Baldur BjarnasonApr 15, 2023

The only two viewpoints on generative AI that get any play among tech punditry are:

1. AI is a lever that helps people do better
2. AI is effective automation that will replace people, or be a threat to them.

The third viewpoint, that AI tools are kind of shit and, if used in their current form at scale by corporations and governments, will “enshittify” large portions of our society, doesn’t seem to register with them at all.

Show threadMartin CarpellaApr 15, 2023

@baldur I think that's because we are at the beginning of a new hype cycle. And compared to the previous one (crypto currencies and "Web3") I can see some lasting and useful applications in this one.

Said that, the future is STARTING now, we definetely are not there yet. :-)

Show thread★ Amy Star ★
@martinc @baldur "this is just the beginning, it has so much potential" is the exact same line that they used for crypto/web3, and my god, did that do some incredible damage before it fizzled out and became shitty capitalist background radiation that just low-key destroys people's lives without winding up in headlines
Apr 17, 2023 at 12:30amWeb
Show threadLuna Dragofelis ΘΔ moved to @[email protected]Apr 17, 2023
@AmyZenunim @martinc @baldur the thing with generative neural networks (gonna call them GNNs for the rest of this comment) is that they can actually be used in many existing practical applications like web search, code completion or word processors, in contrast to blockchain which only really has been used for tokens of abstract value.

Not that GNNs will necessarily be good at those purposes, I think in their current state they're dogshit for web search, because current GNNs don't know the accuracy of it's output and don't seem to be very able to understand the limitations of their knowledge (in anthropomorphic terms). Basically it doesn't realize if it actually knows something or just talks out of its metaphorical ass. And that'll just be a mass bullshit generation engine.

I think the use of the term "AI" for GNNs is definitely part of the hype machine. In my opinion, something that can't use logical reasoning and spits out inaccurate results isn't worthy of being called artificial intelligence (it arguably might be something more like artificial gut feeling).