alt Hacker NewsI feel like the negativity is mainly due to lack of understanding on how LLMs work under the hood. The more you learn about it, the more you realize that it’s just a glorified autocomplete machine and the reason why it looks so capable is the engineering behind prompt and harness.
Unless there is another breakthrough in model training, I don’t see AI taking over anytime soon. However I do agree that’s it has become another tool, the engineers can use to increase their productivity which is a positive thing
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> the engineers can use to increase their productivity which is a positive thing
This might be the underlying hidden psychology: being more productive and efficient isn't benefitting the working class. It won't make them more money or make them work less hours, it just means overall more work for equal or less pay or less jobs for programmers outright. It doesn't make things cheaper or better, it just translates into more profit to the owning class. Of course nobody can articulate their anxiety's like that in a hyper capitalist society, but that might be the real reason underneath anti ai sentiment.
> glorified autocomplete machine
It is a next token prediction function and it is important to understand the technology accurately based on what it actually is.
What is unique about a next token prediction function though is that every computer program is just a string of instructions. At the theoretical limit a next token prediction function can generate the entire instruction stream (boot loader, OS, application) so a next token prediction function can theoretically generate any computer program, which means that it is a universal predictor for anything that a computer can simulate. Still not AGI/ASI in the woo-woo non-technical interpretations of those terms, but incredibly powerful.