385: AI Snake Oil

Sayash Kapoor (Princeton) discusses the incoherence of precise p(doom) predictions and the pervasiveness of AI “snake oil.” Check out his and Arvind Narayanan’s new book, AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference.

Topics include:

• What’s a prediction, really?
• p(doom): your guess is as good as anyone’s
• Freakishly chaotic creatures (us, that is)
• AI can’t predict the impact of AI
• Gaming AI with invisible ink
• Life is luck—let’s act like it
• Superintelligence (us, that is)
• The bitter lesson
• AI danger: sweat the small stuff

Links:

AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference

AI Existential Risk Probabilities Are Too Unreliable to Inform Policy 

AI Snake Oil (Substack)