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LLM Inevitabilism

(tomrenner.com)
1616 points SwoopsFromAbove | 1 comments | 15 Jul 25 04:35 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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delichon ◴[15 Jul 25 04:49 UTC] No.44567913[source]▶
If in 2009 you claimed that the dominance of the smartphone was inevitable, it would have been because you were using one and understood its power, not because you were reframing away our free choice for some agenda. In 2025 I don't think you can really be taking advantage of AI to do real work and still see its mass adaptation as evitable. It's coming faster and harder than any tech in history. As scary as that is we can't wish it away.
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NBJack ◴[15 Jul 25 05:00 UTC] No.44567951[source]▶
Ironically, this is exactly the technique for arguing that the blog mentions.

Remember the revolutionary, seemingly inevitable tech that was poised to rewrite how humans thought about transportation? The incredible amounts of hype, the secretive meetings disclosing the device, etc.? That turned out to be the self-balancing scooter known as a Segway?

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1. petesergeant ◴[15 Jul 25 09:01 UTC] No.44569295{3}[source]▶
> Ironically, this is exactly the technique for arguing that the blog mentions.

So? The blog notes that if something is inevitable, then the people arguing against it are lunatics, and so if you can frame something as inevitable then you win the rhetorical upper-hand. It doesn't -- however -- in any way attempt to make the argument that LLMs are _not_ inevitable. This is a subtle straw man: the blog criticizes the rhetorical technique of inevitabilism rather than engaging directly with whether LLMs are genuinely inevitable or not. Pointing out that inevitability can be rhetorically abused doesn't itself prove that LLMs aren't inevitable.