Sounds like planet described in The Naked Sun by Isaac Asimov

Thanks for writing that. It reminds me that there are many things we build and they work (for some definition of work) even though we don't fully understand them.

Did the first people that made fire understand it? You mentioned bridge building. How many bridges have failed for unknown (at the time) reasons? Heck, are we sure that every feature we put into a bridge design is necessary or why it's necessary? Repeat this thought for everything humans have created. Large software projects are difficult to reason about. You'll often find code that works because of a delightfully surprising combination of misunderstandings. When humans try to modify a complex system to solve one problem they almost always introduce new behavior, the law of unintended consequences.

All that being said, we usually don't get anywhere without at least a basic understanding of why doing X leads to Y. The first humans that made fire had probably observed the way fires started before they set out to make their own. Same with bridges and cars and computers.

So yes, you are absolutely correct that nobody fully understands how AI/LLMs work. But also, we kinda do understand. But also also, we're probably at a stage where we are building bridges that are going to collapse, boilers that will explode, or computer programs that are one unanticipated input away from seg faulting.

Government is doing stuff that's awful and whenever people propose solutions to this someone always complains that government "won't be able to get anything done." That's the point! What are you worried about?

"...for the negligible price of occasionally having to look at ads..."

"negligible price" and "occasionally" are outright lies in just that one tiny snippet of this opinion piece. I was going to highlight more, but there are just too many. Read this article if you love examples of private industry using rhetoric techniques straight from 1984

I was genuinely surprised at how much outright dishonesty was in this editorial.

Amazing when it comes to Epstein (and other controversial actions/decisions) how detailed and open minded we are when it comes to someone we liked and supported, and how cut and dry we want things to be when it's someone we don't like.

I don't know, it seems Bill Gates pretty quickly flushed any goodwill he had cultivated with the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation once the Epstein stuff came to light, although views of him before that point were certainly mixed still.

I think the difference with Chomsky is that he is in many ways a modern-day guru with adherents who are naturally resistant to viewing their teacher and leader in a negative light.

Nah, anyone associating with Epstein can get flushed down the toilet. Maybe it's a generational thing.

Let's hope you never wind up in the massive email history of a terrible person because people like you will wish you dead.

If I end up in the massive email history of one of the most vile men in US history, please flush me down the toilet assuming I haven't already heavily invested in the Remington retirement plan

Then be careful to never do anything that is interesting enough or important enough that it will become newsworthy, or write any books or articles on interesting or important topics, or even posting helpful things on social media.

There are a lot of people in Epstein's email history who are there because the above kinds of things caught his interest, and he wanted to discuss or recommend them to others.

Sorry sheikh, busy opening windows in Moscow.

Best I can do is drown you in a bathroom sink around February 2029, not getting dirty toilet water on my good shoes again.

/s

This is so disheartening. Time to short more tech stocks

This author puts to words several thoughts of mine that have been jelling recently. In the end I still seems to miss that AI is totally optional. It's a depressing read because the basic gist is, this AI stuff is weird and depressing and addicting to the point of losing productivity, but I have to use it so here are some ways to try and counter those negatives.

Dude! You don't have to use it!! Just write code yourself. Do a web search if you are stuck, the information is still out there on stack overflow and reddit. Maybe us kagi instead of Google, but the old ways still work really well.

Control over code requires understanding it. That's what letting an LLM wrote everything takes away from you

I see what you mean but I haven’t had an LLM produce code that I didn’t understand or couldn’t follow. Also, if it does it’s pretty easy to ask it to explain it to you. I’ve asked for explanations for ridiculously long lists of tailwind css classes but that’s just a pet peeve really, I mean, I understand what they’re doing.

You what code is? A very detailed specification that drives a deterministic machine. Maybe we don't need to keep giving LLMs more details, maybe we could skip the middle man there

The gravity well's pull toward a management track, or in the very least the desire to align one's sympathies with management, is simply irresistible to some people. Unfortunately I do not think Hacker News is the best venue to discuss solutions to this issue.