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628 points cratermoon | 9 comments | | HN request time: 1.609s | source | bottom
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gyomu ◴[] No.44461457[source]
Broadly agreed with all the points outlined in there.

But for me the biggest issue with all this — that I don't see covered in here, or maybe just a little bit in passing — is what all of this is doing to beginners, and the learning pipeline.

> There are people I once respected who, apparently, don’t actually enjoy doing the thing. They would like to describe what they want and receive Whatever — some beige sludge that vaguely resembles it. That isn’t programming, though.

> I glimpsed someone on Twitter a few days ago, also scoffing at the idea that anyone would decide not to use the Whatever machine. I can’t remember exactly what they said, but it was something like: “I created a whole album, complete with album art, in 3.5 hours. Why wouldn’t I use the make it easier machine?”

When you're a beginner, it's totally normal to not really want to put in the hard work. You try drawing a picture, and it sucks. You try playing the guitar, and you can't even get simple notes right. Of course a machine where you can just say "a picture in the style of Pokémon, but of my cat" and get a perfect result out is much more tempting to a 12 year old kid than the prospect of having to grind for 5 years before being kind of good.

But up until now, you had no choice and to keep making crappy pictures and playing crappy songs until you actually start to develop a taste for the effort, and a few years later you find yourself actually pretty darn competent at the thing. That's a pretty virtuous cycle.

I shudder to think where we'll be if the corporate-media machine keeps hammering the message "you don't have to bother learning how to draw, drawing is hard, just get ChatGPT to draw pictures for you" to young people for years to come.

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raincole ◴[] No.44461707[source]
People will write lengthy and convoluted explanation on why LLM isn't like calculator or microwave oven or other technology before. (Like OP's article) But it really is. Humans have been looking for easier and lazier ways to do things since the dawn of civilization.

Tech never ever prevents people who really want to hone their skills from doing so. World record of 100m sprint kept improving even since car was invented. World record of how many digits of pi memorized kept improving even when a computer does that indefinitely times better.

It's ridiculous to think drawing will become a lost art because of LLM/Diffusal models when we live in a reality where powerlifting is a thing.

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zwnow ◴[] No.44461789[source]
My guy its not only about the art its about killing passion and the lifeline of people. Your take is incredibly ignorant to people who value human created work. These things will kill industries. What jobs should people work in, who got their income cut by LLMs? Force them into blue collar work?
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JW_00000 ◴[] No.44461942[source]
But isn't that the same as saying: what about all the horse carrier drivers who lost their jobs due to cars? What about all the bank tellers we lost after inventing the automated teller machine?
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AnonymousPlanet ◴[] No.44462007[source]
Not exactly. It depends on how many professions get extinct at the same time. If you have ever lived in a place that is in an economic decline because professions have moved abroad and the new professions replacing the old ones just don't provide the scale or only benefit a few in society, you know where things might be headed.
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1. nostrebored ◴[] No.44462276[source]
What do you think happened in the rise of industrial agriculture?
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2. AnonymousPlanet ◴[] No.44462414[source]
We're talking about places that even after decades haven't recovered. What do you think is happening there right now?

There's a common fallacy that tries to argue that it'll be alright over time, no matter what happens. Given enough time, you can also say that about atomic wars. But that won't help the generations that are affected.

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3. sfn42 ◴[] No.44464745[source]
If you live in a dead town with no opportunities then you either make your own opportunities or you move to a place with opportunities.

If you just sit on your hands complaining about the lack of opportunities then you won't get any sympathy from me. People aren't entitled to live wherever they want, humanity's entire thing is adaptability. So adapt. Life is what you make it.

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4. zwnow ◴[] No.44465090{3}[source]
Humans are entitled to live wherever they want. Capitalists destroying rural regions with false promises (prosperous jobs) is a thing since the industrialization. Should all people move to overrun big cities? Small once established markets are getting destroyed by big discounters or stuff like Amazon. Also adapting is and never was a thing for most people. I dont know where you got that from but this isn't the wild west anymore. People are trying to set up a life for themselves without moving every 2 years. Entitled city person viewpoint.
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5. sfn42 ◴[] No.44465259{4}[source]
There's plenty of rural areas with plenty of opportunities. Cities are not the only option. If I lived in a dead mining town I'd move elsewhere. You can blame corporations or whatever you want, doesn't matter whose fault it is. Complaining and blaming doesn't solve anything. Finding solutions does. Stop complaining, start finding solutions. I grew up in a beautiful rural place. I'd like to live there, but what I like even more is not having to drive for over an hour to work every day. So I moved. I also went to university in my late 20s and some of my peers were in their 40s and 50s.

People adapt to all kinds of stuff all the time. Saying adapting isn't a thing for most people is ridiculous. Of course it's a thing. It's what you do when your current situation isn't working. You adapt.

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6. AnonymousPlanet ◴[] No.44465456{3}[source]
When I say 'place' that includes entire countries. Adapting then depends on the kindness of strangers towards foreign refugees.

I wouldn't be surprised if at some point in the near future something like "Adapt. Life is what you make it" could be read in big bold letters above the entrance of a place like Alligator Alcatraz.

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7. arbitrary_name ◴[] No.44469453{5}[source]
And that is extremely difficult at a large scale. Especially when you reduce safety nets and heighten the consequences of failure. A lack of healthcare, poor rural hospitals, extortionate tuition at colleges, high housing costs; these all make it extremely difficult to adapt.

Sure, you can smugly say that the hard-working will survive. But i don't want to imagine what the USA will be like millions of unemployed and under-provisioned Americans. Poverty and the process of falling off the socio economic ladder is ugly for everyone, unless you're wealthy enough to afford to insulate yourself from the consequences.

The fact that this nuance appears to be lost on you makes me suspicious of your motives for posting your opinion.

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8. sfn42 ◴[] No.44473219{4}[source]
I think it's pretty clear that I'm not referring to Palestinians, Ukrainians or Syrians etc here. I support refugee programs but I also acknowledge that we have limited resources. We can't help everyone. We can't just open the borders and let everyone in.

I hadn't heard about alligator Alcatraz until now, I'm not American so I don't keep up with all of Trump's shenanigans. I feel compelled to make it clear that I in no way support Trump. The fact that the US has elected that clown not once but twice is frankly embarrassing.

9. sfn42 ◴[] No.44473347{6}[source]
I'm not talking about large scale. I'm also not talking about politics, which I assume is what you're implying re my motives. I don't have any motives, I'm not even American. I don't really care about all the crazy stuff happening over there. They got what they voted for, meanwhile the world is wondering how they elected that clown not once but twice.

The ironic thing in all this is that these rural people you're talking about are probably the exact people responsible for electing him. Evokes images of leopards eating faces and such.