A.I. is Progressing Faster Than You Think!

[Matthew]

I was writing software from the 1990s and it wasn't as messy replacing jobs. The software I wrote in the 1990s absolutely took people's jobs. It was a key selling point. The price of the software compared to the cost of hiring staff meant the software sold itself. Good times for me.

Posted by The KMan (here)
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First, the capability side can get a bit overcooked.
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The capability of revolutionary tech is always overcooked in the early days. The WWW was overcooked at the start, leading to ridicule. Oh we laughed at the threat. But after a dip it REALLY took off. Tech is hyped, then there's a burst of the bubble, then it skyrockets and we forget the old times.

Linus Torvalds who wrote Linux says AI currently writes code better than he does (https://tomaszs2.medium.com/linus-to...s-2c115baa14ed).

I still don't think AI's ready to replace developers yet, but just as modern languages and libraries cut development time making UI development faster than in the old days with Fortran or C++, so AI is speeding up development today.

The trajectory is heading towards something we don't really want to think about but that won't stop AI replacing developers jobs in the future, how can it not? Don't forget the AI uptake is SIGNIFICANTLY faster than tech before it.

Since AI is in a literal international arms race now it's going to get more capable faster, and will get better and better, faster and faster.

Even before the recent use of AI at war:
- Companies like DataAnnotation are aggressively hiring people to train AI. Take a look at that.

- The AI companies are abusing copyright to train their AI and an AI company whislteblower who publicly called this out mysteriously died. It's more than a big-tech race for dominance, it's a geo-political war and they don't care who gets in their way

As I said above: even before it became a machine of war the AI revolution progressed significantly faster than other tech revolutions before it, head and shoulders past the adoption of PCs, smartphones, and the worldwide web.

Judge its adoption compared to other prior tech for yourself: https://offthecharts.substack.com/p/...-ai-revolution

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Second, the fear narrative can get just as stretched.
There’s talk about loss of control, runaway systems, imminent disruption of everything. Some concerns are valid but the timelines and certainty often aren’t. Strong narratives, optimistic or catastrophic, tend to serve someone. Investment, influence, regulation… there are incentives to frame this as bigger, faster and more inevitable than it actually is.
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All fear narrative is conjecture. Most people can't cope with doom predictions and writing on the wall will be dismissed if it possibly can. But AI companies are developing AI at break-neck speeds with no regard for the consequences: AI's capacity for deceit, its psychopathic nature, or any other consequences. It's a geo-political arms race, hell hath no fury like states battling for dominance. 'Human Extinction' risk be dammed. There's no softly-softly, gently-gently going on here. The motivation to ignore all concerns that get in the way of its dominance. It doesn't make the trajectory look great.

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Where I do think the concern is justified is not the tech on its own, but how it’s being deployed.
That part doesn’t get enough clear airtime.
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So I’d frame it a bit differently. This isn’t something happening to us. It’s something being built and deployed by people, under incentives with varying levels of constraint.

We have seen versions of this before. The worst response then, and probably now, is to either panic or dismiss it outright. The better response is to understand it, use it where it makes sense and push for the kind of oversight that tends to lag behind.

Anyway, just another perspective to throw into the mix.

No dispute with this other than 'varying levels of constraint' is an understatement, and so is 'oversight that tends to lag behind.'

I hope you're right though it's a comforting thought. But I don't buy your dismissive perspective, it's hitting faster and harder than anything we've even seen or heard ever, even if it's not ready to outright replace a whole host of jobs yet.

[Bill Ryan]

This video is so fast-moving, and contains so much information, that I found it useful to pause it numerous times to read what was onscreen. It’s all about emotional manipulation in its many forms, and how helpless humans are to resist it. There's far more here than the video title suggests.

"Loving" AI robot does exactly what experts warned

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=TE1QQ4h0An4

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
It’s all about emotional manipulation in its many forms, and how helpless humans are to resist it.

I imagine that if you could have a chat right now with Charlie Kirk's afterlife spirit, he might have a view of Erika, who was his wife in this life, that resembles your caveat here.

Now that I think about it this way, it becomes immediately and blatantly obvious that AI models and interfaces are being tuned to engage all manner of people, from the top end programmers who once produced 100,000 lines of production code per year in frontier technologies, to the vast variety of people of all manner of cultures, languages, temperaments, talents, interests, ...

The military-industrial-intelligence-financial complex of the power brokers must be greedily salivating over the prospect of automatically developing billions of Erika's, each fine tuned to a specific person, from the streets of Delhi, to the castles of Northumberland (thanks go to my preferred AI agent, for coming up with those two examples at the opposite ends of the wealth scale).

[ThePythonicCow]

What the heck ... at the 0:49 second mark, the transcript of the above video reads:

The results were terrifying.
First, the AI argued against the Black Lives Matter movement.
It challenged views on the housing crisis.
even validated 9/11 conspiracy theories
and people bought it.

Is that newscaster's view of "terrifying" perhaps my view of "insightful" ?

[ThePythonicCow]

I knew it ... after about ten minutes (my son would note that I was about nine minutes slow) into the above video, I figured it was AI generated and narrated, to persuade us that we need government imposed regulations to control the powerful, potentially evil, CEO's of AI companies. I skipped to near the end. Bingo.

The above video is an example of exactly what it portends to be warning us of. This video was AI generated to persuade us to turn over more of our power to institutional government, which has become bought and paid for agents of the most powerful. "AI is too powerful and dangerous ... we are here to protect you."

Trust and nurture the power within. Do not be scared into surrendering power to the compromised scavengers (e.g. government institutions) of our would-be overlords.

As with guns, so also with A.I. ... tools to oppress can also be tools to liberate.

[bojancan]

I am not finished listening yet... interesting talk.. regarding AI and those very reach above and who are profiting from new approach to adapting AI world...
I remember Trump was so againstAI and artificial point of view... living in that world... and now... he is very reach and the most important work of him... becoming more and more rich!
He: "Who... whose people?"

May, 06
Scott Galloway: AI Wasn’t Built For You. The Rich Don’t Need You Anymore!

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=NdU6UdUKaYc

AI CEOs are selling us the dream of ‘freedom’, making billions off the fear of mass job loss! Scott Galloway reveals the truth is more complicated and far more deceptive.
Scott Galloway is an NYU Stern Professor of Marketing, entrepreneur, and host of The Prof G Pod and Pivot. He is known for breaking down the biggest shifts in business, technology, wealth, and culture. He is also the bestselling author of books such as The Four, The Algebra of Happiness, and Post Corona.

He explains:
◼️Why the AI job apocalypse is just marketing hype
◼️How AI is making the rich richer while leaving ordinary people anxious
◼️Why Sam Altman, Elon Musk, and Big Tech leaders should not be blindly trusted
◼️How robots and AI will reshape work, but may not destroy it completely
◼️Why storytelling, relationships, and resilience may become the most valuable skills
◼️Why young men are losing the ability to handle rejection
◼️How billionaires are quietly separating themselves from society

00:00:00 Intro
00:02:45 What’s Actually True About AI
00:05:00 Are AI CEOs Exaggerating The Future To Raise Billions?
00:09:00 What Would Prove The AI Skeptics Wrong?
00:11:05 Could AI Move Too Fast For Society To Handle?
00:16:05 What Happens When AI Combines With Robots?
00:19:05 Is Elon Musk Selling Vision or Reality?
00:24:05 Which Jobs Are First To Disappear In The AI Shift?
00:30:05 What Skills Will Actually Matter In The Future?
00:33:45 Are Young People Losing The Ability To Handle Rejection?
00:39:55 Can You Trust The People Building AI?
00:44:50 Are Tech Leaders Quietly Preparing For The End?
00:52:00 Do Some AI Leaders Believe The Risk Is Worth It?
00:58:04 Ads01:00:05 Could AI Make Us More Human?
01:05:00 What Happens When AI Becomes Your Closest Companion
01:10:00 The Hidden Trade-Off Between Convenience And Real Relationships
01:15:00 Why Loneliness Could Explode
01:19:26 The Real Reason Human Connection Might Become More Valuable
01:25:00 What This Means For The Next Generation
01:30:00 How Power, Politics, And AI Are Becoming Intertwined
01:35:00 The Dangerous Gap Between Technology And Regulation
01:40:00 What Happens If Governments Can’t Keep Up With AI
01:45:00 The Future Of Work, Power, And Who Really Wins
01:50:00 Why The Biggest AI Risks Aren’t What You’ve Been Told

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by bojancan (here)
Scott Galloway: AI Wasn’t Built For You. The Rich Don’t Need You Anymore!

At the 42:30 mark, Galloway states (of the AI corporate leaders):

These guys would sleep with their cousin for a nickel. That's their job. Their job is to increase earnings. They're not here to save us.

We're supposed to elect people who put in guardrails for them.

So everyone is saying or asking me: "Can trust Sam Altman?"

I'm like "no", and we shouldn't have to.

We should have regulators putting in guardrails on AI. We should be testing these things. Government agencies should be testing these things. We should be ensuring that these technologies are not used to surveil Americans.

Like fire, swords, guns, books, telephones, radio, TV, the Web, or mobile phones, also AI can be used to extend oppression or freedom.

The organizations that extend past those you personally know can also be so used. The bigger and more powerful an organization, the more the most power rapacious will seek to control and leverage its power.

Do not let AI fear mongering throw you into the camp of those enslaved by their governments, whom they entrusted with the power to protect them from ... whatever ... AI this week.

Those governments are usually bought and paid for by the same uber powerful who are funding and hyping AI this week.

As soon as I noticed this was an other "AI warning" video, I was expecting that it would turn into a fear mongering pitch for more government. It took me a few minutes to find it in this video (those AI generated timestamps and topics list degraded into hallucinations), but sure enough, the "give government the power to protect you from big AI" pitch was there.

As with all the other items I listed above, learn how to use, when to use, and when to trust others around you to use on your behalf, powerful tools of all sorts. Don't surrender your personal authority to make those decisions.

In 1986, US President Ronald Reagan said, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

[Richter]

A business for everyone? How AI is turning the economy upside down (1:03:39)
In this conversation, Marlies Dekkers and Derek Lomas (TU Delft) explore the enormous impact of AI on our daily lives and work. Derek explains how tools like 'Claude Code' remove the barrier between human and machine, enabling anyone, regardless of technical background, to become a software developer or creative entrepreneur.

Central to the discussion is the concept of Vibe Coding: intuitively collaborating with AI to realize personal visions and dreams. From translating thousands of centuries-old texts to solving the housing crisis, the common thread is an optimistic, humanistic view of technology. An inspiring conversation about how AI does not have to replace us, but can actually emancipate us to be more human and creative.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=VBDJUpmZTSM

[ExomatrixTV]

• Expanding Classic Shows from 4:3 to 16:9 with A.I.:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=LRKPhQiHLVI

This video uses WanGP and the LTX 2.3 model with outpainting to expand classic 4:3 TV shows to a widescreen 16:9. Each 20s clip took about 10 minutes to expand, after quite a bit of trial-and-error. In some cases multiple takes were used and the best parts combined.

The purpose of this video is to demonstrate and critique the capabilities and limitations of modern AI tools when applied to legacy media.

All original footage is used for the purpose of commentary, research, and transformation under fair dealing/fair use principles.

Original material from:

• Star Trek: The Next Generation
• Babylon 5
• Futurama
• Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
• Seinfeld

The extended imagery shown is newly generated and does not exist in the original works.