The only winning move is not to play
37 points
5 hours ago
| 3 comments
| gregg.io
| HN
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8bitsrule
53 minutes ago
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"A new theoretical analysis ... provides evidence that large language models, such as ChatGPT, are mathematically constrained to a level of creativity comparable to an amateur human.... The study highlights that human creativity is not symmetrically distributed" - https://www.psypost.org/a-mathematical-ceiling-limits-genera...

URL of study: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jocb.70077

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doug_durham
1 hour ago
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Isn't it "The only winning move is to do good work"? If non-AI aided work is superior then it should win out in the long run because companies that do that type of research will be able to make superior decisions and thus be rewarded in the market. The argument isn't really AI versus non-AI, it's quality work versus shoddy work. It is right to lose patience with people who submit shoddy work whatever the source.
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alphazard
48 minutes ago
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The article leaves out the fact that corporate research has gone the way of political research. It exists to give cover for some decision that is unpopular, or serves the decision maker more than the company. It doesn't actually inform decisions, it retroactively justifies decisions in the most palatable way.

If anyone actually talked to users and did what they wanted, then software wouldn't suck.

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mattnewton
1 hour ago
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If management can measure it. But in practice, the problem of course is the extra marketing of your good work against the marketing of all the ai firms trying to sell to your boss.

Many firms are unable to accurately measure the quality of research work and so they will be duped by the alternative marketing. The market can correct for this on a long enough time horizon if a competitor takes the opposite bet on whether this job is automate-able that way, but in the meantime you are probably out of a job and your equity goes down.

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doug_durham
47 minutes ago
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That seems problematic. It sounds like this is a long time horizon issue. An experienced researcher should be able to surface to management their concerns about the quality of research. Why is the research wrong?
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pylua
10 minutes ago
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The reality is that shoddy work often wins out due to pricing.
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hekkle
49 minutes ago
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> The argument isn't really AI versus non-AI, it's quality work versus shoddy work.

Unfortunately, that's not how most people make decisions on what to purchase. It's all about bean counting; what is cheap, vs what is expensive. Don't believe me? Why is Trump currently putting tariffs on foreign countries? Because it is cheaper to manufacture there, are their products better than American ones? No, but they're cheap.

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add-sub-mul-div
51 minutes ago
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Denying that slop general labor won't thrive in the market due to its cheapness is like denying that fast food and other cheap garbage food has thrived.
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doug_durham
23 minutes ago
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Then the market has spoken. Fast food fills a niche. I don't think you can qualitatively say that humanity would be happier if everyone paid more for food that was painstakingly created by hand. I know I can't. If poor marketing research is sufficient then the market has spoken.
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satisfice
3 minutes ago
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The market is inefficient. It speaks too soon. DDT, asbestos, and radium were all wonder products for which that market spoke and later recanted.
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kromem
54 minutes ago
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Seems very strawmanned.

There's currently a bit of an 80/20 rule with AI where it does great automating 80% of an overlapping problem domain and chokes on it 20% of the time.

The idea of someone giving 100% of their work to Claude as in the examples is dumb. But so is someone doing 100% of the busywork themselves.

Don't waste your own time and your client's money for the sake of some nonsense purity ideal. Learn to thread the needle of changing times.

Cause they are gonna keep changing.

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hekkle
35 minutes ago
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The only constant is change -- Heraclitus
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