[visarga]

> I think both of these views can be true at the same time: ChatGPT (or, LLMs really) are revolutionary and they won't revolutionize the world the way technologists/researchers say.

Yes, because people think that LLMs are almost AGI based on the social media reactions and can't imagine they still have unknown/unsolved problems. But if we take a look at the 14 years of self driving car development, it becomes clear how AI can be both amazing and not good enough at the same time.

[Paul-Craft]

> Yes, because people think that LLMs are almost AGI....

Surprise, surprise... this has happened before:

> Lay responses to ELIZA were disturbing to Weizenbaum and motivated him to write his book Computer Power and Human Reason: From Judgment to Calculation, in which he explains the limits of computers, as he wants to make clear his opinion that the anthropomorphic views of computers are just a reduction of the human being and any life form for that matter.[29] In the independent documentary film Plug & Pray (2010) Weizenbaum said that only people who misunderstood ELIZA called it a sensation.[30]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA#Response_and_legacy

And, it's easy to see why. You can talk the damn thing, and it talks back! People love to anthropomorphize things, anyway, but if you can talk to it and it talks back, people think there's got to be something to it.

This time, though, is a little different. GPT-3 and GPT-4 actually do behave like they understand natural language to a great extent. That makes them directly analogous to Searle's Chinese room construct, and suggests that they could actually pass the Turing test (if suitably fine-tuned).

This is great, because, as you say, it's amazing. But I also think it's not good enough, because the fact that GPT-4 may be able to pass the Turing test really says more to me about the limitations of the Turing test than anything else. Likewise with the Chinese room analogy: we know what's in the box, and we know it shouldn't be trusted.

But, you're not going to get that kind of analysis from the general public.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_room

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_test

[spacebanana7]

LLMs are different from self driving cars in that they can be useful even when they make wrong decisions occasionally. Copilots, document drafting (legal, copy, etc) and summarisation are useful services that people and enterprises are currently enjoying.

[cl42]

AVs have also struggled with regulatory muddle, which is partly my point.

Self-driving is very possible in many situations and if there was a "Manhattan Project" for self-driving to be up and running by 2025 I think we could do it... But there are so many vested interests that this won't happen.

... and then everyone is disappointed.

BTW, I'm not saying this is all bad... Everyone asking for a 6-month AI research moratorium gets it indirectly via societal inertia and regulatory muddle!