Cal Newport recently wrote a wonderful long piece for the New Yorker called: “What Kind of Mind Does ChatGPT Have?“. Do read it if you have any interest in the future of large language models.
My thanks go to Steve Moore for bringing this to my attention. When he posted it, I replied with this tiny snippet from the article that leapt out for me:
ChatGPT cannot create, it imitates
I then noted in my reply to Steve:
This makes me consider “what is authentic creation of a new idea?”
I’ve often said “there are no new ideas, simply iterations and evolutions of existing ideas”
What is the gap, then, between humans and AI ?
There is much to consider, philosophically, about AI, as the Cal Newport piece goes into, as well as my own question posed above. However, taking the philosophical pondering to another level was the reply Rory Sutherland gave me when I shared my thoughts on this with him:
Simply through sheer brute force and volume it will come up with some interesting concepts. But it is us who will notice they are interesting.
My only response to him as he blew my mind was:
Deep, dude
As I capture those chats here, though, Rory’s response makes me think:
if a tree falls in an AI forest will it make a sound?