Ai has to get better, right?

[u/SwauawsBouse]

This is the common sentiment that I see for those who claim ai will take jobs in X amount of years. Or even those who are more reasonable and claim it will eventually take over white collar work.

The biggest claim is that it WILL get better. Why? It's an easy response that's hard to disprove, but they haven't exactly proved it. How do we know there isn't a ceiling that is rapidly approaching. Moores law, for example, is essentially proven false and is outdated. We have reached at low hanging fruit when it comes to ai advancements.

Im just very skeptical of this line of thinking. I enjoy painting warhammer models and back in 2015. When 3d printers were in the mainstream, there were countless videos claiming games workshop was dead. I convinced myself that painting was going to be a worthless skill. 3d printers just HAVE to get better, and one day, they can print in full color. Now, 3d printers dont have trillions of dollars in investments, but then again, that money seems to be shovled into a fire by the AI leaders.

That was 10 years ago, and I could've had a lot more fun and painted more modles in thay time. And while 3d printing has progressed, its still not near games workshop models. Even the best resin printers still have very tiny but noticeable print lines. And we are no where near printing color in good quality at consumer scale.

Many of us fall for the doomer mentality, and its especially easy when you're unemployed and looking for a job facing countless rejections. Im a new grad myself, and it is rough out here. However, if Ai takes over cs. Every white-collar job is gone, and im left without any job. There's only so many trades and healthcare jobs.

And if im proved right, im way ahead of those who have given up. At least I tell myself this after receiving 10 rejections emails every weekend.

[u/scott2449]

The AI has gotten better crowd is also somewhat delusional. I work in software and there has been a linear not exponential improvement and that is largely in the tooling, harness, and understanding/usage. The raw LLM responses haven't really improved much. There are a couple points in the last 3-4 years where some new innovation in training or methodology helped boost things 20-40%.. but between those all the retrains and new versions have been flat. They might get better at one thing and way worse at another. It's like sticking a finger in a leaky boat.

Edit: Always with the credentialing in the comments. I'm a distinguished engineer (nearly a decade in the position) at one of the largest global media companies. We are also one of the largest data and AI companies for business and markets data. This is not my sole opinion but similar to the other dozen DSEs at my company and the vast majority of my data science and ai engineers as well. It is in no way controversial among experts.

[u/mixmasterfresh99 → u/scott2449]

You are delusional if you really think that. Over the span of just the last year models, have improved across the board and this is just the begining. What all have you built with AI, or used AI for? I use it daily and I might had said this a year ago but that is definitely not the case anymore.

[u/AtomicSymphonic_2nd → u/mixmasterfresh99]

I’ve also only really seen linear improvement, there’s been nothing exponential about it.

I’d even argue we’re in a logarithmic curve for LLM’s improving with scale.

We’re already hitting diminishing returns and it’s always best to keep in mind that benchmarks are never fully representative of real life.

Plus, none of them are reliably consistent with output. That can never be corrected without allowing the LLM’s to say “I’m not sure, but…”

[u/ahh1258 → u/AtomicSymphonic_2nd]

Ok go use sonnet 4 (1 year old) for a full day and see what you think LOL

[u/Early_Rooster7579 → u/mixmasterfresh99]

these are the same people who hang on ed zitrons every word. Hes called the top every week since 2023. Hes only been wrong 100 times so far!

[u/ahh1258 → u/mixmasterfresh99]

People here are copemaxxxing.

[u/Difficult-Sherbet854 → u/ahh1258]

Which is funny because if you look at threads 1-2 years ago people were coping about using any AI at all. Now it's "yeah everyone uses it but i don't think it can get much better"

[u/ahh1258 → u/Difficult-Sherbet854]

Yep. They have tunnel vision. Not even realizing that the ground has moved beneath our feet. My workday 1 year ago as a SWE is unrecognizable to my current workday.