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Anyone else tired of AI?

 
 
 
Bronzeage said:
I remember attending a lecture by a visiting Economic Professor. He talked about the business cycles in the US during the second half of the 19th century. There was a boom in railroad building. Huge amounts of capital was poured into railroads and it wasn't long before they discovered a harsh truth, which was a short railroad can't make any money. There is a minimum customer base and if your market area is too small, it's only a matter of time. Almost all the smaller railroad companies either went bankrupt, or were bought out by larger railroads. This led to consolidation and virtual monopoly power for the survivors.

Today, AI is like the railroads. It costs a lot of money to serve your first customer and almost nothing more to serve the second one. A full train has about the same operating cost as an empty one.

The real question is whether or not there is a market for all the AI capacity that's being built. There's certainly a demand for silly videos and term papers, but how much are people willing to pay when the demo period is over? It's likely to be like the railroads. Those who can't capture a market share that covers the investment will die, leaving the survivors to consolidate until someone is profitable. One thing is certain, a lot of the invested money will be lost in the process.
Click to expand...
AI capacity is capacity regardless of its use. It is expected that it will be business that will increase its percentage of use more so than personal use. A concern would be if AI is underwhelming or rolls out about as fast as a Tesla product, will some of this hardware age out before it is ever fully utilized.
 
Any complex detection system including humans will have a false positive and false negate rate.

Given the school violence issue, in a system to detect kids carrying weapons or violent behavior in schools I'd be more worried about the miss rate than false hits.

Fro local reporting on the lage Amazon job cuts, a lot of white collar jobs are going to be replaced by AI. The cost in part are being made to fund e costs of transitioning to AI.
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In an Econ 101 class the teacher ashed what is the purpose if capitalism. I said something like to provide goods and services at the lowest cost.

He pointed his finger at me and said 'Wrong! The purpose of capitalism is to make a prfit'.

AI all about making a profit, return on investment.

You could say AI started with the solid state transistor and the Turing Machine, Alan Turing's concept of a general purpose programmable computer.

The desk top computer, Windows, and the MS Office suite eliminated a lot of skilled and semiskilled jobs.

Computers and low cost software had a pp found effect in engineer. Who needs a skilled draftsman when software make perfect curves and straight lines with no drawing skills?

Who need an accounting clerk when you have a spreadsheet?

Are you tred of computers and electronics?
 
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steve_bank said:
In an Econ 101 class the teacher ashed what is the purpose if capitalism. I said something like to provide goods and services at the lowest cost.

He pointed his finger at me and said 'Wrong! The purpose of capitalism is to make a prfit'.
Click to expand...
He shouldn’t have done that. It discourages the student from asking questions in the future. See, these people learn subject matter but they don’t learn how to teach.
He should have said that that is one school of thought. Can you think of another?
Isn’t that so much better?
 
TV and credit cards said:
steve_bank said:
In an Econ 101 class the teacher ashed what is the purpose if capitalism. I said something like to provide goods and services at the lowest cost.

He pointed his finger at me and said 'Wrong! The purpose of capitalism is to make a prfit'.
Click to expand...
He shouldn’t have done that. It discourages the student from asking questions in the future. See, these people learn subject matter but they don’t learn how to teach.
He should have said that that is one school of thought. Can you think of another?
Isn’t that so much better?
Click to expand...

The teacher wasn’t wrong, though. In capitalism, the purpose is profit, that’s the engine driving everything else. Providing goods and services at the lowest cost isn’t the goal itself; it’s the result of competition among businesses trying to make that profit. That process is called undercutting for profit.

What “other school of thought” is there for capitalism? Your proposed response doesn’t make sense. It would make more sense to suggest that the teacher expand on how lower costs fit into capitalism, but implying there are competing schools of thought on its purpose? That’s nonsense.
 
Gospel said:
TV and credit cards said:
steve_bank said:
In an Econ 101 class the teacher ashed what is the purpose if capitalism. I said something like to provide goods and services at the lowest cost.

He pointed his finger at me and said 'Wrong! The purpose of capitalism is to make a prfit'.
Click to expand...
He shouldn’t have done that. It discourages the student from asking questions in the future. See, these people learn subject matter but they don’t learn how to teach.
He should have said that that is one school of thought. Can you think of another?
Isn’t that so much better?
Click to expand...

The teacher wasn’t wrong, though. In capitalism, the purpose is profit, that’s the engine driving everything else. Providing goods and services at the lowest cost isn’t the goal itself; it’s the result of competition among businesses trying to make that profit. That process is called undercutting for profit.

What “other school of thought” is there for capitalism? Your proposed response doesn’t make sense. It would make more sense to suggest that the teacher expand on how lower costs fit into capitalism, but implying there are competing schools of thought on its purpose? That’s nonsense.
Click to expand...
My example on the subject matter was not meant to necessarily be accurate. My point is to first keep the student engaged. Pointing at a student and saying “ Wrong!” or shotgunning a student, that is calling on one who hasn’t offered to answer a question can cause some students to disengage. Then at this point the subject matter is for naught. You’ve potentially humiliated this person in front of his peers. Yes, some people are this fragile.
 
Bronzeage said:
I remember attending a lecture by a visiting Economic Professor. He talked about the business cycles in the US during the second half of the 19th century. There was a boom in railroad building. Huge amounts of capital was poured into railroads and it wasn't long before they discovered a harsh truth, which was a short railroad can't make any money. There is a minimum customer base and if your market area is too small, it's only a matter of time. Almost all the smaller railroad companies either went bankrupt, or were bought out by larger railroads. This led to consolidation and virtual monopoly power for the survivors.

Today, AI is like the railroads. It costs a lot of money to serve your first customer and almost nothing more to serve the second one. A full train has about the same operating cost as an empty one.

The real question is whether or not there is a market for all the AI capacity that's being built. There's certainly a demand for silly videos and term papers, but how much are people willing to pay when the demo period is over? It's likely to be like the railroads. Those who can't capture a market share that covers the investment will die, leaving the survivors to consolidate until someone is profitable. One thing is certain, a lot of the invested money will be lost in the process.
Click to expand...

Man, I really love this analogy, it’s more fact than analogy, honestly. I’d only add that the railroads faced physical scalability limits, while AI doesn’t. That difference might let the market adjust to changes in demand more easily.

With railroads, once the tracks were laid, that capital was locked in. If demand dropped or a route failed, there was no way to repurpose it. AI, on the other hand, runs on digital infrastructure, data centers and compute power that can be reallocated, leased, or resold almost instantly. “Dead tracks” isn't a major concern there.

So instead of outright bankruptcies and stranded assets like the rail era, we might see overbuilt AI capacity get absorbed or repurposed. Ya know, hardware being a commodity, small AI models rented, specialized or consolidated between firms.

The bubble will burst, but after the smoke clears, there'd be more redistribution than collapse in comparison to rail IMO.
 
TV and credit cards said:
Bronzeage said:
I remember attending a lecture by a visiting Economic Professor. He talked about the business cycles in the US during the second half of the 19th century. There was a boom in railroad building. Huge amounts of capital was poured into railroads and it wasn't long before they discovered a harsh truth, which was a short railroad can't make any money. There is a minimum customer base and if your market area is too small, it's only a matter of time. Almost all the smaller railroad companies either went bankrupt, or were bought out by larger railroads. This led to consolidation and virtual monopoly power for the survivors.

Today, AI is like the railroads. It costs a lot of money to serve your first customer and almost nothing more to serve the second one. A full train has about the same operating cost as an empty one.

The real question is whether or not there is a market for all the AI capacity that's being built. There's certainly a demand for silly videos and term papers, but how much are people willing to pay when the demo period is over? It's likely to be like the railroads. Those who can't capture a market share that covers the investment will die, leaving the survivors to consolidate until someone is profitable. One thing is certain, a lot of the invested money will be lost in the process.
Click to expand...
AI capacity is capacity regardless of its use. It is expected that it will be business that will increase its percentage of use more so than personal use. A concern would be if AI is underwhelming or rolls out about as fast as a Tesla product, will some of this hardware age out before it is ever fully utilized.
Click to expand...
The Economics and Mathematics Departments are next door to each other. The current capital investment in AI is roughly $200 billion. The US GNP is roughly $30 trillion, so there is room in the economy for commerce to increase by using AI and produce the profits which will pay back the investment. The question of "will it?" remains a big maybe.

If one looks back to the late 1940s and early 50's, popular magazines were filled with articles about the Atomic Future. We were going to power our home for pennies a decade with a back yard atomic reactor. Our Atomic car would need new tires before it would need new fuel. All of that is technically possible, except no one would buy it. The pennies for a decade promise was never delivered.
 
Bronzeage said:
The pennies for a decade promise was never delivered
Click to expand...
This happened for a few reasons: nuclear reactors require solid infrastructure; products of nuclear reactions are quite dangerous to have widely distributed like that; the oil lobby was able to dramatically oversell fears of nuclear power dangers using connections to the fears of nuclear weapons.

This resulted in what amounts to a cultural scale allergic reaction to nuclear power.
 
TV and credit cards said:
Gospel said:
TV and credit cards said:
steve_bank said:
In an Econ 101 class the teacher ashed what is the purpose if capitalism. I said something like to provide goods and services at the lowest cost.

He pointed his finger at me and said 'Wrong! The purpose of capitalism is to make a prfit'.
Click to expand...
He shouldn’t have done that. It discourages the student from asking questions in the future. See, these people learn subject matter but they don’t learn how to teach.
He should have said that that is one school of thought. Can you think of another?
Isn’t that so much better?
Click to expand...

The teacher wasn’t wrong, though. In capitalism, the purpose is profit, that’s the engine driving everything else. Providing goods and services at the lowest cost isn’t the goal itself; it’s the result of competition among businesses trying to make that profit. That process is called undercutting for profit.

What “other school of thought” is there for capitalism? Your proposed response doesn’t make sense. It would make more sense to suggest that the teacher expand on how lower costs fit into capitalism, but implying there are competing schools of thought on its purpose? That’s nonsense.
Click to expand...
My example on the subject matter was not meant to necessarily be accurate. My point is to first keep the student engaged. Pointing at a student and saying “ Wrong!” or shotgunning a student, that is calling on one who hasn’t offered to answer a question can cause some students to disengage. Then at this point the subject matter is for naught. You’ve potentially humiliated this person in front of his peers. Yes, some people are this fragile.
Click to expand...

Job creation, advances in manufacturing efficiency, variety of goods are by products of the profit risk reward incentive. It works as advertsed.

The proble is the expectation that if left alone the system will be fair in results which it never has been.

The right insists that all things be driven by the capitalism including critical infrastructure like health care. They stick to it despite how growing numbers of people are having problems with basic necessities.

AI is a prime example. A lot of money is going into developing AI while people can not afford helth care. Not enough moey for schools. And so on.

Unrestrricted deploymnett desp[ite of hte seropus consunces, all drven by profit.
 
Jarhyn said:
Bronzeage said:
The pennies for a decade promise was never delivered
Click to expand...
This happened for a few reasons: nuclear reactors require solid infrastructure; products of nuclear reactions are quite dangerous to have widely distributed like that; the oil lobby was able to dramatically oversell fears of nuclear power dangers using connections to the fears of nuclear weapons.

This resulted in what amounts to a cultural scale allergic reaction to nuclear power.
Click to expand...
The pennies for a decade promise was based on the current understanding of the problem. It was assumed engineering would solve all the obvious problems in the future. It didn't work that way. The actual production of energy through atomic reactors was so expensive, just like the railroads, it had to be big to be profitable.

Atomic energy ran up a economic reality. The chief competition for a new technology is always the old technology.
 
In the 50s 60s the idea was all you had to do was scale up Naval nuclear reactors to an industrial scale.

Claims were made electricity would be so cheap it would not be metered. Just a flat monthly fee.

People soured on nuclear power from the fear of nuclear war, the images of the use of nuclear weapons, and finally Three Mile Island. The movie China Syndrome.

Where to store nuclear waste is still an issue, NIMBY not in my back yard.

A problem with something like nuclear power is there is no large sclae p[reduction where bugs can be worked out.
 
Bronzeage said:
Jarhyn said:
Bronzeage said:
The pennies for a decade promise was never delivered
Click to expand...
This happened for a few reasons: nuclear reactors require solid infrastructure; products of nuclear reactions are quite dangerous to have widely distributed like that; the oil lobby was able to dramatically oversell fears of nuclear power dangers using connections to the fears of nuclear weapons.

This resulted in what amounts to a cultural scale allergic reaction to nuclear power.
Click to expand...
The pennies for a decade promise was based on the current understanding of the problem. It was assumed engineering would solve all the obvious problems in the future. It didn't work that way. The actual production of energy through atomic reactors was so expensive, just like the railroads, it had to be big to be profitable.

Atomic energy ran up a economic reality. The chief competition for a new technology is always the old technology.
Click to expand...
The obvious problems were never with the engineering. They were with the human NIMBY element, driven by fears of economic displacement within the entrenched fossil fuel industry; that's less an "economic" reality and more a "humans are fuckers" reality.

Individual scale? No, that was never going to happen. But at the scale of existing coal and gas infrastructure was well within reach and would fulfil the promise the century of cheap electric power that was tendered.
 
There is investment and work being done on small sealed playable community scale reactors.

inl.gov

Microreactors

Idaho National Laboratory | Microreactors
inl.gov inl.gov

Simple designs hat can produced on an assembly line so to speak reducing costs, economizes of scale.

It proceeding because there is penitential return on investment.

Potential profit drives the science and engineering to make the cost competitive with other sources.

Capitalism and free market completion.

Nuclear power did turn out to be more expensive than predicted.

Here in Washington decades back here was funding for a new nuclear pants. Dropping elect city costs made it impractical plus cost over runs. I have driven past one of the abandoned cooling towers ,

Nuclear power was never cost competitive with fossil fuels and fossil fuel construction costs.

en.wikipedia.org

WNP-3 and WNP-5 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
steve_bank said:
Where to store nuclear waste is still an issue, NIMBY not in my back yard.
Click to expand...
No, it isn't.

It's been stored in dry casks at nuclear power plants for seventy years, without any kind of incident. We know exactly how and where to store it in a way that is completely safe, and harmless to the environment.

It's a propaganda ploy by the anti-nuclear lobby to declare that there is a problem (there isn't), and that we must solve it (we can't, because it doesn't exist).

Aha! They say. So you admit it can't be solved!

And around and around we go...
 
bilby said:
steve_bank said:
Nuclear power was never cost competitive with fossil fuels and fossil fuel construction costs.
Click to expand...
Yes it was. It isn't now, in the US, because it's been regulated to death.
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Seems like you may have previously attempted to disabuse Steve of his notion of the inherent cost of nuclear.
If Steve was right OKLO would be a penny stock instead of bouncing around between $115 and $185 lately.
 
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bilby said:
Gospel said:
The teacher wasn’t wrong, though.
Click to expand...
Yes, he was; He thought the purpose of teaching was to tell people facts, but it is actually to help them to learn.

:D
Click to expand...

Profit is an eventually required feature of a business in a capitalist system for it to be considered viable, but that doesn’t necessarily elevate profit above all other (possibly even more critical) concerns. Nor is it propitious (IME) to treat it as such.
One of our internal taglines at my last venture was “people, products, profits”.
It was an ordered set of priorities that we imposed upon employees - a mini-corporate “ethos” if you’ll permit.
Yes, you do have to get to profits if you want to wake up tomorrow and be able to do it all again. But it need not be #1 all the time. People come first. If you’re real about that they sense it and trust you.
 
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From what I have read the problem is the financing. It takes many more years to see a return on investment than gas.
I think the only way to move forward is government investment.
 
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