Technology

This.

Anyone who looks into this tech properly, beyond sensationalist headlines made to draw readers or outrageous claims to attract investors sees this emperor as the naked illusion that it is.

It's a great tool for what it's good at (generating convincing text outputs). And completely useless at others.

The risk to jobs currently are owners and managers with little to no knowledge trying to actually replace their employees with llms. These are companies setting them selves up for amazing and spectacular failure at this point in the game.

It's impossible to say how this will play out in the long run but currently it's interesting as a research tool, a tool for saving time when writing texts etc etc.

What happens when clever people integrate these models with other systems in intelligent and responsible ways is going to be interesting to follow.

Currently the most important thing to emphasize with AI is that a lot of the coverage and general writing on the subject matter is filled with misconceptions about how the technology works and what it is capable of. It's full on hypecycle season.

I'm currently deep diving into AI and specifically LLMs to strengthen my ability to give respondible advice about it and to explain it in an understandable manner to our bosses and decision makers at work.

There are lots of great deep dives and explainers out there all ready and a few manage to get the fundamentals right without going completely bonkers technical as well.. but the (and I hate using this word as it's being abused way to much) main stream media is not a source with even a grain of propper comprehension when it comes to what this technology is (and perhaps even more important isn't).

This is the video I currently recommended to get a good start at the subject of llms: https://youtu.be/-4Oso9-9KTQ

It is general enough for most people to follow but detailed enough to burst the biggest illusions on the subject.

This is one of the best takes I've seen for a while. LLMs seem like they are the "new Google" in that just searching for information super-charged productivity. Now, instead of using some google fu and having to wade through some links and read, someone can just ask a direct question to an LLM and get a reasonably good answer that may or may not need some work to fix up.

In fact, I've started using GPT to summarize large reports/emails and generate the base code for projects so that I just have to tweak it. It has made work that would take hours or days into an hour or two. Honestly, GPT and Llama have made me a much more productive person. Understanding how to use LLMs to one's advantage is going to be a skill going forward just like how effectively using a search engine is a skill now. It's not a skill that will likely be appreciated (much like how effectively googling isn't), but it will set workers apart.

I beat a Waymo self driving car off the stop sign yesterday instead of respecting its right of way and the passenger in my car with me remarked. I told them it’s because I know and don’t fear AI. It’s going to be protective of itself over taking the intersection, so why not take advantage of that fact. I said something like when Terminator happens and everyone is running around panicking, I’ll be that dude walking around pushing them over because I’m wearing a mask that confuses facial recognition.

Your cynicism isn't properly calibrated.

If you look at the viewpoint of a CEO, you'll see that they would be chomping at the bit to get rid of as many high paying technical or administrative roles as they can; it's not like that extra money is going to flow down the chain.

Now, if there were a threat of LLMs replacing a management position, that would be a different story.

Edit: Apparently my reading comprehension is what needs calibrating. Turns out I agree! My bad.

If the MBA folk had their way the only people with jobs would be MBAs and golf caddies, and those golf caddies would have MBAs from less desirable schools.