Post by ares623 » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:36 AM UTC

drooby wrote: post #53

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

Carpenters, landscapers, roofers, plumbers, electricians, elderly care, nurses, cooks, servers, bakers, musicians, actors, artists... Those jobs are probably still a couple decades plus off from displacement. some possibly never, And we will need them in higher numbers.. and perhaps it's ironic because these are some of the oldest professions. Everything we do is in service of paying for our housing, transportation,…

Well when i get unemployable i will start upskilling to an electrician. And so will hundreds of thousands like me.

That will do very well to salaries I think and everyone will be better of.

Re: AI is different

#68

Post by mips_avatar » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:36 AM UTC

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

We have to also choose to build technology that empowers people. Empowering technologies don't just pop into existence, they're created by people who care about empowering people.

Re: AI is different

#69

Post by schneems » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:38 AM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #42

btilly wrote: post #7

In every technology wave so far, we've disrupted many existing jobs. However we've also opened up new kinds of jobs. And, because it is easier to retrain humans than build machines for those jobs, we wound up with more and better jobs. This is the first technology wave that doesn't just displace humans, but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can. Right now it can't replace human…

> but which can be trained to the new job opportunities more easily than humans can What makes you think that? Self driving cars have had untold billions of dollars in reaearch and decades in applied testing, iteration, active monitoring, etc and it still has a very long tail of unaddressed issues. They've been known to ignore police traffic redirections, they've run right through construction barriers, and recently…

A few months ago I saw one driverless car maybe every three days. Now I see roughly 3-5 every day.

I get that it’s taken a long time and a lot of hype that hasn’t panned out. But once the tech works and it’s just about juicing the scale then things shift rapidly.

Even if you think “oh that’s the next generation’s problem” if there is a chance you’re wrong, or if you want to be kind to the next generation: now is the time to start thinking and planning for those problems.

I think the most sensible answer would be something like UBI. But I also think the most sensible answer for climate change is a carbon tax. Just because something is sensible doesn’t meant it’s politically viable.

Re: AI is different

#70

Post by parineum » Sat, Aug 16, 2025, 3:39 AM UTC

solarkraft wrote: post #23

> After all, a plateau of the current systems is possible and very credible, but it would likely stimulate, at this point, massive research efforts in the next step of architectures. A lot of AI’s potential hasn’t even been realized yet. There’s a long tail of integrations and solution building still ahead. A lot of creative applications haven’t been realized yet - arguably for the better, but it will be tried and so…

I'd argue that the applications if LLMs are well known but tgat LLMs currently aren't capable of performing those tasks.

Everyone wants to replace their tech support with an LLM but they don't want some clever prompter to get it to run arbitrary queries or have it promise refunds.

It's not reliable because it's not intelligent.