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AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

understandingai.org

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Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#91

Post by exe34 »

Flamentono2 wrote: post #58
simianparrot wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s why it keeps looking exactly like NFT’s and crypto hype cycles to me: Yes the technology has legitimate uses, but the promises of groundbreaking use cases that will change the world are obviously not materialising and to anyone that understands the tech it can’t. It’s people making money off hype until it dies and move on to the next scam-with-some-use.

We already have breakthroughs. Benchmark results which have been unheard of before ML. Alone language translation got so much better, voice syntesis, voice transcription. All my meetings now are searchable and i can ask 'ai' to summarize my meetings in a relative accurate way impossible before that. Alphafold made a breakthrough in protein folding. Image and Video generation can now do unbelievable things. Realtime v…

You have to understand, real AI will never exist. AI is that which a machine can't do yet. Once it can do it, it's engineering.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#92

Post by callc »

Flamentono2 wrote: post #64

I'm not sure why people on HN (of all places) are so divided regarding the perception of AI/ML. I have not seen anything like it before. We literaly had not system or way of even doing things like code generation based on text input. Just last week i asked for a script to do image segmentation with a basic UI and claude just generated that for me in under 1 Minute. I could list tons of examples which are groundbreaki…

> “I'm not sure why people on HN (of all places) are so divided regarding the perception of AI/ML.”

Everyone is a rational actor from their individual perspective. The people hyping AI, and the people dismissing the hype both have good reasons.

The is justification to see this new tech as ground breaking. There is justification to be weary about massive theft of data and dismissiveness of privacy.

First, acknowledge and respect that there are so many opinions on any issue. Take yourself out of the equation for a minute. Understand the other side. Really understand it.

Take a long walk in other people’s shoes.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#93

Post by jodrellblank »

ktallett wrote: post #67
Flamentono2 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutly not true I was not able to get meeting transcription in that quality that cheap ever before. I followed dictation software for over a decade and tx to ML the open source software is suddenly a lot better than ever before. Our internal company search with state of the art search indexes and search software was always shit. Now i ask an agent about a product standard and it just finds it. Image generation nev…

A lot of these issues you have had are simply user error or not using the right tool for the job.

You know what they were doing and what tools they were using… how?

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#94

Post by isaacfrond »

plasticeagle wrote: post #25

Does anybody else find it peculiar that the majority of these articles about AI say things like "of course I don't doubt that AI will lead to major discoveries", and then go on to explain how they aren't useful in any field whatsoever? Where are the AI-driven breakthroughs? Or even the AI-driven incremental improvements? Do they exist anywhere? Or are we just using AI to remix existing general knowledge, while making…

The article itself lists as successful, even breakthrough, applications of AI: protein folding, weather forecasting, and drug discovery.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#95

Post by sundarurfriend »

eschaton wrote: post #40
toolslive wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't a politician invent the internet ?

That’s a meme created and spread by pseudo-journalist Declan McCullagh specifically to tar Al Gore in the lead-up to the 2000 election. Specifically, Gore said in an interview that he “took the initiative in creating the Internet” by introducing the bill to allow commercial traffic on ARPAnet, which McCullagh twisted in an article to “Al Gote claimed he invented the Internet” in order to to smear him.

Given how close that election turned out to be, this smear campaign likely changed the presidency, and given George WMD Bush's actions, changed the course of the world for the worse in many ways. (For those who were too young or not yet born at the time, these jokes were MASSIVE to the extent that became largely Al Gore was known for, for years after. So it's not much of an exaggeration to say they had a material impact on his perception and hence the votes.)

Al Gore understood technology, the internet, was a champion for the environment, and it's unbelievable today that he came that close to presidency (and then lost). When people say "we live in the bad timeline", one of the closest good timelines is probably one where this election went differently.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#96

Post by thrdbndndn »

nottorp wrote: post #33
thrdbndndn wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kinda off-topic, but about the cutting itself: I used to work in academia and was involved in NSF-funded programs, so I have mixed feelings about this. Waste and inefficiency are rampant. BTW I'm not talking about failed projects or research that were dimmed "not important", but things like buying million-dollar equipment just to use up the budget, which then sits idle. That said, slashing NSF funding by 50% won’t fi…

> but things like buying million-dollar equipment just to use up the budget, which then sits idle. That's not specific to the US, and it's because of a perverse incentive coming from those who assign the funds. If you don't use them they cut your funding for the next cycle.

This is a common saying, and I’m sure there’s some truth to it. But IMHO, the main reason is that PIs just want to use the money.

Because… why not? It's free money. Having the newest shiny equipment, at the very least, boosts your group’s reputation. Not to mention that straight-up corruption (pocketing funds for personal gain) is not unheard of.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#97

Post by [deleted] »

exe34 wrote: post #91
Flamentono2 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We already have breakthroughs. Benchmark results which have been unheard of before ML. Alone language translation got so much better, voice syntesis, voice transcription. All my meetings now are searchable and i can ask 'ai' to summarize my meetings in a relative accurate way impossible before that. Alphafold made a breakthrough in protein folding. Image and Video generation can now do unbelievable things. Realtime v…

You have to understand, real AI will never exist. AI is that which a machine can't do yet. Once it can do it, it's engineering.

[deleted]

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#98

Post by Sharlin »

eschaton wrote: post #34
plasticeagle wrote: post #25

Does anybody else find it peculiar that the majority of these articles about AI say things like "of course I don't doubt that AI will lead to major discoveries", and then go on to explain how they aren't useful in any field whatsoever? Where are the AI-driven breakthroughs? Or even the AI-driven incremental improvements? Do they exist anywhere? Or are we just using AI to remix existing general knowledge, while making…

If they didn’t say that the rah-rah-AI crowd would come for them with torches and pitchforks. It’s a ward against that, nothing more.

Similar to the way many Trump supporters, when daring to criticize him, feel the need to assert that they still love him and would vote for him again.

(See, eg. r/LeopardsAteMyFace for examples. It’s fascinating.)

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#99

Post by IanCal »

StopDisinfo910 wrote: post #79
ktallett wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hype surrounding them is not as a pa and tbh a lot of these use cases already have existing methods that work just fine. There are ways to find key information in files already, and speedy meeting minutes is really just a template away.

Microsoft is absolutely selling them as pa and already selling a lot. I think HNers being mostly software developers live in a bubble when it comes to the reality of what LLMs are actually used for. Speedy minutes are absolutely not a template away. Anyone who ever had to write minutes for a complicated meetings knows it’s hard and requires a lot of back and forth for everyone to agree about what was said and decided…

There are so many tasks in the world that

1. Involve a computer

2. Do not require incredible intelligence

3. Involve the messiness of the real world enough that you can't write exact code to do it without it being insanely fragile

LLMs suddenly start to tackle these, and tackle them kind of all at once. Additionally they are "programmed" in just English and so you don't need a specialist to do something like change the tone of the summary or format, you just write what you want.

Assuming the models never get any smarter or even cheaper, and all we get is neater integrations, I still think this is all huge.

Re: AI in my plasma physics research didn’t go the way I expected

#100

Post by ktallett »

jodrellblank wrote: post #93
ktallett wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of these issues you have had are simply user error or not using the right tool for the job.

You know what they were doing and what tools they were using… how?

Ok take Transcription, they were trying to use free as in cost tools instead of using software that works efficiently that has been effective for decades now.
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