| >People’s susceptibility to anthropomorphizing an even slightly convincing computer program has been known since ELIZA, one of the first chatbots, in 1966. It’s called the ELIZA effect. I'm tired of these arguments. Very very few people are anthropomorphizing chatgpt.. very few. The majority of people both technical and non technical who have played with chatGPT in a non trivial way are aware of the chatbots limitations. It's like recognizing a crazy person on the street. Humans are well equipped for that. This argument characterizes the average person as some kind of stupid buffoon as if he/she can't tell chatGPT really screws shit up. Sure there are a few gullible outliers but as a generality his claim is simply completely false. Pretty much everyone and I mean everyone is aware about the limitations of LLMs. This is a weak and repeated trope that's being regurgitated as if the critics are LLMs themselves. Let me specify exactly what's going on. People who are afraid of/support AI are more speaking to the potential of AI. Why? Because just as much as this thing hallucinates about half the time it answers a complex question with an equally complex and correct answer and that answer in isolation is often indistinguishable or even at times superior to a humans answer. Yes we know it hallucinates and forgets shit. This is obvious, no need to readdress an obvious weakness that everyone is aware about. If critics want to have a real discussion then they seriously need to address the actual strengths and phenomenons of LLMs instead of repeatedly highlighting the obvious weaknesses. Because while we have somewhat of an explanation for the hallucinations we currently don't know how chatGPT was able to do something like this: https://www.engraved.blog/building-a-virtual-machine-inside/ Read to the end of you haven't seen this. The ending is what is quite unexplainable by experts. You can't just trivialize that entire post as if it was just a statistical phenomenon. There's obviously an alternative angle here. |
The technology behind LLMs probably does have some interesting and valuable applications. But look at the hype and follow the money with a skeptical eye. If so-called AI does or will soon deliver real benefits then why all of the hype around it? Show, don't tell, and especially don't tell stories based on possible future advances or breakthroughs.
Future editions of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds will have long chapters about crypto and AI. If you think most people understand the tech and its limitations and don't act according to gullibility, ignorance, and greed that book should disabuse you.