I may regret this at some point, but I felt the need to put down in writing how I feel about this moment in the tech industry.
It is not kind. You may well be insulted by it. If you are... then you really should question yourself.
garfieldtech.com/blog/selfish-…
#AI #LLM #Programming
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William Whitlow
in reply to Larry Garfield • • •Thank you for quantifying the various aspects that it takes to keep AI running. It’s one of those details that is becoming increasingly apparent, but difficult to grasp the scope.
Would you care to elaborate on the “This is how societies die.” comment? Is that primarily in the sense of social apathy? In the lack of respect for others/foresight over long term consequences? The disruptive tactics of numerous tech companies that have eliminated many norms? Or something else?
Larry Garfield
in reply to William Whitlow • • •All of the above.
Major empires aren't destroyed from without, but by their own greed, infighting, and incompetence.
In this case, the "it is what it is" attitude is unworthy of someone in a democracy. That's how the billionaires and pedo-fascists were able to take over.
Then add short-sightedness about global warming for the last 50 years, and AI is just the latest part of it. That will kill us all. "It is what it is."
Derick Rethans
in reply to Larry Garfield • • •I think the societal aspect goes further than that. Because we are ending up not teaching anything person to person any more.
Take StackOverflow. Although there were often simple questions (and answers) with little thought, there was also a large amount of great questions, with equally great answers — so detailed that you learned the actual basics. This is now gone due to AI.
LLMs have only learned old content from there, anything newly created projects won't even be thought.
El Duvelle
in reply to Derick Rethans • • •toni
in reply to El Duvelle • • •El Duvelle
in reply to toni • • •Derick Rethans
in reply to El Duvelle • • •Newest 'xdebug' Questions
Stack Overflowkrig
in reply to Larry Garfield • • •El Duvelle
in reply to krig • • •I have the same question.. Why would you have to use the "AI" coding tools? I'm not in the coding industry so I'm probably missing something
Lars Marowsky-Brée 😷
in reply to El Duvelle • • •@elduvelle @krig Because companies have made "AI adoption rates" part of the corporate goals, and thus resisting / opposing it is an actual job-loss level risk.
Some individuals can take it, or are principled enough to; not everyone can, especially those marginalized and/or with care obligations.
El Duvelle
in reply to Lars Marowsky-Brée 😷 • • •But, prospective employers don't need to know what techniques you use to do your coding, right? If you plan your code architecture with pen and paper, or use a genAI to plan it (...) isn't the output the thing that matters: is the code well-written, does it work, is it well documented and easy to update / fix?
Could you just lie and say that you use genAI if it makes them happy, but actually not use it, would they even see the difference?
Lars Marowsky-Brée 😷
in reply to El Duvelle • • •@elduvelle @krig Employers do measure and observe AI use. You're often required to not *only* use company approved tools (for compliance reasons), but to *use* company approved tools.
They *would* know.
Being caught in a lie would also not be great.
(And there's the unfortunate fact that, for certain applications and subjects, GenAI *is* a productivity boost, so one would fall behind in an externally observable manner.)
Stephen John Anderson
in reply to El Duvelle • • •El Duvelle
in reply to Stephen John Anderson • • •@larsmb @krig @Crell
Larry Garfield
in reply to El Duvelle • • •Justin Macleod
in reply to krig • • •krig
in reply to Justin Macleod • • •Justin Macleod
in reply to krig • • •krig
in reply to Justin Macleod • • •Larry Garfield
in reply to krig • • •Quoting the article: "But, at this point, it's become obvious that I have to either compromise on that, or leave tech entirely. And every time I think about that, I get angry."
Every time someone else says "it is what it is," it makes it harder for me NOT to. *That* is the problem. Every "it is what it is" forces me to choose between my daughter's present and my daughter's future, which is an agonizing choice.