In the last weeks, I have seen some posts against kinds of AI, we are using as a society since decades (yes, decades) just because the Term AI is used.
When we are talking about society and planet destroying AI, we are talking generative AI. That is that shit we know als Claude and ChatGPT.
But media (and we) are starting to mix this up with "classical Machine Learning"
Some stuff that is AI, and I am pretty sure we are not fighting against:
- hand written numbers recognition (developed around 30 years ago)
- lane hold assist systems
- voice recognition
- image classification (computer aided diagnostics in radiology is around since 2010).
Those tasks do not need GPUs, huge amount of RAM or electricity.
We should differentiate between Generative AI (LLM, Video and image Generation) and those old school, valid and useful "AI" systems.
Not seeing a difference between those things is a AI Bro behavior, and should be beneath us.
Just being against everything because somebody wrote "AI" besides it only offers AI Bros an attack surface on every other argument we bring forward.
Everything that makes GenAI bad (hallucinations, AI psychosis, energy consumption, RAM usage,....) is a result of the generative part.
An AI model that recognizes YOUR (yes, your!) handwriting on a envelope and routes your letter correctly, and does that since decades, is also AI. I hope nobody here expects us to go back to sorting boxes and hand sorting of letters and packages.
EDIT: for more detail on AGI vs. GenAI look at this great comment.
Couldn't agree more. I feel this is somewhat what modern discourse is like. Nobody is concerned with concepts. Or what it even is they're "against" or "for". We rather run on emotionalism. Fight words or people instead. That's way easier than tackle the real issue. It's somewhat the same in politics.
I feel most online discussions are more about identity than anything else. People want me to subscribe to their group identity or I'll get downvotes on social media. Nobody is really concerned about the war we're currently talking about and the people living there. Or what AI factually is and what the issue is with those ridiculously large and predatory companies and their effect on people, the environment and basically everything... Which would be the real deal for me. I don't really care if you think text to speech and a thermostat is the same as ChatGPT. It's not. But that's not really why someone would form an identity around being pro- or contra AI in my eyes?!
I always wonder if these big polarizing online topics are healthy in the way we deal with them. I always like to think there's someone sitting at the other end in some office chair in front of a computer. And they feel like they achieved something and really stuck it to their enemy by banning me, or other people, or being very loud about their opinions. All the while the world is probably going to continue to deteriorate? I mean it's not wrong to be vocal about one's opinions. That's the right thing to do. But there's also facts. Most real-world things come with nuance, or some important context attached to the thing itself. And there is some higher goal to achieve... Which is way more important than yelling at random people and subscribing to the simplest "truth" out there, or feeling a certain way.