Despite the fact that the technology still struggles with simple calculations, many people still seem convinced that AI will replace every job on the planet. As the AI hype continues to fade, the gap between hype and reality is becoming impossible to ignore.
The large-scale language models that make up the world’s favorite chatbots may be powerful compared to the predictive text algorithms that came before them, but they are far from the era-defining superintelligence that many assumed was just around the corner.
In a thread posted to the Reddit forum r/singularity that has since been deleted, an AI enthusiast asked what was clearly a great question. “AI text generation is technically capable enough, so why hasn’t it disrupted books in a big way yet?”
“Language and writing are the most powerful abilities of an LLM because it is an LLM,” the user continued. “Yet people still read books created by humans. Why is that?”
“Ask your LLM to write a sequel to your favorite work. [H]arrive [P]Otter novel, and it will be,” they were excited.
As pointed out in the comments, the answer has to do with the LLM’s lack of focus. As the length of an AI chatbot’s responses increases, it is no longer possible to keep them all consistent, creating a debilitating limitation known as “context rot.” Context corruption is why we never see individual AI-generated video clips longer than a few seconds, or long books that humans actually want to read.
Books aren’t the only thing tech optimists expected to be devoured by AI. In a separate post on X (formerly Twitter), OpenAI staffer Ryan Brewer expressed frustration that AI “didn’t create a renaissance in education.”
“Isn’t it possible to learn a language in a month?” Brewer asked in a post that quickly garnered more than 2.1 million views. “What did we do wrong?”
In reality, of course, attempts to integrate AI into education consistently end in disaster. After all, technology that confidently spews out a mix of fact and fiction without requiring users to track or digest the information themselves isn’t particularly conducive to effective schooling.
One user quipped, “It’s so depressing that so many people think this is what learning is all about.”
Another user simply shared a screenshot of an AI chatbot’s text box that includes the prompt “Tell me”.
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