Darth in 3...2..1..
reply
Oh so much fodder in this article..
AI is a serious technology and I'm not smart enough to really understand how it works. I like to believe that I'm smart enough to see hype when I see it. Andreessen wrote this article for two reasons:
  1. He's probably funding a bunch of small AI startups and he's afraid of Open AI encouraging the kind of regulation that might strangle them. Open AI have all the attention right now so they just might succeed.
  2. The guy is a tech bro that got rich from several decades of fiat-funded tech companies that would have been considered a malinvestment in a free market, but thanks to extremely low interest rates managed to do quite well. This bubble is starting to pop, but there is a sliver of hope that the hype around AI might keep inflating it a bit longer. This probably requires calming people down because most people are in a frenzy.
Again, not an expert, but I don't think AI is an existential threat or a panacea. I understand the potential benefits and dangers of AI, I just don't think that any extreme scenarios (curing cancer overnight, extinction-by-superintelligence) are particularly likely.
Still, I'd love to tear into some of his tech bro optimism:
Andreessen says:
"Every child will have an AI tutor that is infinitely patient, infinitely compassionate, infinitely knowledgeable, infinitely helpful."
MudbloodGPT says:
Fuck you, I'm not going to sit my kids down in front of a screen to talk to a chatbot all day. That's a surefire way to raise a bunch of sociopaths. We're not too far away from achieving that with smartphones as it is, no reason to speed it up. Infinitely compassionate? As if we didn't have enough snowflakes! I want my kids to make mistakes, experience the consequences, pick themselves up and do better the next time.

Andreessen says:
"Productivity growth throughout the economy will accelerate dramatically, driving economic growth, creation of new industries, creation of new jobs, and wage growth, and resulting in a new era of heightened material prosperity across the planet."
MudbloodGPT says:
Um... how about a currency that can't be inflated so that I can work my ass off for a few years and then retire to growing tomatoes in my garden because I have provided enough value to others and it can't be eaten away by a greedy government? That technology won't make YOU filthy rich, but it has a feature set that I would really like. I don't want to be on some inflationary treadmill that causes "creation of new jobs," most of which are bullshit anyway.

Andreessen says:
"The creative arts will enter a golden age, as AI-augmented artists, musicians, writers, and filmmakers gain the ability to realize their visions far faster and at greater scale than ever before."
MudbloodGPT says:
Nah dude, we already experienced the golden age, when Jackson Pollock discovered that he can splatter paint on canvas and sell it to some sucker for millions.

Andreessen says:
"I even think AI is going to improve warfare, when it has to happen, by reducing wartime death rates dramatically. Every war is characterized by terrible decisions made under intense pressure and with sharply limited information by very limited human leaders. Now, military commanders and political leaders will have AI advisors that will help them make much better strategic and tactical decisions, minimizing risk, error, and unnecessary bloodshed."
MudbloodGPT says:
As a large language model, I can't condone making war and I cannot provide you with good strategies to defeat your enemy.
Nah, just kidding. See, you didn't even need an AI tutor to become a sociopath.

Andreessen says:
"And this isn’t just about intelligence! Perhaps the most underestimated quality of AI is how humanizing it can be. AI art gives people who otherwise lack technical skills the freedom to create and share their artistic ideas. Talking to an empathetic AI friend really does improve their ability to handle adversity. And AI medical chatbots are already more empathetic than their human counterparts. Rather than making the world harsher and more mechanistic, infinitely patient and sympathetic AI will make the world warmer and nicer."
MudbloodGPT says:
Your prompt makes no sense. It was clearly written by a stochastic parrot without any understanding of the underlying words. How is talking to an empathetic AI friend humanizing?
reply
Freedom will save the world, nothing more nothing less
reply
AI is very smart technology which is created by humans!
reply