The worst externalities of AI (mass social disinformation/manipulation) were already realized years ago with the Facebook algorithmic feed. Producing content wasn’t the limiting factor; AI-enabled algorithmic targeting to maximize ad revenue without any consideration for negative externalities has already eroded civil society.
I feel that the article draws a false equivalence between skepticism and doomsaying. If anything, thinking AI is as dangerous as a nuclear weapon signals a true believer.
I distinctly remember multiple big companies quietly letting go of their AI ethics teams in 2023 around the same time the LLM craze started to pick up real steam.
I don’t think the skeptics disappeared, they just got drowned out with all the added noise that came with the new LLM hype cycle.
Yes. I’m an AI skeptic. And I’m quiet. Because AI is the single best thing that ever happened to my consulting business.
Vibe coding generates an infinite stream of „companies“ with proven business model and market fit and obviously unmaintainable, buggy, and impossible to scale software. But once there’s profits and their life depends on that pile of vibe-coded AI vomit continuing to work, they are happy to pay through the nose for a rewrite by experienced human coders. AI might ruin the job market for beginners, but the market for experts is exploding.
So why would I loudly complain about AI? It’s buggy as hell, but from my point of view, that’s a major upside.
I think a large amount of AI skeptics are just tired. I'm what you would call in the AI skeptic camp and the most I'll contribute to in person conversations anymore is feigned indifference towards the topic or something along the lines of "Oh, I haven't really been keeping up with AI news lately."
For me personally (and maybe for others as well?) there's two parts to this. The first is that it's exhausting to constantly be pulled into "debates" with staunch pro-AI supporters who can't accept that you have some reason to be against it or agree to disagree and move on from the conversation. The second is that I've noticed that even mild anti-AI sentiment lately seems to make people (especially tech people) see and treat you as an anti-science luddite or conspiracy theorist.
It's easier to just pretend I don't care or that I'm not interested in public than be a skeptic.
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[ 2.5 ms ] story [ 46.1 ms ] threadWe realized that AI isn't as smart as we feared and the real danger lies in the management believing the AI companies ads.
I don’t think the skeptics disappeared, they just got drowned out with all the added noise that came with the new LLM hype cycle.
Vibe coding generates an infinite stream of „companies“ with proven business model and market fit and obviously unmaintainable, buggy, and impossible to scale software. But once there’s profits and their life depends on that pile of vibe-coded AI vomit continuing to work, they are happy to pay through the nose for a rewrite by experienced human coders. AI might ruin the job market for beginners, but the market for experts is exploding.
So why would I loudly complain about AI? It’s buggy as hell, but from my point of view, that’s a major upside.
Plenty of comment sections with reasonable skeptical takes, they’re just not good headline fodder.
For me personally (and maybe for others as well?) there's two parts to this. The first is that it's exhausting to constantly be pulled into "debates" with staunch pro-AI supporters who can't accept that you have some reason to be against it or agree to disagree and move on from the conversation. The second is that I've noticed that even mild anti-AI sentiment lately seems to make people (especially tech people) see and treat you as an anti-science luddite or conspiracy theorist.
It's easier to just pretend I don't care or that I'm not interested in public than be a skeptic.
Nietzsche, probably speaking about IA