Underestimating the complexity of other fields is not mutually exclusive with overestimating the intelligence of others. The real issue is that society is very stratified so smart people are less likely to interact with regular people, especially in circumstances where the intelligence of the regular person could become obvious.
I don’t see there being an insurmountable barrier that would prevent LLMs from doing the things you suggest it cannot. So even assuming you are correct for now I would suggest that LLMs will improve.
My estimations don’t come from my assumption that other people’s jobs are easy, they come from doing applied research in behavioral analytics on mountains of data in rather large data centers.
Most human intelligence is within a fairly narrow band. Most people I’ve ever met have their own unique intelligences. Perhaps it might be good to meet more people without holding the self-looping dichotomy of “smart people” vs “normal people”. In my experience it tends to lead to huge cognitive errors.
As mentioned I’m in the rather unique position to have analyzed the complete browser history for a substantial number of people - I have learned far more than I wished to.
The behaviors of very high IQ people are rather distinct from regular IQ people due to IQ being both largely generic and those genes having other comorbidities. Most obviously is the depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorders. This is so obvious that even regular researchers have uncovered it.
I think what happens to many people is they confuse their desired reality with actual reality by looking at everything through a tinted lens. In being a data scientist in pursuit of actual reality I’ve had my desired reality repeatedly challenged far more than a person not in this industry. My desired reality was that intelligence was more common and I believed that until it was shown to me in data that I was wrong.
What gets me the most about this is how certain you are that because you have some data about people’s browser history you can make these conclusions. I hope age and experience avails you of these notions - there is no master database that will tell you the nature of people. All you have is the data you have - I’m sure there are many interesting insights and confounding results, but it’s foolish to think you can know anyone from a database, or social media.
Genetic comorbidities with IQ? You at least have a lot to learn about mental health as well if you’re using these as examples.
I think it is you who is blinded by your prior biases. It's not that I have 'some data', it was a mountain of data, and it was my full time job to analyze it specifically for behavioral information with a number of other researchers also doing the same, and we'd compare notes with other research orgs in other companies. I have a feeling that I've thought about this topic far more than you have.
At this point we'll just have to agree to disagree.
If you are suggesting that people shouldn't underestimate the difficulty of the jobs of others - my answer is a strong yes. People should strive for accuracy in all cases. But I did suggest that even if true it does not negate my assertion so I am failing to see the relevance. Perhaps I have misunderstood your point.
Sorry, I was rather obscure - you said "My estimations don’t come from my assumption that other people’s jobs are easy, they come from doing applied research in behavioral analytics on mountains of data in rather large data centers."
And so I considered the preceding discussion in light of your last sentence. Which makes it sound like you are saying "I've observed the behavior of people and they're often flawed and foolish, regardless of the high ideals they claim to be striving for and the education they think they have. Therefore, they will do better with ChatGPT as a companion than with a real human being". But that's quite a few words that you may not have intended, for which I apologize!
It wasn't that I observed them being foolish but many behaviors are subtly linked to intelligence and can be combined to create a proxy IQ. It also helps when people search their SAT scores. I noted that the people I typically interact with are much higher IQ than I had expected which incorrectly skewed my believe of the average higher. I noticed that other high IQ individuals were making the same assumptions. I had very much underestimated how little I interact with regular people.
I think we're already finding out that people are doing better with ChatGPT than with their peers, not all peers are created equal, and they can ask ChatGPT things that they cannot ask their peers. I think this trend will continue to the point that most people will prefer discussing things with ChatGPT than with their peers. Given what I know I predict this is a choice many people will make, I'm not passing judgment on that, it's a choice I've also made and I'm fortunate enough to have better peers than most.
> So even assuming you are correct for now I would suggest that LLMs will improve
Yes, and when we can all wear smart glasses the ways we use them will become increasingly influential in our daily lives: a conversational voice assistant that is visually monitoring our surroundings, helping with decision making (including micro decisions), coaching, carrying out our instructions, etc.
I don’t see there being an insurmountable barrier that would prevent LLMs from doing the things you suggest it cannot. So even assuming you are correct for now I would suggest that LLMs will improve.
My estimations don’t come from my assumption that other people’s jobs are easy, they come from doing applied research in behavioral analytics on mountains of data in rather large data centers.