The new GPT-4 AI arrived today.

[Vortex2]

Sheesh .. I have been looking at the capabilities of the new released GPT-4 AI which was launched today.

ChatGPT/GPT-3 has only been around for a few months .. but this new versions is streets ahead.

For example, it can take an almost illegal handwritten description on a scrap of paper as an image and convert it to a working website in a couple of minutes.

It can take a corpus of tax code/law and produce your tax return in seconds.

It can produce written English of excellent quality ... probably better than most people here .. and in just a second or so.

I love technology ... but these abilities ... and the future abilities of GPT-5, 6, 7 ... are making me feel a bit queasy.

TBH the war in Ukraine and many other issues which we worry about will soon seem like childish noise.

GPT-4 is effectively better educated, and brighter (in some ways) than me and most people that I know.

How can we survive economically when faced with this sort of opponent?

Certainly, many, many jobs are now at risk.

[clv101]

Did you pay for the Plus account?

[Catweazle]

I've been thinking about the effects on the job market, they are worrying for people in advertising, marketing, admin and design jobs. On the other hand, people with manufacturing capability could see a rise in customers asking for custom made products they have either designed themselves with AI or have had designed very cheaply by a designer using it. The manufacturer's will have to compete with AI that is monitoring internet traffic, identifying needs, and automatically ordering products from Chinese factories. Marketing will be extremely targeted, to the extent of featuring items you will have seen in films or TV you watch that day. As AI gets smarter, the content of films or TV will be customised on the fly to better match your potential purchases.

My guess is that we are a step closer to a system of universal basic income, where everyone is given enough to live on and allowed to pick up whatever extra work they can, wherever they can find it, with a simplified tax system, run by AI.

[UndercoverElephant]

Certainly, many, many jobs are now at risk.

This just demonstrates the insanity of our economic system. How can the complete automation of a job make society as a whole poorer? We have made it so that it is economically necessary for everybody to be doing a job, even if the job doesn't need a human to do it. We might has well pay one bunch of people to make holes in roads and another bunch to fill them in. Uses resources, takes up people's time, achieves nothing in the real world, but apparently required for economic reasons. The only conclusion I can draw from this is that the entire academic discipline of economics is intellectually bankrupt.

[Catweazle]

It doesn't make society as a whole poorer, it makes 99% of society poorer, and 1% richer.

[Vortex2]

I have been having long discussions with GPT-4 .. it's more talented than GPT-3.5.

In a couple of specific discussions, its astute/startling responses made me feel physically sick.

I think that job losses will be the least of our problems with AI.

Mental illness will ramp up .. why bother learning or working if a machine can totally outclass you in almost any non-physical challenge?

Take a look at the just released Midjourney-5... goodbye artists and photographers and stock photo houses.

Personally, I'm happy with AIs (at the moment) as I'm learning a lot about all sorts of things : they make good educators, if you have imagination and drive. However, for most people, I suspect that they are more of a threat.

AI is going to screw us up way sooner than any energy shortages.

[PS_RalphW]

AI will not prevent limits to growth, peak oil, climate change, habitat loss, mass extinction event, etc. All it can do is distract the unfocused whilst accelerating the inequality in society as the rich try ever more extreme policies in a futile attempt to sustain the unsustainable.

AI will be forgotten overnight when the Internet goes down for the last time.

If my children are anything to go by, we are already past the tipping point where the Internet has scrambled the brains and mind set and mental health of the latest generation. They are already so deep down the rabbit hole and they simply do not know there is anywhere else to exist.

The modern world reminds me of the late Roman empire, where the invading tribes were at the borders, and society was wracked by riots between fans of rival chariot racing teams.

[clv101]

I spent some time comparing Bard with GPT-3.5 and Bard came of as significantly inferior. It's interesting to ask them to explain why a provided joke is funny. Bard was right less than half the time, GPT got it right more than two thirds the time.

[clv101]

Here's an interesting development!

https://newatlas.com/technology/stanfor ... cheap-gpt/

[Vortex2]

Here's an interesting development!

https://newatlas.com/technology/stanfor ... cheap-gpt/

They have now closed it down ... the usual 'safety argument.

[clv101]

Which aspect is closed down?

[Catweazle]

It's in the wild now, there's no putting it back in a cage.

[johnny]

GPT-4 is effectively better educated, and brighter (in some ways) than me and most people that I know.

DId it write an RGR story that was any more real than the last one?

How can we survive economically when faced with this sort of opponent?

Learn to do things that it can't?

Certainly, many, many jobs are now at risk.

We need a Luddite-like revolution against AI immediately!!

[Mark]

Married father kills himself after talking to AI chatbot for six weeks about his climate change fears:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... fears.html

[Mark]

ChatGPT banned in Italy over privacy concerns:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-65139406