If your argument attacks my credibility, that’s fine, you don’t know me. We can find cases where developers use the technology and cases where they refuse.

Do you have anything substantive to add to the discussion about whether AI LLMs are anything more than just a tool that allows workers to further abstract, advancing all of the professions it can touch towards any of: better / faster / cheaper / easier?

I think your strategy makes sense for all workers. Being aware of your role in the final solution is more important than the steps needed to get there, and tools merely change the process, often improving it in some way.

A guy with a hammer cant automatically build a house without skills, but it sure helps those who have them. A guy with a nail gun can build a house faster and perhaps with less skill, and few argue that it’s not a worthy improvement.

Some types of photographers may no longer need to operate a camera, but instead transition into someone who can knowledgeably ask for the results from an AI that properly captures the mood and tone required for the end result.

We’re changing how it’s done, but not necessarily what is done.

I was at the Canton Fair last week which is a trade show in China where manufacturers display some of their latest technology.

There was a robotics display all where they are showing off how lots of factories, kitchens, another labor-based jobs can be automated with technology.

This doesn’t really have a lot to do with AI or LLMs, but the field of robotics is advancing fast and a lot of basic work that humans had to do in the past won’t be needed as much in the future.

From the article:

“The thing about that farmer,” Altman said, is not only that they wouldn’t believe you, but “they very likely would look at what you do and I do and say, ‘that’s not real work.'”

I think he pretty much agrees with you.

Agreed. His comments are so bizarrely stupid on so many levels.

They’re not just “wrong”: they’re half-right-half-wrong. And the half that is wrong is idiotic in the extreme, while the half that is right casually acknowledges a civilizational crisis like someone watching their neighbors screaming in a house fire while sipping a cup of coffee.

Like this farmer analogy: the farmers were right! Their way of life and all that mattered to them was largely exterminated by these changes, and we’re living in their worst nightmare! And he even goes so far as acknowledging this, and acknowledging that we’ll likely experience the same thing. We’re all basically cart horses at the dawn of the automobile, and we might actually hate where this is going. But… It’ll probably be great.

He just has a hunch that even though all evidence suggests that this will lead to the opposite of the greatest good for the greatest number of people, for some reason his brain can’t shake the sense that it’s going to be good anyway. I mean, it has to be, otherwise that would make him a monster! And that simply can’t be the case. So there you have it.

It’ll be terrible great.

The same is true for most of the jobs I worked in, and about most jobs in large corporations.

I don’t think that’s necessarily true.

My job started as a relatively BS job. Basically, the company I work for makes physical things, and the people who use those physical things need to create reports to keep the regulators happy. So my first couple years on the job was improving the report generation app, which was kind of useful since it saved people an hour or two a week in producing reports. But the main reason we had this app in the first place was because our competitors had one, and the company needed a digital product to point to in order to sell customers (who didn’t use the app, someone a few layers down did) on it. Basically, my job existed to check a box.

However, my department went above and beyond and created tools to optimize our customers’ businesses. We went past reporting and built simulations related to reporting, but that brought actual value. They could reduce or increase use of our product based on actual numbers, and that change would increase their profitability (more widgets produced per dollar spent). When the company did a round of cost cutting, they took a look at our department ready to axe us, but instead increased our funding when they saw the potential of our simulations, and now we’re making using the app standard for all of our on-staff consultants and front-and-center for all new customer acquisitions (i.e. not just reporting, but showcasing our app as central to the customer’s business).

All that has happened over the last year or so, so I guess we’ll see if that actually increases customer retention and acquisition. My point is that my job transitioned from something mostly useless (glorified PDF generator) to something that actually provides value to the business and likely reduces costs downstream (that’s about 3 steps away from the retail store, but it could help cut prices a few percent on certain products while improving profits for us and our customers).

If we all get a really good universal basic income or something

I disagree with your assertion that many jobs exist because people need jobs. I think jobs exist because even “BS” job create value. If there was a labor surplus today, jobs would be created the lower cost of labor acquisition makes certain products profitable that wouldn’t otherwise be.

That said, I am 100% a fan of something like UBI, though I personally would make it based on income (i.e. a Negative Income Tax, so only those under $X get the benefit), but that’s mostly to make the dollar amount of that program less scary. For example, there are ~130M households in the US (current pop is 342M, or about 2.6 people per household). The poverty line is $32,150 for a family, and sending that out as UBI would cost ~4.1T, which is almost as much as the current US budget. If we instead brought everyone to the poverty line through something like NIT, that’s only ~168B, or about 4% of the current budget.

Regardless of the approach, I think ensuring everyone is between the poverty line (i.e. unemployed people) and a living wage (i.e. minimum wage people) is a good idea for a few reasons:

• allows you to quit your BS job and not be screwed - puts pressure on employers at low-paying jobs to provide a better work experience and pay
• allows us to distribute other benefits in dollars instead of services - this book opened my eyes to how much poor people want cash, not benefits; it’s easier to move if you have $1k/month in rent allowance than stuck in your section 8 (government assisted) housing
• could eliminate the federal minimum wage - if employers aren’t paying well, people won’t take the job because they’d rather take the gov’t handout, so I’d consider the UBI/NIT to be the minimum wage instead
• encourages entrepreneurs to start businesses - my main reason for not starting a business in worries about not being able to cover my basic needs; UBI/NIT covers that, so I probably would have started a few small businesses if I had that as a fallback
• can replace Social Security (or other gov’t pension plan), since retirees can treat UBI/NIT as their pension, and not be restricted to a specific age to take it (benefits would be lower, but very predictable)

Giving people a backup plan encourages people to take more risks, which should result in more value across the economy.

This.

It will be the baby of idiocracy and blade runner.

All the horrible dehumanising parts, without any of the gritty aesthetics, and every character is some kind of sadistic Elmer Fudd.