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Earlier quoted context omitted.
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That would only come close to working as an argument if X and Y were mutually exclusive, but this article doesn't even bother to make the case that they are, nor is there any reason why they would be.
Because it’s trivial? Outsmarting can happen because the tortoise runs faster or the hare slows down.
I'm undecided on this, initially I was on the “this is bad, we’re outsourcing our thinking” bandwagon, now after using AI for lots of different types of tasks for a while now, I feel like generally I’ve learnt so much, so much more quickly. Would I recall it all without my new crutch? Maybe not, but I may not have learnt it in the first place without it.
Think of it like alcohol. Some people benefit from the relaxing effects of a little bit. It helped humanity get through ages of unsafe hygiene by acting as a sanitizer and preservative. For some people, it is a crutch that inhibits developing safe coping mechanisms for anxiety. For others it becomes an addiction so severe, they literally risk death if they don't get some due to withdrawal, and death by cirrhosis if t…
Better analogy is processed food.
It makes calories cheaper, it’s tasty, and in some circumstances (e.g. endurance sports or backpacking) is materially enhances what an ordinary person can achieve. But if you raise a child on it, to where it’s what they reach for by default, they’re fucked.
My current opinion is that AI is just a thing that is going to further amplify our existing tendencies (on a person-to-person basis). I've personally found it to be extremely beneficial in research, learning, and the category of "things that take time because of the stuff you have to mechanically go through and not because of the brainpower involved". I have been able to spend so much more time on things that I feel…
The post was largely about young people who are growing up with these tools and are still at the stage of developing their habits and tendencies. Personally I am glad I learnt programming before LLMs even if it meant the tedious searches on stackoverflow because I didn't feel like I was coming up against a wave of new technology when it came to future job searches. Having done so I can understand and appreciate the i…
When it comes to "humans collectively..." kind of grand scheme issues, I just can't take the risk of AI making us stupider too seriously, compared to: - Wars and violence to resolve geopolitical problems - The biggest trading partner of most countries is waging tariff warfare - Climate change - Declining birth rate in almost every country - Healthier foods are getting more expensive despite our technology and nutriti…
If you lived in an earlier time, you'd be worrying about the rise of homosexuality, communism, atheism, etc.
Is AI special here? Maybe, if it's truly an existential risk.
If the argument is that people shouldn't be able to get started on those things without having to slog though a lot of mindless drudgework - then people should be honest about that rather than dress it up in analogies.
I'm undecided on this, initially I was on the “this is bad, we’re outsourcing our thinking” bandwagon, now after using AI for lots of different types of tasks for a while now, I feel like generally I’ve learnt so much, so much more quickly. Would I recall it all without my new crutch? Maybe not, but I may not have learnt it in the first place without it.
It comes down to how you use it, whether you're just getting an answer and moving on, or if you're getting an answer and then increasing your understanding on why that's the correct answer. I was building a little roguelike-ish sort of game for myself to test my understanding of Raylib. I was using as few external resources as possible outside of the cheatsheet for functions, including avoiding AI initially. I ran in…
That system, of course, doesn't rely on generative AI at all: all contributions to the system are appropriately attributed, etc. I wonder if a similar system could be designed for software?
Conciseness is a valuable thing. It wasn’t practical to convey knowledge in a short form previously because printing and distributing a blog post worth of info was too expensive.
On some level long form content just seems… poorly written. It’s long for the sake of being long.
There are things to be concerned about with students today. They are generally shockingly bad at literacy and numeracy. But I don’t buy that a lack of long form books are the culprit.