[adamisom]

Of course he was lucky, you should expect that in general for well-known people because selection pressures that led you to hear of them, vs not hear of them, are likely to involve luck.

That is not at all a slam dunk argument. It’s barely anything.

[janalsncm]

Well unless you’re claiming the same luck that led to Hinton’s fame will lead to his accuracy on the much broader and less constrained topic of the relationship between automated systems and society, I don’t see how it’s not something.

My main point wasn’t to undermine Hinton by saying he was lucky. I did do that and I stand by it. But my main point was to say that to a large degree the future on this issue is unknowable because it depends on so many crucial yet undetermined factors. And there’s nothing you could know about backpropagation, neural networks, or computer science in general which could resolve those questions.

[0xB31B1B]

All people on the leading edge of big things have benefited from a huge amount of luck, and there were likely 100s of other folks on the leading edge of other potential breakthroughs that didn't happen, each of whom were equally capable in terms of raw problem solving ability or IQ. The difference is that when you get the chance to ride the wave, and you and ride it for 10, 15, 20 years, it gives you a significantly different and improved set of experiences, expertise, and problem solving ability than the folks who never had that shot but were still capable. The magic is partly that he was smart, partly that he was lucky, and also partly that the experience of pushing the field forward for 20 years and the field following you brings you something that very few others have and that is in fact very valuable.