Actually Useful AI

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Setting time on fire and the temptation of The Button (www.oneusefulthing.org)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Quote from the article:

And the terrible, horrible thing about it is THIS IS A GOOD LETTER. It is better than most letters of recommendation that I receive. This means that not only is the quality of the letter no longer a signal of the professor’s interest, but also that you may actually be hurting people by not writing a letter of recommendation by AI, especially if you are not a particularly strong writer. So people now have to consider that the goal of the letter (getting a student a job) is in contrast with the morally-correct method of accomplishing the goal (the professor spending a lot of time writing the letter). I am still doing all my letters the old-fashioned way, but I wonder whether that will ultimately do my student’s a disservice.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Although AI will impart a pretty new flavor to it, I think whether or not AI gets used a tool to create more genuine value, vs being used to produce bullshit at greater scale and efficiency, comes down to human organizational factors that don’t have much to do with AI. Take the example of the recommendation letter: if the person writing the letter and the organization receiving it cares that content of the letter reflects real experiences, then I think AI writing assistance will be used to that end. If it’s just a rote requirement that needs to be ticked off, then lazy AI written letters will prove quite effective. Whether people care or not I think has to with the interaction of their own personal values with the structural incentives the organization. New developments in AI may highlight how those incentives are aligned or misaligned, but potential solutions have to do with a facet of human behavior that’s much more ancient.

[–] JerkyIsSuperior 1 points 1 year ago

One thing stuck with me from this article - AI technology has the potential to free us from busywork or might mean that we get saddled with even more pointless work whose sole purpose is control and monitoring. It is up to decide which future do we want.