Paul MacDougall

Toronto's legendary Highway 401

I think we are in the process of discovering that humans are bad at mathematics. A gibbon would scoff at an Olympic climber; the human body is not optimized for climbing. We're getting mounting evidence that our brain may be far from optimal for advanced math. No disrespect to mathematicians. I was a two-time IMO silver medalist; I'm just smart enough to appreciate that some people are much, much smarter. But it's starting to look like math is somewhere on the midpoint of Moravec’s paradox; between chess (computers surpassed us some time back) and cooking (probably many years to go, for general capabilities). It's fairly hard for us, and so it looks like computers are going to surpass us. AI math still has important weaknesses. For instance, AI systems have not yet shown any ability to identify interesting research directions, or develop new concepts on which further work can build. But they are starting to look superhuman in some respects. And once AI *starts* to become superhuman in some domain, we all know what happens next.

Back-of-envelope numbers for 1 gigawatt data center: All-in Capex: ~$50 bn Enterprise revenue generated: ~$25-30 bn/year Electricity cost: $1-2 bn/year ~2 year payback. The boom is real.

the hypocrisy is baffling

The “it’s not AGI because machine intelligence is jagged” is dumb cope. It’s obviously AGI. If you had a friend who had a 130 IQ, could write production code flawlessly, could write academic papers of a high research caliber, pass any exam in any field with flying colors, create a sophisticate LBO model, draw technical diagrams perfectly, compose poetry in any language, and could find solutions to significant unsolved mathematical problems, you would call that person a world historical genius. Certainly, no single human has ever had intelligence that “general” before. Now you think it’s “not AGI” because it sometimes slips up and makes mistakes - so does any human that you would consider “extraordinarily intelligent.” The professor might forget a colleagues name that he has known for a decade. He is still considered intelligent. The math genius might be a little autistic and shy, unable to maintain polite conversation. Still intelligent. You might stare at the fridge for 30 seconds unable to find the butter, despite 5 million years of evolution perfecting your visual intelligence. We give intelligent humans a pass when they have jagged intelligence. So why the double standard? The qualities people list as “necessary for AGI” are important traits to have, but no longer pertain to intelligence. People will say things like “true AGI requires agency, long term goal setting, embodiment, self-direct action”. But none of those things are intelligence. Those are “things that humans have that AI lacks”. Raw intelligence, AI has it in spades. That other stuff - important yet, but broader than and different from intelligence. The unwillingness of people to acknowledge that AGI obviously exists and has existed for a while is due to a kind of anthropic chauvinism - a psychological need to believe that humans are superior in every respect, that we possess soft skills that no machine could replicate. Yes humans are different from machines, but if we are limiting the discussion solely to general intelligence, AI has it already. That battle is over. If you want to reframe the discussion to matters of human dignity and personhood, fine, but that’s not an AGI question. That’s something else. Just take the loss on AGI already. It’s over.

Sure Jan

Labor Force participation is collapsing at a pace only seen during the 2020 crisis. Participation always drops before the official unemployment numbers skyrocket. Of-course that's only if you assume the BLS unemployment numbers are accurate.

Google Omni vs Seedance 2.0 🔥 watch this video and then tell me.. which one is better according to you?

70% of Americans think AI is moving too fast. 77% think entire industries will be eliminated. 97% say AI safety should be subject to rules. Maybe, just maybe, it’s time Congress listened to the American people — not just the billionaires pushing it — and regulated AI.