The creation of the system is deeply impressive, so are compilers but I don't raise a toast to it each time I build my code. Like generated art, people aren't going appreciate it on the same level.
To each their own. I mean compilers didn’t produce trillions of dollars of investment, and produce serious and profound philosophical questions about the nature of consciousness but you’re right, thank god we have C
Compilers just made it all possible, but they are not new and shiny. LLMs did not produce the philosophical questions, but they do raise them. It's worth noting that computers have been changing the way we think about consciousness long before LLMs, largely thanks to compilers.
I don't think the level of investment in an idea is equivalent to how impressive it may be. Most of the investment in AI is based on the idea that it will make professions and human labour obsolete, which means whoever has the reins at the moment it "solves" the "problem" of human labour will effectively reign over everyone else. The level of investment is then somewhat orthogonal to how technically impressive it is.
Not to mention that the less easily-explainable a technical achievement is, the less investment it will attract simply because fewer people will grasp the ramifications. You can describe AI in two words ("machine human") while it would take a few more to describe compilers in an instantly understandable way.
I mean - I'd say electricity, agriculture, steam power, metallurgy, silicon computing (cmos), atomic power, the scientific method - these are _all_ very impressive - all lead to drastic changes for humanity. Not sure how I'd rank them.
I personally think AI will end up sitting in the top 3 of these - but that is an opinion. I do think it is obvious it is at least _somewhere_ in that list.
What a weird fucking measuring stick. By your logic crypto is one of man's greatest achievements because it received oodles of investor cash, and kicked up tons of conversations online about the nature of finance and banking.
It’s not the measuring stick, what it can do is the measuring stick. Another person comparing a system that can do Erdos proofs to a compiler or even worse, crypto? Everyone has a right to be unimpressed i just find it incredible to be so dismissive with a straight face.
Wow! I have not heard about that! A 40m tal! Quandong!? Crikey! Tallest I've seen is about 10m. I guess they usually don't get that big in SA.
Must have been ideal conditions for it in your case and maybe it happened to be a particularly vigorous/fast-growing variant!? I have heard that it can be hard to get the seeds to germinate (sounds like it was working without troubles on your property!) I'd actually be kinda happy if it took over most of the grass at my place though I reckon! :)
Ah wow that is awesome, thankyou for clarifying that! Today I learned there's another native fruit with a similar name, but you're right it's a totally different species! Good to know!
I wondered, since quandong sounds like an Aboriginal word, whether it might be similar to what happened with the word 'sapote' in South American fruits. I have heard that it means 'soft fruit' and hardly any of them are even related species!: White Sapote (ice-cream fruit, it's amazing, related to citrus) Black Sapote: might not quite live up to the name chocolate-pudding-fruit, but a perfectly ripe one is still delightful imo, related to persimmon) I haven't tried Mamey Sapote yet or any others.. something to look forward to! :)
I'm envious of that volcanic soil! Quite clay-y in the Adelaide Hills.. I have had a white Sapote in the ground for years and it's still less than 1m tall :/ don't know if it will ever fruit.. should care for the soil better I'm guessing, that might get it going :)
No, IBM has Unisys contractors, not employees. All the techs I’ve worked with from IBM have been a nightmare. One dropped an entire drive array on the ground, and tried to install it despite it being bent and no longer fitting on the rack. I have been acquired by IBM twice. They are a nightmare, horrible company.
IBM has plenty of hardware techs. They're called system services representatives (SSRs) and if you got a Unisys contractor, that just means you're not spending enough money for IBM to send an SSR.
In more minor markets like Europe/Australia it seems to be a lot less leetcode and a lot more (1) experience (2) degree (3) actual interview performance
This is more so because the US companies have been flooded with East / South Asian workers. The proliferation roughly tracks with a decrease in white (European) American representation in tech companies. US companies used to be much more like you described.
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