Good example! Lots of cultures and civilizations understood this well over certain eras, and things from those places and times tend to be designed in very fun ways.. While in other places or other eras, everything gets quite boring (look at a lot of Soviet buildings and objects!).
Taiwan is an interesting place to walk around for this reason. Fun temples next to Soviet era buildings. What are some other examples? Have you written about this?
Modern skyscrapers are likely much more involved per floor with respect to HVAC, safety (of the building and its builders), fire prevention, electrical infrastructure, and complexity of criminal grifts. Fits the "Ship of Theseus" analogy in multiple ways.
If I'm wrong so be it, but AI identifying a writer based on a generic line w/o access to the internet or the specific article its from totally red-lines my BS detector. Possibly it's a line or passage that appeared verbatim in the past that *is* accessible or was part of its "learning".
I agree and thought about that, but you would think that almost a hundred years of progress would create some productivity tailwinds too to compensate for at least part of that (software to do planning, layout, various parts made in factories that just needs to be installed on site, modern communications and scheduling on site, etc).
As for the ID'ing, others have tested it on other authors with very recent work (within days), so it seems to be legit. I feel like if some of the models that claim not to have internet access had it, people would've found it via many ways, so it's probably statistical analysis of the text, which is kind of scary in itself!
Agreed, esp. in re: “scary”. BMW (maybe Mercedes?) is bragging that they can now tell if a new factory will actually work, or avoid major & costly errors, if first modelled as a virtual factory “metaverse”. Wut… this hasn’t been done for decades? I expect for every real or presumed / theoretical productivity tailwind you listed there are plenty of regulations, grifts and unintended consequences to more than negate the benefits.
Then there’s the ESG / DIE BS one must pretend to value and take seriously to get anything done in too many endeavours. Silicon Valley Bank collapsed in no small part because of it. Someday skyscrapers probably will too.
In France they recently spent some $200mm+ IIRC (or billion?) on trains too big to fit into existing tunnels. We could certainly debate whether this was actually an error. Our perceived error or inefficiency is someone’s huge payday if not entire career.
Yep, I think that's exactly the point. We should be able to do at least as well, or better, but we've lost that ability and should seriously look at what is making everything so slow and expensive. It's not all BS, some stuff should be kept, but I suspect that A LOT of it is BS and could be cut or reformed.
I love this re fun haha. This is how I feel about goose neck kettles for pour over coffee. Just epically delightful every day
Good example! Lots of cultures and civilizations understood this well over certain eras, and things from those places and times tend to be designed in very fun ways.. While in other places or other eras, everything gets quite boring (look at a lot of Soviet buildings and objects!).
Taiwan is an interesting place to walk around for this reason. Fun temples next to Soviet era buildings. What are some other examples? Have you written about this?
I haven't written on this, at least not directly... but maybe I should!
Defying the rational part of my brain I decided to jump into the mechanical keyboard world for more fun and haven’t looked back
I haven't gotten into that rabbit hole yet... I kinda like my Apple Magic Keyboard with fairly low travel keys.. But maybe someday!
The best demonstration of Ship of Theseus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY
Ha! That's perfect. I had never seen that one before, thank you Marc 💚 🥃
Modern skyscrapers are likely much more involved per floor with respect to HVAC, safety (of the building and its builders), fire prevention, electrical infrastructure, and complexity of criminal grifts. Fits the "Ship of Theseus" analogy in multiple ways.
If I'm wrong so be it, but AI identifying a writer based on a generic line w/o access to the internet or the specific article its from totally red-lines my BS detector. Possibly it's a line or passage that appeared verbatim in the past that *is* accessible or was part of its "learning".
A fun & thought provoking read as always. Thanks.
I agree and thought about that, but you would think that almost a hundred years of progress would create some productivity tailwinds too to compensate for at least part of that (software to do planning, layout, various parts made in factories that just needs to be installed on site, modern communications and scheduling on site, etc).
As for the ID'ing, others have tested it on other authors with very recent work (within days), so it seems to be legit. I feel like if some of the models that claim not to have internet access had it, people would've found it via many ways, so it's probably statistical analysis of the text, which is kind of scary in itself!
Agreed, esp. in re: “scary”. BMW (maybe Mercedes?) is bragging that they can now tell if a new factory will actually work, or avoid major & costly errors, if first modelled as a virtual factory “metaverse”. Wut… this hasn’t been done for decades? I expect for every real or presumed / theoretical productivity tailwind you listed there are plenty of regulations, grifts and unintended consequences to more than negate the benefits.
Then there’s the ESG / DIE BS one must pretend to value and take seriously to get anything done in too many endeavours. Silicon Valley Bank collapsed in no small part because of it. Someday skyscrapers probably will too.
In France they recently spent some $200mm+ IIRC (or billion?) on trains too big to fit into existing tunnels. We could certainly debate whether this was actually an error. Our perceived error or inefficiency is someone’s huge payday if not entire career.
Yep, I think that's exactly the point. We should be able to do at least as well, or better, but we've lost that ability and should seriously look at what is making everything so slow and expensive. It's not all BS, some stuff should be kept, but I suspect that A LOT of it is BS and could be cut or reformed.