The Dark Side Of The Singularity

**wickedsolo** · 07-17-2018, 07:22 AM

Originally Posted by Dade

LOL I know you weren't. But yeah...I see those people all the time and it pisses me off. I'm a GS-12 and the 13s and 14s are the most useless, waste of spaces I've ever encountered.

Totally understand. That's why I left the Fed Gubberment 4 years ago. I was a 12 and the lead analyst for our team. Had a few 14's on the team that I oversaw. They couldn't deal with the fact that a 12 was the lead and they weren't. What made it worse was that those people were pretty darn worthless.

What really made me leave was a guy who was a GS-15. Awesome guy. Ton of operational experience, prior Army NCO, etc. He tried to get involved on the ops team several times and he was blatantly told "stay in your lane" by inferior people. So, he did. He got into work in the morning around 6:30AM. He added some info to his morning brief slide. The info was provided to him, he didn't generate it. He then forwarded 6 emails to distro lists. He went home practically every day around noon.

That guy is making over $130K a year, plus gov benefits, and an upcoming pension.

And he presents 1 slide and forwards 6 emails.

That's it.

**Dade** · 07-17-2018, 09:16 AM

Originally Posted by wickedsolo

Totally understand. That's why I left the Fed Gubberment 4 years ago. I was a 12 and the lead analyst for our team. Had a few 14's on the team that I oversaw. They couldn't deal with the fact that a 12 was the lead and they weren't. What made it worse was that those people were pretty darn worthless.

What really made me leave was a guy who was a GS-15. Awesome guy. Ton of operational experience, prior Army NCO, etc. He tried to get involved on the ops team several times and he was blatantly told "stay in your lane" by inferior people. So, he did. He got into work in the morning around 6:30AM. He added some info to his morning brief slide. The info was provided to him, he didn't generate it. He then forwarded 6 emails to distro lists. He went home practically every day around noon.

That guy is making over $130K a year, plus gov benefits, and an upcoming pension.

And he presents 1 slide and forwards 6 emails.

That's it.

Wow. That type of stuff is all over the federal government. Fortunately I don't have to deal with the other 13s and 14s much being a Director, and everyone under me is active duty.

**BPF2** · 07-17-2018, 10:25 AM

Originally Posted by Dade

Wow. That type of stuff is all over the federal government. Fortunately I don't have to deal with the other 13s and 14s much being a Director, and everyone under me is active duty.

It's not just in government. I've worked my whole career in a few Fortune 100 companies. The bigger the organization, the more of those types there are. There are lots of people who basically do no work other than to make your own work more difficult with red tape and policies. That's the go to excuse "that's the policy". Do you know how difficult it is to change a policy in a large corporation? It has to get approvals from people so high up who really don't give a shit about that policy (nor should they honestly) so any request is back burnered or just dismissed.

**Trackmaster** · 07-17-2018, 11:19 AM

For anybody who is a gamer at all, you realize pretty easily just how far behind AI is from human decision making. Its not even close. The only way they can have the computers put up any kind of a challenge for a good player in a strategy game is to give the computer all kinds of resource and other fake built-in advantages. The AI just can't create complex, effective, and deceptive strategies the same way that humans can. The human mind just has so many different connections and complexities that we'll never be able to create electronically.

**JAB1985** · 07-17-2018, 11:53 AM

Originally Posted by Trackmaster

For anybody who is a gamer at all, you realize pretty easily just how far behind AI is from human decision making. Its not even close. The only way they can have the computers put up any kind of a challenge for a good player in a strategy game is to give the computer all kinds of resource and other fake built-in advantages. The AI just can't create complex, effective, and deceptive strategies the same way that humans can. The human mind just has so many different connections and complexities that we'll never be able to create electronically.

I dont know if thats a good example.

Game makers arent building games with AI dominance in mind. theyre building a game for the player, one that they hope they continue playing. Winning is more fun than getting your ass handed to you to the point you dont bother playing. they walk a tightrope with that, hard enough that you struggle and keep playing, but easy enough that its actually doable.

If were going to go down the Video game route as an example, look at chess. They design AI to play that to win, not with the other players exerience in mind, and theyve far exceeded the human range on the Elo rating scale because of that.

**Dade** · 07-17-2018, 12:51 PM

Originally Posted by Trackmaster

For anybody who is a gamer at all, you realize pretty easily just how far behind AI is from human decision making. Its not even close. The only way they can have the computers put up any kind of a challenge for a good player in a strategy game is to give the computer all kinds of resource and other fake built-in advantages. The AI just can't create complex, effective, and deceptive strategies the same way that humans can. The human mind just has so many different connections and complexities that we'll never be able to create electronically.

As Jab said that's not a good example. Building AI in a video game to respond to the player for specific purpuses is different to AI/automation of our economy. Even then, AI's have been created that have beaten the best in the world in chess and Go.

https://www.wired.com/2016/03/google...ius-lee-sedol/

**NCRAVEN** · 07-17-2018, 01:27 PM

Originally Posted by Dade

As Jab said that's not a good example. Building AI in a video game to respond to the player for specific purpuses is different to AI/automation of our economy. Even then, AI's have been created that have beaten the best in the world in chess and Go.

https://www.wired.com/2016/03/google...ius-lee-sedol/

I don't think chess is a good example of AI either though. Chess is a series of moves and counter moves, really all AI is doing is processing those moves faster than a person, which is not a shock.

**usmccharles** · 07-17-2018, 01:28 PM

Originally Posted by wickedsolo

I'm telling you NC...buying 500 acres in northern Montana or something is sounding better and better...buy 500 acres most of it wooded in the hills/mountains. Clear about 10 acres for a house, crops, and livestock.

Lately I have been soul searching a bit trying to figure out what is important to me in life. I am really considering buying some land by a lake where I grew up in Arkansas and maybe going the shipping container route and building something small and efficient for myself, basically for the reasons being discussed right now

**NCRAVEN** · 07-17-2018, 01:32 PM

Originally Posted by usmccharles

Lately I have been soul searching a bit trying to figure out what is important to me in life. I am really considering buying some land by a lake where I grew up in Arkansas and maybe going the shipping container route and building something small and efficient for myself, basically for the reasons being discussed right now

I wish I could get my wife to sign off on something like that.

**Dade** · 07-17-2018, 01:46 PM

Originally Posted by NCRAVEN

I don't think chess is a good example of AI either though. Chess is a series of moves and counter moves, really all AI is doing is processing those moves faster than a person, which is not a shock.

True. But the AI beating the best at Go in the article I linked is far more impressive.

**Greg** · 07-17-2018, 10:10 PM

Originally Posted by blueridgemtnman

If I were a young person today, or advising one, I'd be looking into robotics as a career path in some way, shape or form. Also, I believe it's coming faster than most think. I imagine Mickey D's, etc. are working fast and furious to automate. Right now.

I didn't mention healthcare but that is a likely field not to go away.

**Greg** · 07-17-2018, 10:26 PM

Originally Posted by Laxdad24

I think “manual labor ‘ jobs are gonna be around for a long time. I dont see a robot changing the brake pads on your 2019 Buick.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If it were worthwhile and there weren't more profitable lower hanging fruit they could make a robot that could change brake pads very quickly.