Let's talk about Artificial Intelligence

[willedoo]

One example of job losses will be in the modelling industry. There will still be a need for physical catwalk models but almost all of the print and media advertising will go to AI generated models. That's a spin off from the graphics getting to the point where AI models can just about pass off as the real thing. A lot of photographers and modelling agencies will have to find something else to do. It's happening already; most of the online clothing retailers are using AI generated models now. It's not something that's going to happen one day; it's happening now and things will really accelerate, like a snowball effect.

 

I can see the point of it though. If you were running a retail business or you were an advertising agency doing advertising work for companies, why would you employ a modelling agency when you can do it all with a few mouse clicks. No photographers, no studios, no booking venues and sets for model shoots. Unfortunately also no jobs for those people.

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

40 minutes ago, rgmwa said:

I think that's going to be one of biggest problems it's going to create, although if it manages to wipe out much of humanity along the way, maybe it won't have that much impact. 

What does wiping out humanity actually mean? Does it mean killing every human (and possibly other living thing) on earth? Or does it mean so extremely disrupting the fabric and order of society that we will turn on ourselves in some Mad Max like civil war type thing (I have never seen Mad Max)? And what are the real chances of that happening? At the moment, they are saying 10%.. but if humanity is wiped out, so too goes the profits of the AI companies - and they are included in the wipe out anyway. My guess is then different AI models will turn on others and wipe each other out. In fact, a simple prompt to convince an AI the other AI is a human may well save humanity!

 

Is it possible - yes... whatever the definition is.. Is it likely.. Not sure.

[Jerry_Atrick]

7 minutes ago, willedoo said:

One example of job losses will be in the modelling industry. There will still be a need for physical catwalk models but almost all of the print and media advertising will go to AI generated models. That's a spin off from the graphics getting to the point where AI models can just about pass off as the real thing. A lot of photographers and modelling agencies will have to find something else to do. It's happening already; most of the online clothing retailers are using AI generated models now. It's not something that's going to happen one day; it's happening now and things will really accelerate, like a snowball effect.

 

I can see the point of it though. If you were running a retail business or you were an advertising agency doing advertising work for companies, why would you employ a modelling agency when you can do it all with a few mouse clicks. No photographers, no studios, no booking venues and sets for model shoots. Unfortunately also no jobs for those people.

 

 

There are many industries where job losses will be huge. No longer need camera operators, editors, directors, etc. A creative writer can generate something all by themselves. That motorbike club patch took me all of 2 - 3 mins to get to how I wanted it. An that was a general LLM/Generative AI tool. Imagine specialist ones. I can see the day you need a scan - walk into the radiogrpahers (or whatever they are called today), lay down; the machine automaticaly through AI determines the correct scanning angles, takes the shot, analyses the results are of sufficient quality to pass to the consutlant AI, that examines them and provides a diagnosis and treatment plan.. all before you get home..  Yeah, there will be the odd case where they have to have a nurse., radiographer, and consultant, but the vast majority will not be required. 

 

Copwriters, solicitors, accountants and may of these types of roles and supporting roles will all but evaporate (you still will need a few). 

 

If we are getting 15 - 20 times productivity increase, that means around 5 - 7% of the workforce needed. AI is not generating enough alternate jobs to pick up the slack.  That is maths. 

 

Obviously, some roles will not be replaceable for some time yet - until robotics and AI are more advanced that what they already are. Trades, ambos, etc. Basically anything that needs physical capacity coupled with dexterity roles (watch maker/repair - although with electronics, I would say that has already died). 

 

But that time will come, too. And AI is helping. 

 

[rgmwa]

It's a good question and I'm not sure that anyone really knows what it means or which part of humanity would be most affected. Presumably the most complex and highly ordered societies would be the most vulnerable, but the actual threat is unclear, at least to me. I imagine massive disruption to services that rely on digital systems to operate would be the biggest threat, but that wouldn't necessarily translate to massive loss of life.

 

[nomadpete]

I remain unconvinced. I mentioned services that I figured were unlikely to be improved by A.I. because I was searching for a meaningful benefit. We plebs want to see tangible improvements to our lives before we see value in the new tech.

 

I mentioned return on investment because nobody invests billions without an expectation of billions income from it.

 

So far the promises are intangible. They have not been clearly defined in a way that we can look forward to any specific improvement to our life.

 

Rather, the opposite;

 

There will be less jobs, and no promise of a reduction in cost of living. But certainly someone somewhere will be reaping megadollars income - dollars which must be coming from the people.

 

 

[facthunter]

Loss of order and predictability  will bring the whole thing undone. Ask IA how it would go about bringing it about.  I'm sure there are Plenty of ways. Whether we realise it or not we are Highly Interdependent, and take a lot of things for granted.  Things don't JUST happen. It takes a lot of organising co-operation Order, planning. and sticking to agreements and rules. Nev

Edited 13 hours ago by facthunter

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

My view is that the jobs it will create will not be absorbed by the jobs it will displace

That's what we said when desktop computers began being used in business. Mankind is adaptive. New technologies might eliminate old jobs, but they also create new ones. There are jobs in existence now that were never thought of 50 years ago. However, the problem is that the doers of those old jobs are maybe too old to retrain to do the new jobs. However, their children will train to do them. There are a lot of occupations that are necessary to keep society going and people will still be needed to do them. Not everyone has to be a paper-shuffler in an office. Someone has to be a barista.

[Jerry_Atrick]

I understand - I was one that advocated that the desktop PC and normal automation won't because the jobs they create will cover the job losses. 

 

AI will become so pervasive, the only way I see it happening is that almosy everyone becomes a business.  Running what we call today, side hustles. 

[Jerry_Atrick]

1 hour ago, nomadpete said:

remain unconvinced. I mentioned services that I figured were unlikely to be improved by A.I. because I was searching for a meaningful benefit. We plebs want to see tangible improvements to our lives before we see value in the new tech.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666990024000132 

 

Is one example. 

 

Of course, this may be biased because AI answered it but:

 

 

Edited 12 hours ago by Jerry_Atrick

[Marty_d]

I'm sorry Jerry, I don't see any upside at all to AI.

I'm a programmer too, not on your level I'm sure. My employer is all gung ho about AI.

Obviously if you own or run a company then you want AI. Let's face it, buying or renting an employee who works 24/7, doesn't require breaks, doesn't get pregnant, isn't an alcoholic or lazy or just distracted by all the shit that happens to humans - probably seems like a great idea.

But while it benefits the shareholders at the top, what does it do for society and the other 99% of humanity? We can't all be baristas, and even now it wouldn't be hard to totally automate that.

Work is part of our identity. Without purpose, what do we do? Sit around all day watching AI slop?

[rgmwa]

3 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666990024000132 

 

Is one example. 

 

Of course, this may be biased because AI answered it but:

 

 

Does anyone really need AI to organise a recipe?  Reminds me of the early days of computers. 

[Jerry_Atrick]

@Marty_d - I am at best, a very average programmer. Which is probably why formally I am no longer one.

 

But do you not see an upside of AI being improved and early diagnostics of medical conditions leading to better health outcomes? I see that as a definite upside (at my age, anyway). What about better engineering to lower environmental impacts? Or better investment decision making so you reach your goals earlier? I see it these as positives of AI

 

Even as a programmer, do you not see an advantage of AI doing a lot of the menial work I would normally do. We would still have controls to ensure the programmers review the code that is cut, but when I use AI at home it really tidies up a lot of the code that I write and sometimes cleans up the core logic... I find that great.. 

 

 

[rgmwa]

I think AI has great potential in things like medical and scientific research as well as tasks like coding. Our firm is actively exploring ways to use it in engineering design as well as routine administrative tasks like taking meeting minutes and summarising long documents. I find it very handy to answer random questions that Google doesn’t do as easily. My concern is the uses it could be put to by people whose motivations are criminal or hostile, or if and when it develops to the point where we don’t know what it’s doing or lose control of it altogether.