[dspillett]

> And for blockchain... it was launched with the promise of decentralized currency.

Cryptocurrencies were launched with that promise.

They are but one use¹ of block-chains / merkle-trees, which existed long before them².

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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkle_tree#Uses

[2] 1982 for blockchains/trees as part of a distributed protocol as people generally mean when they use the words now³, hash chains/trees themselves go back at least as far as 1979 when Ralph Merkle patented the idea

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockchain#History

[nottorp]

But if you put it that way neural networks were defined in the 70s too :)

[dspillett]

Very much so. Is there a problem with that? To what time period would attribute their creation?

In fact it is only the 70s if you mean networks that learn via backprop & similar methods. Some theoretical work on artificial neurons was done in the 40s.

[nottorp]

The point is whatever you said in defense of blockchain/crypto applies or does not apply to neural networks/LLMs in equal measure.

I for one fail to see the difference between these two kinds of snake oil.

> Some theoretical work on artificial neurons was done in the 40s.

"The perceptron was invented in 1943 by Warren McCulloch and Walter Pitts. The first hardware implementation was Mark I Perceptron machine built in 1957"

[dspillett]

> whatever you said in defense of blockchain/crypto

You seem to be labouring under the impression that blockchain and cryptocurrencies are one in the same. The point you seem to be missing is that I'm saying they are not the same. Blockchains (usually actually trees like merkle trees) are a thing that has existed long before cryptocurrencies which are one application of technique.

> I for one fail to see the difference between these two kinds of snake oil.

The gaggle of quackish sales people with miracle cures based on LLMs is pretty much the same sort of quackish sales people that touted miracle cures based on crypto currencies, yes. But LLMs are one use of neural networks and crypto/proof-of-work is one use of blockchains.

This all started with me correcting “And for blockchain... it was launched with the promise of decentralized currency.” — which is the incorrect equivalency of blockchain/cryptocurrency writ large.

> > Some theoretical work on artificial neurons was done in the 40s.

> "The perceptron was invented in 1943 by Warren McCulloch and Walter Pitts.

Exactly. You've just repeated my sentence with a little more detail.

40s: theory

50s: attempts at practical implementation

early 70s: backprop methods (as we currently mean the term wrt neural networks, backpropagation as a more general concept existed before that) first published, starting that decades' big excitement over the potential for neural networks.