Once upon a time people thought software development and Math would be among the last refuges as AI took work, and did it better and cheaper. Instead, there are still people stacking supermarket shelves (for now), and it’s white collar work that is being eliminated.
Cédric Villani is a professor of Math at the École normale supérieure de Rennes and he raises a lot of thought provoking points in this interview.
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He says AI’s rapid improvement in Math has taken him by surprise, and he did not anticipate it 12 months ago.
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Universities haven’t the budget to compete with AI companies, hence their research students are now cut off from leading Math research.
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The purpose of PhD programs is to develop skills, but if AI can do it all quicker and better, what’s the point in Math PhD programs?
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Among undergraduates, most are using AI, and their basic basic reasoning skills are atrophying as a result.
Youtube Interview between Prof. Cédric Villani & Takahiro Yasuno 安野貴博の自由研究
The future is stupid
Yes we humans should stop being able to understand all the things the machines come up with, and just let them have all the control. What could possibly go wrong?
I feel like the whole world was drugged at some point, how did you people all get so fucking dumb?
People have been fed the Story of Progress for the last centuries and it became a secular religion next to the Story of Money. It’s the last few years that many people see how unequal the happy ending is in these stories, thanks to the billionaire class and AI companies doing and saying their thing.
The ruling class will sacrifice anything to reduce their dependence on workers.
I like how they find the one math professor who is like “should we even teach higher level math anymore?”
Every kind of knowledge work is headed for that crossroads. It sucks when it starts to feel like the ‘human in the loop’ is the bottleneck, especially when you’re the human.
But cutting education programs feels shortsighted and reactionary. We still need people that understand things.
The AI math better so we can mathn’t
So, their PhD programs were bullshit, and they’ve been called out on it. That’s how I’m reading it.
