this post was submitted on 05 Sep 2024
150 points (99.3% liked)

technology

23303 readers
17 users here now

On the road to fully automated luxury gay space communism.

Spreading Linux propaganda since 2020

Rules:

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
 

https://futurism.com/the-byte/government-ai-worse-summarizing

The upshot: these AI summaries were so bad that the assessors agreed that using them could require more work down the line, because of the amount of fact-checking they require. If that's the case, then the purported upsides of using the technology — cost-cutting and time-saving — are seriously called into question.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

You seem to have a kind of "head in the sand" approach to this

Even more smuglord and there's so much more text to read. Here we go.

(I get it, we have to protect our egos)

Maybe educate yourself on what some of the research in this field looks like.

Maybe stop ignoring entire fields of research that, to this date, are still figuring out what biological brains are doing and how they are doing them instead of just nodding along to what you already want to believe from people that have blinders for anything outside of their field (computers, in this case). It's a case of someone with a hammer seeing everything as a nail, and you buying into that.

Honestly you sound scared about this stuff.

More like tired. If you weren't so religiously defensive about the apparent advent of whatever you're hoping for, you'd know that I have on many occasions stated that artificial intelligence is possible and may even be achieved within current lifetimes, but reiterating and refining the currently hyped "AI" product simply isn't it.

It's like if people were trying to develop rocketry to achieve space travel, but you and yours were smugly stating that this particularly sharp knife will cut the heavens open, just you wait.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Hey there, I've got no stakes here and I don't want to speak for anyone but I think what happened here was QuillCrestFalconer and DPRK_Chopra were simply pointing out that the technology is rapidly evolving, that it's capabilities even just a couple years ago were way less than now, and it appears that it will continue to develop like this. So their point would be that we need to still prepare and anticipate that it may soon advance to the point where employers will be more willing to try to replace real workers with it. I don't think they were implying that this would be a good thing, or that it would be a smart or savvy move, just that it's a possible and maybe even a likely outcome. We've already seen various industries attempt to start doing that with the limited abilities of "AI" already so to me it does seem reasonable to expect them to want to do that more as it gets better. Okay, thanks for reading. 👋

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, the technology is rapidly developing but I am not the only one unconvinced that just piling in more data in the exact same way as it is now is going to 1:1 match biological brains. I'm not saying it is impossible, far from it. I'm saying the current "just spend more energy and produce more carbon waste pile on the data" approach, powered by marketing, isn't likely to produce a generalized artificial intelligence on its own.

Marketing hype being what it is and how it's both misused and even doing a disservice to actual nascent artificial intelligence research, I reject calling the current LLM technology "AI."

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Okay. I am under no illusion that current technology is anywhere near replicating digital brains. I don't think that's what QuillcrestFalconer or DPRK_Chopra were saying either. When we say "replace workers" we mean "replace the functions that those workers do for their employers". We're not talking about making a copy of your coworker Bob, but making a program that does many of the tasks that are currently assigned to Bob in a manner that isn't too much worse than the real guy (from the warped perspective of management and shareholders of course), and anything the machine can't do can be delegated to someone else who gets paid a pittance. That's what we're talking about, nothing about recreating human intellects. I put the term AI in scare quotes in my first comment because I too am well aware that it's a misnomer. But it's the term that everyone knows this technology by (via marketing and such like you said) so it's easy fall back on that term. LLM, or "AI" in scare quotes, I don't think the specific term really matters in this context because we're not talking about true intelligence, but automation of task work that currently is done by paid human employees.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

I put the term AI in scare quotes in my first comment because I too am well aware that it's a misnomer. But it's the term that everyone knows this technology by (via marketing and such like you said) so it's easy fall back on that term.

My primary beef and the main thrust of my argument was exactly that: the primary triumph of "AI" is as a marketing term.

It does a disservice to research and development of generalized artificial intelligence (which I hope won't be such a fucking massive waste of resources and such a massive producer of additional carbon waste and other pollution) by jumping the gun and prematurely declaring that "AI" is already here.

I don't think the specific term really matters in this context

I think it does, unfortunately, if only because of how people already take that misleading label and ride it hard.

we're not talking about true intelligence, but automation of task work that currently is done by paid human employees.

Valid discussion for sure, and I wish it could be pried away from the marketing bullshit because it's really misleading a lot of people, including otherwise educated people that should know better.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Maybe stop ignoring entire fields of research that, to this date, are still figuring out what biological brains are doing and how they are doing them instead of just nodding along to what you already want to believe from people that have blinders for anything outside of their field (computers, in this case).

Well first, brains aren't the only kind of intelligent biological system but they aren't actually trying to 1 for 1 recreate the human brain, or any other brain for that matter, that's just marketing. The generative side of LLM's is what gets the focus in the media but it's really not the most scientifically interesting or what will actually change that much all things considered.

These systems are absolutely fantastic at finding real patterns in chaotic systems. That's where the potential lies.

It's like if people were trying to develop rocketry to achieve space travel, but you and yours were smugly stating that this particularly sharp knife will cut the heavens open, just you wait.

More like trying to go to the moon with a Civil War era rocket, it is early days yet. But progress is insanely quick.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

These systems are absolutely fantastic at finding real patterns in chaotic systems. That's where the potential lies.

No arguments there; my issue is the marketing bullshit that wants to call them 1:1 "artificial intelligence" which is an insult and a dismissal of actual ongoing artificial intelligence research projects.

More like trying to go to the moon with a Civil War era rocket, it is early days yet. But progress is insanely quick.

My metaphor was heavy handed, I know. Maybe I should have said it's like trying to fire a bullet at the moon and just expecting more and more gunpowder to do the trick instead of considering a different approach using chemical propulsion.