Like a lot of blog posts, this feels like a premise worth exploring, lacking a critical exploration of that premise.
Yes, "inevitabilism" is a thing, both in tech and in politics. But, crucially, it's not always wrong! Other comments have pointed out examples, such as the internet in the 90s. But when considering new cultural and technological developments that seem like a glimpse of the future, how do we know if they're an inevitability or not?
The post says:
> what I’m most certain of is that we have choices about what our future should look like, and how we choose to use machines to build it.
To me, that sounds like mere wishful thinking. Yeah, sometimes society can turn back the tide of harmful developments; for instance, the ozone layer is well on its way to complete recovery. Other times, even when public opinion is mixed, such as with bitcoin, the technology does become quite successful, but doesn't seem to become quite as ubiquitous as its most fervent adherents expect. So how do we know which category LLM usage falls into? I don't know the answer, because I think it's a difficult thing to know in advance.
Yes, "inevitabilism" is a thing, both in tech and in politics. But, crucially, it's not always wrong! Other comments have pointed out examples, such as the internet in the 90s. But when considering new cultural and technological developments that seem like a glimpse of the future, how do we know if they're an inevitability or not?
The post says:
> what I’m most certain of is that we have choices about what our future should look like, and how we choose to use machines to build it.
To me, that sounds like mere wishful thinking. Yeah, sometimes society can turn back the tide of harmful developments; for instance, the ozone layer is well on its way to complete recovery. Other times, even when public opinion is mixed, such as with bitcoin, the technology does become quite successful, but doesn't seem to become quite as ubiquitous as its most fervent adherents expect. So how do we know which category LLM usage falls into? I don't know the answer, because I think it's a difficult thing to know in advance.