7 ms·

> The age of humans comprehending things is coming to an end: our brains just won't have the capacity to make meaningful contributions to science, math, or tech

> The age of humans comprehending things is coming to an end: our brains just won't have the capacity to make meaningful contributions to science, math, or technology. That sentiment makes me cringe. If you understand how LLMs work, you'd know it'll never be possible without a fundamental change in how these work. We're also supposed to be reaching that point, somehow, without the LLMs ever being intelligent (in the dictionary definition sense, not the "high reasoning model" marketing sense). Based on observations, the ones who are fooled by the supposed emergent properties, are just that, fools. Any sufficiently unintelligent agent will perceive transformer based LLM text predictors as possessing high intelligence.

tossandthrow 1mo ago
Maybe you can enlighten us. In what way aren't LLMs able to make new contributions. LLMs in agentic harnesses are Turing complete. To my best knowledge, we don't know of any greater computational model that the brain is a part of, that LLMs are not.
- pfdietz 1mo ago
  Obviously actual intelligence has an ineffable essential aspect, just like unicorn farts do.
- okamiueru 1mo ago
  First of all, the argument isn't that LLMs (with I assume some automation) cannot be used in searching a problem space. I'm assuming this is what you're referring to, in terms of contributions? That's the part where LLMs are used as tools. Which there are plenty of places where they are useful. Also, do you know what turning completeness is? Why are you bringing that up here? The crowd that AI psychosis has brought to HN is interesting. But not in the "I'd love to learn more" kind
  - tossandthrow 1mo ago
    > That sentiment makes me cringe. If you understand how LLMs work, you'd know > But not in the "I'd love to learn more" kind I hope you are able to see the problem in your own communication here. Computation classes are interesting because they say something about fundamental capabilities. Two machine that are Turing complete are in theory able to carry out the same computations. They are isomorph mediums of computation. Regardless. Please keep it sober. If you think you know something, enlighten us. But don't just propagate out lies.
    - okamiueru 1mo ago
      The thing about discussing or explaining constraints, is that it rarely is useful or productive if the other side does not accept (or understand) the reality of them. Turing completeness is not exactly a high bar, and it's genuinely confusing as to why you bring it up. Your C++ precompiler is exactly as intelligent as whatever is your favorite agentic workflow with whatever harness you're referring to. Both might be Turing complete. Neither are intelligent. But one of them seems to be fooling you to think otherwise. There have been many times that the C++ precompiler produced some output I couldn't understand. I might even at some point thought it was trying to tell me something profound I was too dumb to comprehend. Turns out it was just a missing semicolon.
      - tossandthrow 1mo ago
        Yes, so there is not reason to believe that you can do computations that the precompiler can not do. There is no reason to believe that that you can not fully simulate intelligence in a C++ precompiler. The precompiler can be simulated by human intelligence, and human intelligence can simulate a c++ precompiler. Again, you are the one who arrogantly say they llms can not be intelligent without supplying any argument for such.
        okamiueru 1mo ago
        > Again, you are the one who arrogantly say they llms can not be intelligent without supplying any argument for such. Not really. You've provided the arguments yourself, just now. But, you don't understand them. Which, brings me back to the initial remark, as to why this engagement is bound to be unproductive. I'm off to bed. Have a good one.

tossandthrow 1mo ago

Maybe you can enlighten us. In what way aren't LLMs able to make new contributions. LLMs in agentic harnesses are Turing complete. To my best knowledge, we don't know of any greater computational model that the brain is a part of, that LLMs are not.

pfdietz 1mo ago
Obviously actual intelligence has an ineffable essential aspect, just like unicorn farts do.
okamiueru 1mo ago
First of all, the argument isn't that LLMs (with I assume some automation) cannot be used in searching a problem space. I'm assuming this is what you're referring to, in terms of contributions? That's the part where LLMs are used as tools. Which there are plenty of places where they are useful. Also, do you know what turning completeness is? Why are you bringing that up here? The crowd that AI psychosis has brought to HN is interesting. But not in the "I'd love to learn more" kind
- tossandthrow 1mo ago
  > That sentiment makes me cringe. If you understand how LLMs work, you'd know > But not in the "I'd love to learn more" kind I hope you are able to see the problem in your own communication here. Computation classes are interesting because they say something about fundamental capabilities. Two machine that are Turing complete are in theory able to carry out the same computations. They are isomorph mediums of computation. Regardless. Please keep it sober. If you think you know something, enlighten us. But don't just propagate out lies.
  - okamiueru 1mo ago
    The thing about discussing or explaining constraints, is that it rarely is useful or productive if the other side does not accept (or understand) the reality of them. Turing completeness is not exactly a high bar, and it's genuinely confusing as to why you bring it up. Your C++ precompiler is exactly as intelligent as whatever is your favorite agentic workflow with whatever harness you're referring to. Both might be Turing complete. Neither are intelligent. But one of them seems to be fooling you to think otherwise. There have been many times that the C++ precompiler produced some output I couldn't understand. I might even at some point thought it was trying to tell me something profound I was too dumb to comprehend. Turns out it was just a missing semicolon.
    - tossandthrow 1mo ago
      Yes, so there is not reason to believe that you can do computations that the precompiler can not do. There is no reason to believe that that you can not fully simulate intelligence in a C++ precompiler. The precompiler can be simulated by human intelligence, and human intelligence can simulate a c++ precompiler. Again, you are the one who arrogantly say they llms can not be intelligent without supplying any argument for such.
      - okamiueru 1mo ago
        > Again, you are the one who arrogantly say they llms can not be intelligent without supplying any argument for such. Not really. You've provided the arguments yourself, just now. But, you don't understand them. Which, brings me back to the initial remark, as to why this engagement is bound to be unproductive. I'm off to bed. Have a good one.