Wonderful essay, Josh. Always glad to see McLuhan brought into the discussion...his provocations are relevant because the transition he describes has been underway since Gutenberg. And thanks for pointing to my review of Co-Intelligence.
I vividly recall getting my first pocket knife, a Barlow, when I was ten. Two blades, limited purpose, but very good for when you needed to cut something. I enjoyed comparing it to my grandfather's swiss army knife and others I encountered, because there was such a variety of tools. I remember loving the chance to flip all the tools out when a friend would let me hold theirs, just to see what it held inside.
I love your analogy because it captures the feeling of using generative AI. You try it out on something and maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. They are both general purpose tools, so the utility and effectiveness vary a great deal with each specific use. The more you use it, the more knowledgeable you are about how to use it well.
Great post. I too invoke the Swiss Army knife metaphor with respect to chatbots, in part because the companies deploying them -- OpenAI in particular -- keep adding functionalities that are outside of the core LLM-based transforms technology. For example, ChatGPT will now execute Python code in response to certain mathematical prompts. Useful, perhaps, but another indication that these tools are, well, tools, and not sentient beings.
Good essay. I am usually irritated by the calculator analogy, being of an age that was in junior high and high school when it hit. This is the first time that I have not been irritated by it. The scalpel and Swiss Army Knife analogy is quite good and probably worth borrowing. I still think the long-term implications are more akin to clocks and watches, but this is great.
What is a LLM?
Wonderful essay, Josh. Always glad to see McLuhan brought into the discussion...his provocations are relevant because the transition he describes has been underway since Gutenberg. And thanks for pointing to my review of Co-Intelligence.
I vividly recall getting my first pocket knife, a Barlow, when I was ten. Two blades, limited purpose, but very good for when you needed to cut something. I enjoyed comparing it to my grandfather's swiss army knife and others I encountered, because there was such a variety of tools. I remember loving the chance to flip all the tools out when a friend would let me hold theirs, just to see what it held inside.
I love your analogy because it captures the feeling of using generative AI. You try it out on something and maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. They are both general purpose tools, so the utility and effectiveness vary a great deal with each specific use. The more you use it, the more knowledgeable you are about how to use it well.
Great post. I too invoke the Swiss Army knife metaphor with respect to chatbots, in part because the companies deploying them -- OpenAI in particular -- keep adding functionalities that are outside of the core LLM-based transforms technology. For example, ChatGPT will now execute Python code in response to certain mathematical prompts. Useful, perhaps, but another indication that these tools are, well, tools, and not sentient beings.
Good essay. I am usually irritated by the calculator analogy, being of an age that was in junior high and high school when it hit. This is the first time that I have not been irritated by it. The scalpel and Swiss Army Knife analogy is quite good and probably worth borrowing. I still think the long-term implications are more akin to clocks and watches, but this is great.