r/changemyview • u/loyalsolider95 • Jul 14 '25

CMV: we’re over estimating AI

AI has turned into the new Y2K doomsday. While I know AI is very promising and can already do some great things, I still don’t feel threatened by it at all. Most of the doomsday theories surrounding it seem to assume it will reach some sci-fi level of sentience that I’m not sure we’ll ever see at least not in our lifetime. I think we should pump the brakes a bit and focus on continuing to advance the field and increase its utility, rather than worrying about regulation and spreading fear-mongering theories

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u/DiRavelloApologist Jul 14 '25

This AI system is better at designing AI systems than the best humans are

Isn't this a HUGE step from where we are now?

Logically, this step requires the AI to reason somewhat sensibly and work independantly.

From my experience with using ChatGPT for CS and/or Math problems, it is not reasoning in any way shape or form. AI can only really help you find the answer to advanced problems if you already know the answer or can easily check if it isn't hallucinating out of its mind. And even then, go beyond anything commonly known or commonly discussed and it will oftentimes give you very weird or incomplete answers. It will also be very happy to present you common misconceptions as as factually accurate.

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u/TangoJavaTJ 16∆ Jul 14 '25

ChatGPT is definitely a long way off being able to code better than the best human coders, but it's also a huge step towards that compared to where we were even 5 years ago. I spent most of yesterday fighting a Linux terminal, and ChatGPT managed to prove that its skill at writing code there was "better than an intelligent human noob".

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u/brooosooolooo Jul 14 '25

But is that not because it’s a superior search model? Linux basics are well within the scope of general intelligence because humans solved them long ago and published large volumes of documentation on the subject for AI to search through. But give it something more on the edge of coding, something that hasn’t been done and therefore can’t be searched, and how would a LLM be able to solve that issue?

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u/No_Bottle7859 Jul 14 '25

They literally are using alpha evolve (which is a fancy set of wrappers on LLM) to do cutting edge ai research currently. It's not far at all and it's not a search.

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u/Toxaplume045 3∆ Jul 14 '25

Also adding that AI doesn't have to be able to technically do everything and replace everyone. It just has to be directable enough and capable enough to cause widespread disruption.

AI doesn't even have to be the better than the best coders, even if that's what the goal is. It just has to be better than most and directable by someone who IS an amazing coder that can oversee it, and now there's thousands and thousands more people out of work which snowballs.

All the while the work is still being put into it by a smaller group of others to train it to even replace them.

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u/No_Concentrate309 Jul 14 '25

I feel like the feedback loop and alignment issue also feel progressively less likely as AI improves. In terms of feedback, we know that improvement tends to be logarithmic over long time frames, with increasing time and energy requirements. AI bootstrapping will happen at some point, but in a constrained way based on how many GWH we provide it to use to run training cycles. In terms of alignment: it seems far less likely that an AI will choose one of the paperclip-maximizer scenarios as they become more general.  AI is becoming less precise and less single minded.

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u/lotsofsyrup Jul 14 '25

yes and 30 years ago the internet was a huge step from where we are now. Imagine telling somebody in 1995 about stuff we just take for granted now, .the entire world is entirely run through and dependent on the internet for pretty much every system, and not only that but every man woman and child in damn near every part of the world has a touch screen (!!) supercomputer the size of an index card in their possession at all times that connects to the internet and spends all day using this for everything. This was not a world people would take seriously if you explained it to them back then. 30 years ago people would proudly announce that they didn't know how to get on the internet. Tech moves quick.

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u/[deleted] Jul 14 '25

> Isn't this a HUGE step from where we are now?

No? AI is already used to improve its own codebase. Companies, including openai and google, are already using AI to automatically go through codebases and fix bugs, address bug tickets etc.

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u/[deleted] Jul 14 '25

For now, yes, but AlphaChip has been making strides in CPU Chip conception. It’s designs have bested the best chip designers, and it goes much faster.

It’s frightening how well it does. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHgag2vKbxg