I don't think AGI is right around the corner

Anyone who claims that a poorly definined concept, AGI, is right around the corner is most likely:

- trying to sell something

- high on their own stories

- high on exogenous compounds

- all of the above

LLMs are good at language. They are OK summarizers of text by design but not good at logic. Very poor at spatial reasoning and as a result poor at connecting concepts together.

Just ask any of the crown jewel LLM models "What's the biggest unsolved problem in the [insert any] field".

The usual result is a pop-science-level article but with ton of subtle yet critical mistakes! Even worse, the answer sounds profound on the surface. In reality, it's just crap.

Thousands are being laid off, supposedly because they're "being replaced with AI," implying the AI is as good or better as humans at these jobs. Managers and execs are workers, too--so if the AI really is so good, surely they should recuse themselves and go live a peaceful life with the wealth they've accrued.

I don't know about you, but I can't imagine that ever happening. To me, that alone is a tip off that this tech, while amazing, can't live up to the hype in the long term.

Some employees can be replaced by AI. That part is true. It's not revolutionary (at least not yet) — it's pretty much the same as other post-industrial technologies that have automated some types of work in the past. It also takes time for industries to adapt to these changes. Replacing workers couldn't possibly happen in one year, even if our AI models were more far more capable than they are in practice

I'm afraid that what we're seeing instead are layoffs that are purely oriented at the stock market. As long as layoffs and talk about AI are seen as a positive signal for investors and as long as corporate leadership is judged by the direction the stock price goes, we will see layoffs (as well as separate hiring sprees for "AI Engineers").

It's a telltale sign that we're seeing a large number of layoffs in the tech sector. It is true that tech companies are poised to adapt AI more quickly than others but that doesn't seem to be what's happening. What seem to be happening is that tech companies have been overhiring throughout the decade leading up to the end of COVID-19. At that time hiring was a positive signal — now firing is.

I don't think these massive layoffs are good for tech companies in the long term, but since they mostly affect things that don't touch direct revenue generating operations, they won't hurt in the near-term and by the time company starts feeling the pain, the cause would be too long in the past to be remembered.