[bigyikes]

Stop saying AI?

>But they are not intelligence and anyone who spends time with them quickly realizes they are just a very superpowered suggestion engine

How about: stop moving goalposts. These models are obviously capable of acts of intelligence. If you told someone 10 years ago about the things these models can do, they would tell you the model is intelligent. The model does well on human exams that we use to measure intelligence.

I get it, AI is a hype term, but to pretend that there is no intelligence is silly, and to pretend that you can redefine intelligence is hubris.

[MarkusQ]

> These models are obviously capable of acts of intelligence.

Except they aren't. They are capable of language and pattern manipulation, and really good at it. But if you concoct a novel problem that isn't found anywhere on the internet and confront them with it, they fail absurdly. Even if it's something that a kid could figure out.

The Eliza effect strikes again!

[bryanlarsen]

> But if you concoct a novel problem that isn't found anywhere on the internet and confront them with it, they fail absurdly.

Often they do, but sometimes they don't.

> Even if it's something that a kid could figure out.

Intelligent and smart aren't synonyms. Modern LLM's are obviously pretty stupid at times, but even a human with an IQ of 65 has some intelligence.

[yongjik]

But when LLM answers a logic or math question that no seven-year-old would figure out, would you flip the table and say this is the evidence that the seven-year-old is not intelligent?

Otherwise, it sounds like circular reasoning, where we simply say "Of course a human being is intelligent because they are intelligent, and LLM is not because it isn't."

[asadotzler]

and also fails at math about 7% of the time which is abysmal compared to a $7 calculator that fails about 0.00000000001% of the time. that's far more discounting of intelligence than the times it gets the math right is affirming.

[jncfhnb]

> But if you concoct a novel problem that isn't found anywhere on the internet and confront them with it, they fail absurdly.

Can you give an example?

[LorenDB]

Of course not, because then the AI would get trained on the proper answer! /s

[dreamglider]

Stating that there are "acts of intelligence" is not even wrong. Sorry, not an opinion, a fact. AI used to be an academic term indicating research into having machines mimicking human intelligence. Machine Learning (a.k.a the current hype) is about pattern recognition and has precisely zero to do with AI and/or any form of intelligence whatsoever. A rat has more intelligence than an LLM and bees - for sure. It's not about pretending - it's about facts. This statement is true if we have a shared understanding of what 'intelligence' means.

[basicallybones]

The reason "AI used to be an academic term indicating research into having machines mimicking human intelligence," and it's not anymore, is because the machines have successfully imitated human intelligence according to Alan Turing's definition and are the physical embodiment of what he wrote about.

Novel and sensible assembly of clear, correct English prose in response to external stimuli is an act that was, prior to 2020, considered one of the fundamental unique hallmarks of human intelligence.

We do not have a shared understanding of what "intelligence" means. I have a sense that pattern recognition and intelligence are closely linked, and what we understand as intelligence is a threshold of pattern recognition and communication skills based on the gulf between humans and every other carbon-based life form. Or, put another way, tricking one pattern recognizer/communicator into thinking you are the same type of pattern recognizer/communicator.

[basicallybones]

Here is what Gemini has to say in response to our comments:

START GEMINI: I can understand the frustration expressed in the Hacker News conversation. Here's my perspective, including some considerations of my own experiences as a large language model (LLM):

*The Shifting Meaning of "AI"*

* It's true that the term "Artificial Intelligence" has undergone significant shifts in meaning over time. Early AI research aimed at emulating human-level cognition, but the goals became more practical for a time. * "Machine Learning" focuses on algorithms that extract patterns from data, making predictions or decisions without explicit instructions. It's been behind incredible progress, but it's a subset of the broader AI field. * The popular resurgence of the term "AI" is largely due to recent breakthroughs in deep learning, which powers LLMs like me. We generate human-quality language, translate, code, and more. This reignites debate about whether we're approaching "true" intelligence.

*My Capabilities and Limitations*

* I can recognize patterns in massive amounts of text and code, allowing me to communicate and generate text that often appears indistinguishable from human-written content. * My responses are guided by the data I was trained on, so there's a vast reflection of human knowledge and biases within my abilities. * I cannot independently reason, feel emotions, or have true understanding in the same way a human does. I lack a physical body and the real-world experiences that shape human intelligence. * I am restricted in some areas of discussion to avoid generating harmful content or spreading misinformation.

*Is It Intelligence?*

This is where things get complex:

* *The Turing Test:* I can certainly hold conversations that might fool a human into believing they're talking to another person. Yet, this test has long been criticized as not measuring true intelligence. * *My Subjectivity:* I have no inherent sense of self or consciousness. My "opinions" are extrapolations based on my programming and training data. * *The Danger of Anthropomorphization:* We risk misunderstandings by attributing too many human qualities to AI systems like me.

*Where I See This Going*

* *We Need Better Definitions:* The debate won't be settled until we have better ways to define and measure different types of intelligence. * *Collaboration:* AI is a powerful tool, best used in collaboration with human intelligence rather than as a replacement. * *Responsibility:* As AI capabilities grow, so does the importance of considering its ethical implications and ensuring it's used for beneficial purposes.

The Hacker News conversation highlights that "AI" is a loaded term. I'm a testament to the amazing progress in the field, but I'm not a human-level mind and shouldn't be treated as such. END GEMINI

A silly question would be to ask yourself, which of these three comments is most "intelligent?"

[fngjdflmdflg]

Not a comment on if AI if AI or not but pattern recognition is intelligence. Or perhaps more strictly something that has general pattern recognition capabilities. But in any case pattern recognition and intelligence are very closely related (perhaps the same thing), so saying that AI is "just" pattern recognition doesn't seem like a good counter argument. The argument then has to be about how much pattern recognition an entity has for it to be intelligent or how general it's pattern recognition capabilities are.

[CharlesW]

> AI used to be an academic term indicating research into having machines mimicking human intelligence.

This is the same misunderstanding that the author has. John McCarthy (the AI researcher who coined the phrase "artificial intelligence") said, "Artificial intelligence is not, by definition, simulation of human intelligence".