AI over the next few years

[Nutmuncher]

I’ve recently shifted my reading content from war, doom scrolling and political madness towards being positive for the next few years, mainly scientific breakthroughs and technological advances from AI. There’s so much to be excited about (aside from the inescapable dose of fear and nerves of war doom climate doom and politics) and I think it’s something MN should be talking about more.

AI is coming whether we like it or not, it’s going to bring with it a seismic shift for the world that’s going to be incredible but also bring with it a tricky societal transition that will impact us all in some way, jobs will change, industry will evolve, the human touch will become increasingly important. How easily we transition to that new world is another story, how will those who don’t use devices or aren’t technology native actually navigate a more connected world? The economic implications if entire industries go or certain careers are no longer needed could be catastrophic if not managed properly and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. But I want to focus on the positives so let’s gloss over the bumpy transition period for now 😅

The advances and changes we’re going to see in the coming years will make today look like the 80’s in a relatively short space of time. The pace of progress in companies such as Anthropic, SpaceX, OpenAI right now is breathtaking. People think picture editing or making dodgy FB posters whenever you mention AI but it’s so much more than that, we just think it’s bad for the environment and that it’s taking jobs away when actually alongside technology and robotics it’s going to revolutionise how we live dramatically.

Excited about-

Medical advances and breakthroughs, we’ve seen the impact GLP-1s brought, there’s so much more just like those coming in the next few years. Drugs are being discovered super fast, research is taking months instead of years and analysis of clinical trials is more thorough and accurate. As new technologies come available the medicines keep improving. Gene therapy and having targeted treatments based on our own genetics is an exciting area of research that’s currently happening, the understanding of our own bodies will be a major step forward. I have always been keen in longevity and wellness, areas which I’m watching like a hawk.

Education. AI isn’t going to be a hologram teacher (not yet anyway) instead it could help teachers tailor lessons to each child, minimise many of the laborious administrative tasks, help to identify learning difficulties earlier and much more. I think classrooms are going to look very different in the next 5 years.

Industry. Rather than replacing entire industries, AI will automate repetitive work, improve decision-making and help people work more efficiently. Some sectors will change more than others and productivity will increase along with efficiency in the businesses that adopt and adapt. I think industry and workplaces in general will soon be judged on how quickly they use new technology, those that do will appear relevant and capable and those that don’t will resemble an office if it were still using a typewriter today.

Anyone else excited?

Driverless cars are frightening to me. They are inherently racist as they don’t recognise black and brown faces as human. So no thanks.

A tiny number of people are “writing the AI program”. Anthropic is worth (allegedly) $950Bn - more than the GDP of Taiwan. It has fewer than 5000 employees.

To be fair, not all legal work requires strategy. There are simple cases within areas like small claims, divorce or say conveyencing that yes, AI could absolutely do the donkey work on, I recently won a small claim using char gpt, look how many people represent themselves in divorces- stuff that wouldn’t have been accessible 30 years ago. All legal fees that are not being spent

I agree. Eg The SQE is difficult to pass. Those that tend to be successful are working entry level jobs in solicitors.

I believe new industries will flourish and open up job roles we can’t imagine yet. The opportunities AI will offer those with an entrepreneurial spirit will create new careers we haven’t thought of yet that simply don’t exist.

Maybe employers see an employees 2 day week productivity has actually surpassed what they were doing in 5 days so why wouldn’t they be paid the same?

Maybe governments actually legislate that AI augmented roles require full time pay regardless of hours worked. The notion of full time and part time could disappear. Some people may actually want to work full time still if they love their jobs, I know a few people who absolutely adore their careers and job satisfaction is real.

AI can learn, by itself. That’s part of the reason people are frightened by the controls around it

It doesn't learn, it eats its own shit. It's like saying that you can eat 100 meals all in one go and then just recycle that over and over and live forever. It's obviously nonsense.

I’m confused to. Drive a Tesla?!

It already is doing the donkey work in a lot of firms.
what happens when you need someone qualified though? How have they got the job if they’ve not learnt doing the donkey work?

No government can force companies to pay full time for 2 days wages.
the companies will just fuck off to a country that won’t force that
it’s a global market for jobs with AI

i have to say, the high level lawyers I know (admittedly- 3, 1 barrister x2 partners m&a) have never been near something like a small claims case. There is presumably a middle ground where the profession needs to identify how people can gain experience in the areas that remain

It means that they only need to hire enough juniors to maintain succession. So whereas in the past a firm might have issued 20 training contracts they might only offer 5 once there is pervasive adoption of AI.

Its the same in any industry or profession that is desk-based and where the majority of a junior employee’s work is repeatable and knowledge based.

Or what @SadiraOfTyr said, better than me. 😆

Mere details. Still, at least op is amused.

Resources aren’t distributed fairly now and we have recent experience of whole communities falling into deprivation due to dying industries. But somehow we are expected to believe that against a backdrop of turbocharging the processes that bring about wealth inequality and the increasing impotence of elected governments, these issues will be magically resolved.

Regardless about what I think of your opinions on AI...have you ever met a human!? There is no way any company in the world will pay a member of staff for their output rather than hours worked.

Time and time again threads pop up from people on here along the lines of 'I earn a decent salary but am expected to work 50/60 hours a week rather than my 35/40 contracted ones'. Or 'Im a carer - if you take my travel into account I'm on less than minimum wage'. Businesses don't currently pay many skilled people according to the hours they work. Why would they suddenly pay them full time for 2 days work whilst also paying for AI use!?

Not really. We are building agents that can build a sort of memory and generate their own skills based on examples, but the models themselves do not learn at all - they have no memory of anything at all - the only reason that a chatbot appears to ‘remember’ what has been going on in a conversation is that every time you prompt it you are actually resending all the previous information and ita previous answers. Eventually you run out of context and it starts to ‘forget’ (ie the earlier parts of the conversation are no longer in the context)

The only way you can teach an LLM new things is by retraining it, which is horrendously expensive to do. When an LLM is trained it only has its training data in memory and can never add anything else. The only reason it knows who won the football last night is because it google’d it, just like you would. The difference is that it then instantly forgot it.

I’ll be excited when it cleans the toilets and does the ironing for me!!

I would be quietly confident the government can legislate anything they want when it comes to businesses having access to the UK market. This isn’t a UK centric problem either, it would be global so very few nations could allow that level of exploitation, plus people would simply not work for them if their pay wasn’t in line with minimum wage expectations.

oh that exists already…..

newatlas.com/robotics/weave-robot-isaac1-laundry-bed/

That robot requires 'tele-operation' - i.e. a person to operate it. Hiring a human is cheaper, safer and more practical.

I do not feel positive. I work in tech. There is far too much hype around what LLMs and agentic systems can do in some areas and nowhere near enough terror about what they can do in others.

The US big tech companies will not be paying enough tax in the UK to provide universal income. That is propaganda. I'd bet my house and every penny I have that we would never see that. They are not socially responsible companies who would provide it themselves.

I'm not a ludite. I grew up on Star Trek and find AI 'cool'. I agree it will revolutionise many things positively (healthcare, education, development of other technologies as you've mentioned). But 'truth' as a concept is being eroded before our eyes - verified news agency visits have tanked since AI search was introduced as standard on Google (with questionable records on veracity), peer-reviewed papers have nonsense references to one another etc etc. Democracy is inconvenient and unnecessary to the big tech companies. And for as long as it exists, they can influence it enormously. AI is not a problem - it's the hands of the men people it rests in that is

I think one part is that the definition of "AI" is so broad now that even stuff that's been around for ages is being rebranded as AI. Eg we were walking through a touristy area and there was a novelty photo booth type thing promising to use "AI" to put a photo of you into a historical background. That's been around for yonks.

Have you watched any Ed Zitron?

Very few law firms will be involved with small claims. There’s no money in it given the sums in dispute and the costs regime. So they aren’t going to be losing work in that area.

Well, the tech bros are already claiming that AI is replacing people. If they were that serious about UBI you would think they would be clamouring for the government to tax them and set the wheels in motion to redistribute some of that money. Yes very mysteriously Elon musk and the rest of the UBI proponents aren't doing that... Very strange

I think Ed is great. He's one of the few people who doesn't talk utter bollocks.