[datsci_est_2015]

The obvious meme to invoke here is:

  - AI will solve all of our problems 
  - No not like that!

Are the trillion dollars sloshing around the AI economy well-invested if the refrain is always “you’re holding it wrong”?

So we’re trying to define, through trial and error, what problems “AI” will actually solve, and this paper is one of the many cobblestones on that road.

[endymion-light]

i mean it's more like

"AI can solve this one problem, but it needs X, Y, Z, because it's not a omnipotent god entity"

"I tried it without any of those things and it didn't work - this is worthless tech!"

I don't know if more accurate calorie counting using AI exists - but it's like being upset that the screwdriver isn't gluing wood. AI is far more than frontier LLMs.

[datsci_est_2015]

There are plenty of positions on the spectrum from “omnipotent God entity” and “Casio SL-300SV”. What does the current valuation of LLMaaS companies represent though?

LLMs are certainly not worthless, that’s a strawman in the same way my statement “AI will solve all of our problems” is a strawman. The question of their worth is being explored.

“AI is a black box that can solve problems”. Which problems? How consistently? At what cost? How quickly?

[sleepybrett]

> "AI can solve this one problem, but it needs X, Y, Z, because it's not a omnipotent god entity"

0 advertisements from openai or anthropic say this. They all sell you an omnipotent god entity.

[pertymcpert]

Skill issue in thinking.

[muwtyhg]

In this case, what is the 'X, Y, Z' that the apps are providing that the model is not?

[endymion-light]

Theoretically:

- A queryable large vector database containing calorie counts for specific meals.

- A vision model specifically trained on food images with labelled data containing approximate calorie counts.

- OCR model allowing reading of barcodes + calorie information.

A model trained to ask for additional context & information (e.g for pasta - please provide a photo of the original sauce tin/ect), (please approximate the weight of X meat)

I don't know how accurate integrating all of those aspects would be - and you could argue the end user would probably be incredibly annoyed and it wouldn't be a good app - but I'd argue you'd at least need that if you're developing an app for diabetes management.