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by _akhe 774 days ago
That's fair, and although I disagree, I at least like that the debate has evolved from doctors vs LLMs to Wikipedia vs LLMs.

When we accept that AI is not replacing knowledge workers, the conversation changes to a more digestible and debatable one: Are LLMs useful tools for experts? And I think the answer will be a resounding: Duh
1 comments
JohnFen 774 days ago
> When we accept that AI is not replacing knowledge workers

I don't accept this, personally. These tools will absolutely be replacing workers of many types. The only questions are which fields and to what degree.

> Are LLMs useful tools for experts?

I didn't think this was a question in play. Of course they can be, once experts figure out how to use them effectively. I thought the question was whether or not the cost/benefit ratio is favorable overall. Personally, I'm undecided on that question because there's not nearly enough data available to do anything but speculate.

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_akhe 774 days ago
> These tools will absolutely be replacing workers of many types

Yeah I agree with that, that's why I specified knowledge workers. I don't think it's bad if cashiers get replaced by self-checkout or if receptionists get replaced by automated agents on either end.

Emergency/police dispatchers - obviously increased sensitivity that makes it a special case, but I still think AI can eventually do the job better than a human.

Driving cars - not yet, at least not outside specific places, but probably eventually, and definitely for known routes.

Teaching yoga - maybe never, as easy as it would be to do, some people might always want an in-person experience with a human teacher and class.

But importantly - most knowledge workers can't be displaced by AI when the work entails solving problems with undocumented solutions that the AI could not have trained on yet, or any work that involves judgment and subjectivity, or that requires a credential (doctor to write the prescription, engineer to sign off on the drawing) or security clearance, authorizations, etc. There's a lot of knowledge work it can't touch.

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JohnFen 774 days ago
> that's why I specified knowledge workers.

I don't think all knowledge workers are immune. Some will be, but companies are going to shed as much payroll as their customers will tolerate.

> I don't think it's bad if cashiers get replaced by self-checkout or if receptionists get replaced by automated agents on either end.

Well, it's bad for those workers. And, personally, I'd consider it bad for me. Having to use self-checkout is a much worse experience than human cashiers. Same with replacing receptionists (and etc.) with automated agents.

When people bring up these uses for LLMs, it sounds to me like they're advocating for a world that I honestly would hate to be a part of as a customer. But that's not really about LLMs as much as it's about increasing the rate of alienation in a world where we're already dangerously alienated from each other.

We need more interpersonal human interactions, not less.

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