[visarga]

While I agree with your sentiment regarding ML engineers - they are just another kind of devs, and that's where it will go - I think DL is not just a tool like any other from the software toolbox. It's more like a paradigm changer, like the print, the engine, electricity, communication and computing. It tends to eat the world.

[s1t5]

> It's more like a paradigm changer, like the print, the engine, electricity, communication and computing.

Either we really disagree about deep learning, or you vastly underestimate the influence of the other technologies that you've listed.

[mattkrause]

I'd maybe buy it if you broadened the claim to "quantification" or something. It's undoubtedly true that aggressively collecting and analyzing data has transformed society a lot: Taylorism, mass production, bureaucracies, science (not just data), even Guinness. However, this has been going on for ~150 years already.

As for deep learning specifically...meh.

[_bxg1]

That's exactly what I'm arguing against: I think the "eating the world" part is a hype-cycle. I think DL has truly revolutionized a handful of very narrow cases - computer vision and speech recognition/synthesis, for example - but that people are vastly over-estimating how "paradigm-changing" it actually is.

[visarga]

Take just computer vision alone. It has applications in manufacturing, robotics, SDCs, medical scans, cartography, agriculture, and many others. It's like the motor - a universal tool.

[Jack000]

yes, but reliable facial recognition alone has huge social implications, never mind all the other potential applications for cognitive automation.