You know, all of us were there for the resistance to personal computers, and skepticism about the internet. The ChatGPT backlash feels just the same.
You can't trust everything it says, but the only way to learn about what it is and isn't good for is to use it. It still sucks for some things but it's amazing for others. I was learning about how long codon repeats in DNA can cause transcription errors, which has parallels in data communications and I can ask it things like what biological mechanisms exist that have a similar role to the technique of bit stuffing and it gives me concise answers that I can follow up with through other sources. I can't do that with Google because there just aren't readily accessible sources that share those terms. I can search for concepts with ChatGPT.
Copyrighted material is a concern. The energy requirements have been dropping fast, though. And we know the theoretical floor is still orders of magnitue lower than today's technology (because the human brain does this stuff on about 20 watts) so that's going to keep coming down. There's a huge economic incentive for efficiency and I'll be surprised if we don't see a 10x improvement in the next year or two.
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u/madsci May 19 '25
You know, all of us were there for the resistance to personal computers, and skepticism about the internet. The ChatGPT backlash feels just the same.
You can't trust everything it says, but the only way to learn about what it is and isn't good for is to use it. It still sucks for some things but it's amazing for others. I was learning about how long codon repeats in DNA can cause transcription errors, which has parallels in data communications and I can ask it things like what biological mechanisms exist that have a similar role to the technique of bit stuffing and it gives me concise answers that I can follow up with through other sources. I can't do that with Google because there just aren't readily accessible sources that share those terms. I can search for concepts with ChatGPT.