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Comment by grayfaced | Hacker News Reader

AI is a tool. Someday it will be more then that, but for now it's just a tool. If we design it and train it to be altruistic, it may be do some of the things he claims. If we design it and train it to deliver stockholders profit then it will prioritize that. If we design it identify dissidents and maintain security, then that will be it's priority.

Looking at who's doing development on AI, I have my predictions for the likeliness of altruistic AIs.

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Key point. Generative AI is not a product. It's a tool, or at best a raw material that might be used to make a product. All these BigTech (and LittleTech) companies gushing about how they're now "AI first" and "going all-in on AI" and refocusing all their efforts on AI... It just sounds so ridiculous.

Instead of bloviating about AI, explain the product and the benefit. And if that product happens to use AI under the hood, who cares? Why even mention it? When I buy some electronics device, I'm not buying it because it is made with silicon and capacitors. Im buying it for what it does.

I'm a little saucy because I currently work for a tech company that's going through hysterics trying to pivot all of their projects to be about AI because we should now be working on all-things-AI. It's exhausting.

It used to be that anything which worked well enough to go into a product ceased to be "AI"... I have a feeling though that the buzz will persist from now on

So you disagree with the author, just to be clear? He's literally arguing that it will never be more than a tool, likening it to toaster. Just wanted to highlight the radical nature of that claim...

We'll live in a future where AI overlords hassle us (politely) when we're not working to maximize shareholder returns.

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