I Don't Like "AI" (ian.mccowan.space)

A poem I composed from the section headings:

It's Not "AI" Its Boosters Are Misanthropic The Hype Sucks And It’s Encroachingly Ubiquitous Its Obsequity Is Annoying And Its Prose Is Vapid Its Boosters Don’t Give A Shit About Consent So What Am I Even Fucking Doing Here

Check on all points. Well said. The misanthropic quality was well worth saying early. I hadn't cogitated on that one but I am now.

It stands out to me that people like Hinton aren't boosting and aren't seeking stonks. I suspect he's aghast.

The post can be summarised "I am an old grumpy man. I don't like change. I don't like hype. I don't like people with different values than I have. Let's opposite all change."

Sure, the stuff is bad. You can use the same arguments for any tech: Internet, mobile phones, social media. But for most of the people, the stuff is good. ChatGPT has hundreds of millions of active users. Those users are happy, because it creates enormous value for them.

Yes, autocorrect is also AI. LLMs are more impressive though.

>> 4. I never had any doubt that this would work. GPT is trained on the internet, which is replete with nerds talking about their nerd shit. Nerds love nothing more than to explain things. As evidence, see: this whole-ass web site

::applause::

This post was top 3 in HN. Now shadowbanned. I‘m out.

This is like an extension for https://xkcd.com/1289/ - it works for everything: internet, phones, electricity, tv, etc:

1) Because the thing you are talking about is just rebranded thing that existed 20 years before

2) Because boosters are egocentric drug addicts, pederasts, druglords with crypto stashes, raped their sister, or everything altogether

3) Because it failed to solve MY task

4) Because it can't be more important than a sunshine

5) Because it attacks my intellectual property

Saying that humans are not stochastic parrots because it makes you feel bad isn’t really proof that we aren’t parrots. I’m not saying we are parrots, just that many of the arguments in the post are unfounded vitriol.

Sam Altman saying we are all stochastic parrots says more about him and his view on the world more than anything.