this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2024
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[–] [email protected] 98 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I thought this was fake or a bad result or something, but totally just duplicated it. Wow.

If you read the block of text…. It doesn’t make sense either.

[–] [email protected] 67 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I expect if you follow the references you'd find one of them to be one of those "if Earth was a grain of sand" analogies.

People like laughing at AI but usually these silly-sounding answers accurately reflect the information the search returned.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (19 children)

It's in the quote that they scaled it.

The point is that the entire alleged value is the ability to parse the reading material and extract the key points, but because it doesn't resemble intelligence in any way, it isn't actually capable of meaningfully doing so.

Yes, not being able to distinguish between the real answer and a "banana for scale" analogy is a big problem that shows how fucking useless the technology is.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (2 children)

It’s in the quote that they scaled it.

Yes but they supposedly scaled it to "one meter per meter". A "scale where the distance from the Sun to Earth is 150 million km" is the actual distance.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I just tried and got "about 40,000 billion kilometers". Also the references are completely different from the ones in the post, so I guess it was a ranking issue

AI is just too unpredictable, hard to know what's accurate and you end up doing the work yourself anyways

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

the loaded die at the end that chooses one of the llm's answers happened to land on a good word

[–] [email protected] 65 points 1 month ago (3 children)

A great deal of energy, hardware and software went into providing that wrong answer.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

We should leave AI to the realm of producing fringe/impossible porn, like it was meant for and like what everyone actually wants from it. All this "search engine" stuff is just cover like when you buy some non-lube products like groceries along with the tube of astroglide at 1:00 AM.

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[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 month ago (2 children)

You may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy, Chapter 8.
(...)
”Space,” it says, ”is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mindboggingly big it is. I mean you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space. Listen . . . ” and so on.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Space is small. You just won't believe how itsy, bitsy, mind-bogglingly tiny it is. I mean, you may think it's long way to the fridge, but that's just peanuts to space

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

Space is small.

The diameter of the entire observable universe is not even a full ronnameter.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 month ago
[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (6 children)

Like every tool, it has its uses...but they are not those being advertised. LLMs are great for things where mistakes don't detract from the result (or even add to it) like brainstorming, art, music, disinformation...all that good stuff.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (3 children)

That's what I think too. AI is mainly useful for things that don't have right or wrong answers.

Although this incorrect answers is obvious, what about all the times where an incorrect answer from AI is not obvious?

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[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 month ago

That's a big fucking problem if true. Albeit a short lived problem.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Have you gone 13.6 km up there to verify it's not there?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (4 children)

13.6km is 44,619ft.

So nearly every time one flies commercial, yes, since cruising altitude is between 30,000 and 40,000 feet. I think a large triple-star system would be quite visible at that point.

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 month ago (8 children)

AI is statistically generated word salad.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

Yah I'm so happy every major internet and tech company is deciding to deliberately power every system we use with random word salad generators, there's no chance will cause any problems.

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago (2 children)

In very next line, it says the distance is 4.37 lightyears away... which is also wrong, lol

For anyone wondering, the actual correct answer is about 4.25 lightyears or about 40 trillion kilometers.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (3 children)

These are all equally confusing. How many American football fields?

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

In scientific terms? An absolute fuck-ton of football fields.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Approximately 437,445,319,335,083 of those.

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Relying on LLM for any facts without verifying is playing with fire.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

I suspect there’s a quite-overlapping Venn diagram of people who rely on LLMs for their “facts” with people who believe the earth is flat and people who believe ancient aliens are real.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 month ago (1 children)

So really no excuse when the vogons come

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

There's no excuse anyway. The plans were very prominently displayed.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

On display? I finally found them in the bottom of a locked filling cabinet in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the leopard".

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 month ago

Forgive Bing. It’s American and doesn’t know the metric system.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago

I’m burrrrning!

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago

Stargate is a documentary.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago

It's measuring the distance to your nearest copy of Sid Myers alpha centari

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

Good golly, someone make some chocolate chip cookies, we're going to have to go and welcome them to the neighborhood. Damn rude no one said anything sooner.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

13.6 kilometers ought to be enough for anybody.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Hey, I have a half tank of gas, I think I will go check it out.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It’s ~~126 miles to Chicago~~ 13.6 kilometers to Alpha Centauri, we’ve got a full tank of gas, half a pack off cigarettes, it’s dark, and we’re wearing sunglasses.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago
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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (4 children)

AI sure is gonna be weird if we preface any question involving dimensions with some dumb arbitrary scale as reference.

Depending on trim and accessories, the 2025 Chevrolet Silverado weighs anywhere from 1454 to 1533 watermelons

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Well then, what are we waiting for? Let's go visit Alpha Centauri!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Like, are we sure? Has someone actually checked?

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I have a copy of the Alpha Centauri game about 13.6 meters from me.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

When techbros said "you can type a question and the AI will answer", they seem to have forgotten that we expect the answers to be true and accurate.

And they seem to have forgotten that to do that, they actually need a database of facts.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

That's why it's been so gosh darn hot.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

That explains why it's so hot outside.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

41.5 petameters.

Nobody using the metric system says "trillion kilometers"! 🌞

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