Just A Random Thought – AI
Is all the hype about AI’s potential, as promised by tech companies that stand to benefit financially, much like the vision of flying cars that was imagined when The Jetsons aired? Yet, here we are, 60+ years later, and we’ve barely managed to develop a car that can drive itself. At this time, is AI genuinely and successfully replacing people in many jobs/positions, or are companies using it as an excuse and cover for layoffs while appearing innovative?
Just a random thought.
Asking an AI what it thinks of AI’s future
Question: Hey, “Superhuman AI”, do you think AI will ever live up to its current potential hype?
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Superhuman AI’s answer, verbatim:
AI is currently surrounded by significant hype, with grand expectations of transforming industries, automating complex tasks, and even reaching human-level intelligence. Whether it will “live up” to this hype depends on which aspects you’re focusing on.
What’s realistic:
AI is already making significant progress in fields like language processing, image recognition, healthcare analysis, and robotics.
Over the next decade, it’s likely to become even more integrated into daily life, improving productivity and enabling new kinds of applications.
What’s overhyped:
Some expectations—like fully autonomous general intelligence or AI that can understand and reason exactly like humans—are still far off and may not be achievable with current approaches.
Risks and limitations, such as bias, limited understanding, and unpredictability, are often underestimated during hype cycles.
In summary:
AI will likely meet and even exceed some of the more grounded expectations. However, the most sensational promises may take much longer to realize, if they ever do. The trajectory is promising, but reality often lags behind the boldest predictions.
– January 2026 –
I saw some tech articles about robots being debuted at the CES show in Las Vegas this week. Not quite to the level of Rosie yet, but you can see it heading there. Then 60 Minutes had a segment this week on advances at Boston Dynamics with their latest Atlas with an AI brain. It was interesting to hear them talk about how coding is changing. They are shifting from writing specific code to teaching a robot to do certain things.
I just want to know if these things will be ready in about 20 years when I am too old to do stuff anymore. Then it can mow the lawn while moving 401k investments around to make up for how much I’d have to pay for it and mining crypto at the same time. :)
The upcoming issue (print) of The Atlantic has a ‘How the demise of AI will occur” or some such thinking. I haven’t received it yet so don’t know the gist. I’m all for AI decline if not demise. Unless the tech bros want to give it to humanity free and open then it’s just another way to accumulate power and I’m not sure who we can trust with it. I’m not a Luddite by any means but if AI can eventually self-preserve then we have major problems, right HAL?
I am more than happy to pay the local kid to mow the lawn. :-)
I’ll be interested to read that when it comes out. It’s just hard to see how it is going to be some passing thing. Some have speculated that the tech bros want it so they don’t have to rely on human labor as they retreat into their bunkers when large parts of the planet become unlivable. Or maybe it will follow the path of automation in factories now, a bit of a mix human/machine but a significant labor displacement. Or maybe it will come up with a solution to stop the dangerous path we are on. 🤷♂️
I haven’t seen the Atlantic article, but I expect that many companies and their boards will realize there is little immediate financial reward for all their investments. As a result, they may downsize their efforts to achieve more realistic goals. I think most will agree that AI has been overhyped at this stage of development. I’m not betting on the free-and-open gift option, however. Haha!
There have been previous times when scientific developments and experiments have walked the line of perhaps endangering our very existence. With caution, perhaps that’s the price you have to pay for progress and knowledge in certain areas.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) seems to be used too often as a promotional term these days. Many applications I occasionally use for coding, writing, graphics, and search functions now claim to incorporate AI. While I don’t doubt that some AI technology is in use, my experience suggests that these applications offer a limited set of AI-enhanced features. However, being first off the developmental blocks isn’t always the best, for as they say, you only get one chance to make a first impression. We’ve definitely witnessed some bad first steps from some AIs, for example, Elon Musk’s Grok, aka MechaHitler.
I expect the military to be a prime first adopter of AI capabilities. Automated drones (air, sea, land) that can be set to seek and kill on the battlefield. Some of it is already in play—future scary Terminator-type stuff.
If it’s twenty years, I can live with that, or should I say not live with that, as I’d be in my nineties. Who knows, it could be the beginning of a golden age, or not. I wonder what will happen when AI is fully capable: how will everyone make a living so they can afford all the AI conveniences?
I’ve listened to some talks with Geoffrey Hinton, and some other folks like him and besides going way over my head, it is interesting to hear them speak about the entirely different approach to “code” whereas the AI nodes act more like our own brain neurons than typical computer code. It’s both fascinating and scary. There have already been cases where a chatbot tried blackmail. Maybe I’ve watched too many movies, but given the way countries can just can seemingly invade each other, maybe a country will sabotage an AI like with nuclear plants, etc.
I really haven’t been able to grasp the basic concept of AI nodes, especially when they’re acting more like brain neurons than computer code. As an old IT guy/programmer, I’m so f*cking out of date. If I were a produce, I would have been pulled off the shelf a long time ago. There seems to be no end to the ways we can imagine this all going wrong and becoming a threat rather than a blessing. One more thing we have to endure and hope it gets resolved for the better.
I’m guessing it’s a little of both. Getting the job done and laying off. But I hate dealing with AI chatbots and AI on the phone. I think most people do. I would rather use a company that has real people on the front line.
I agree with you; I don’t like getting an AI if I’m trying to get support for something. They just haven’t progressed to the point where they can be flexible enough or understand some of the finer points of communication. They may get there someday, and I don’t know if the AI is much worse than getting third-party support, where even a common language is a problem.