These experts on AI are here to help us understand important things about AI.
Who are these generous, helpful experts that the CBC found, you ask?
“Dr. Muhammad Mamdani, vice-president of data science and advanced analytics at Unity Health Toronto”, per LinkedIn a PharmD, who also serves in various AI-associated centres and institutes.
“(Jeff) Macpherson is a director and co-founder at Xagency.AI”, a tech startup which does, uh, lots of stuff with AI (see their wild services page) that appears to have been announced on LinkedIn two months ago. The founders section lists other details apart from J.M.'s “over 7 years in the tech sector” which are interesting to read in light of J.M.'s own LinkedIn page.
Other people making points in this article:
C. L. Polk, award-winning author (of Witchmark).
“Illustrator Martin Deschatelets” whose employment prospects are dimming this year (and who knows a bunch of people in this situation), who per LinkedIn has worked on some nifty things.
“Ottawa economist Armine Yalnizyan”, per LinkedIn a fellow at the Atkinson Foundation who used to work at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.
Could the CBC actually seriously not find anybody willing to discuss the actual technology and how it gets its results? This is archetypal hood-welded-shut sort of stuff.
Things I picked out, from article and round table (before the video stopped playing):
Does that Unity Health doctor go back later and check these emergency room intake predictions against actual cases appearing there?
Who is the “we” who have to adapt here?
AI is apparently “something that can tell you how many cows are in the world” (J.M.). Detecting a lack of results validation here again.
“At the end of the day that’s what it’s all for. The efficiency, the productivity, to put profit in all of our pockets”, from J.M.
“You now have the opportunity to become a Prompt Engineer”, from J.M. to the author and illustrator. (It’s worth watching the video to listen to this person.)
Me about the article:
I’m feeling that same underwhelming “is this it” bewilderment again.
Me about the video:
Critical thinking and ethics and “how software products work in practice” classes for everybody in this industry please.
LLMs are godawful at obscure languages. not sure how many devs working on non-legacy projects are “the guy who knows whatever semi obscure language” though given how focused the industry is on choosing tech stacks based on dev availability. so I guess your threat is directed towards the legacy projects I’m not doing, or the open source shit I’m doing on my own time in the obscure languages I prefer? cause if there’s one thing I need in my off time it’s a torrent of garbage, unreviewable PRs
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That’s well put!
I keep thinking/worrying in terms of how I use chatgpt vs what people think chatgpt can accomplish on its own.
To me, I feel like I’ve been given a supercharger and can handle way more than before by easily double checking syntax of better functions. But if people are relying on chatgpt to code chunks for them, god help them.
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I dunno, I do think these LLMs are objectively different and more comprehensive than any IDEA or resource. I don’t search for an answer, I just ask a question and get pretty much exactly what I need right away, rather than hunting through resources trying to find the right thing.
To each their own but I’m pretty sure if I can do more work much faster than before, others can too. Unless this creates additional work, I imagine this means fewer devs needed in total. Admittedly, I am a pessimist.
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If those were to happen, probably not. Thus far in the almost 10 months of use, I’ve had zero issues.
Possibly but with the ridiculous investments into the field recently, and thr fact that most nations are seeing the field as a strategic competition, I wouldn’t want to bet against AI.
Aaaah, the ‘ole Heaps Of Currency Will Definitely Solve it argument
I’ll never tire of hearing it lapping on the shores, its dulcet lack of understanding reverberating across the scene of sensibility
You should go into VC when you give up on programming - you’d fit into that crowd
it’s weird how the folks who loudly insist their AI bubble hype looks nothing like their previous cryptocurrency bubble hype then immediately revert to crypto arguments without acknowledging it. there’s the classic “there’s so much investment in
dogecoinChatGPT bro how could it go wrong” and of course the asshole programmer classic “it works on my machine/in my editor”, a good stand-in for “bro I already got my lambo, you must be doing bitcoins wrong”. as always, the real innovation in the crypto space was realizing mediocre tech folks are the easiest marks in the world, and when the very same folks at the top went into selling LLMs, they sure as fuck kept that lesson close to heartI’m reminded of people who have, at every major industrial change, scoffed and said it’ll never work.
https://magicvalley.com/news/local/hidden-history-cars-will-not-replace-horses/article_6aca2040-e98a-5fcb-832b-a9be92238417.html
But hey, if you want to insist that your job is completely irreplaceable and plan accordingly, go ahead! It didn’t work for the weavers or more recently, factory workers in middle America but this time, you might just be right! At least, you hope so!