The Age of Flippy is Coming
As a general rule, i think a lot of people misunderstand just how excited I am about AI. Plausibly, this could also be due to my much more obvious, and considerably greater elation toward hypersonics.
But AI is getting very, very good, very quickly.
Let’s talk about GPT Astra for a moment. In simple terms, GPT6 Astra is really good at parsing images and then turning those images into 3D renderings in programs like Blender and the like. And while that might seem like just another impressive AI demonstration, I think the implications are much larger than that. We’re rapidly reaching the point where AI is starting to perform actual work → work that, until very recently, you needed a person to do.
So, guess who’s going to be out of a job now?
Here’s what’s happening. I recently went to a McDonald’s with a buddy of mine, gave them my order, and it was an AI taking the order. How could I tell? Because it got everything right. So, that’s the real reality here: AI is working. It’s taking people’s jobs.
And what’s going to happen to all the Uber drivers whenever Cybercabs and Waymos take over? Because people are acclimating to this. I have buddies out in the U.S. who are driving around and seeing these things all over the place. And then I look at the data, and the data says, pretty unequivocally, that these self-driving cars are infinitely safer than a person driving the car. So where is this going? What’s going to happen in the long term with this?
And I think we really need to come to terms with that, because right now, it looks like a lot of people are going to be losing their jobs. And I think that’s a sad thing in a lot of ways. But we have to look at reality, and this is what reality is.
Now, especially in the West, there’s obviously a lot of hostility toward AI. Some people think that this sentiment is even being egged on by China in order to make the U.S. less competitive in AI, or at least make Americans less sympathetic toward the technology. I think that’s probably true to an extent. But the much simpler reality is that people are trying to manufacture this false consensus that AI is bad because they don’t want to lose their jobs.
That’s the real reason. People need a job to live, and obviously they don’t want to lose that job. Which is why I find it interesting that these same people had no issue with 90 other forms of automation and technology replacing other people’s jobs. But the moment the automation comes for theirs, suddenly this is a crime against humanity.
I think I see what’s going on here. And I think everybody does, by the way. More and more, you’re starting to see these double standards emerge, where AI is perfectly acceptable as long as it isn’t replacing the jobs of the people complaining about AI. Once it threatens their job, suddenly the entire conversation changes. But ultimately, I don’t think that’s going to stop any of this. A lot of people are just going to end up getting replaced. And I don’t really mean this in a derogatory way, but there is an entire category of work that I would refer to as “bot jobs.”
Now, what are “bot jobs”? Bot jobs are things that a robot could do (unsurprisingly). A gold farmer in a video game is a bot job. I’d say an Uber driver is a bot job, right? You just drive from point A to point B. Taking a drive-through order is a bot job. You take somebody’s order and write it down. A secretary or a data-entry job can be a bot job. There are a huge number of jobs where you’re essentially just taking some predetermined process and repeatedly applying it.
And if you imagine the bell curve of human IQ, a lot of the jobs in the first half of that bell curve are generally going to be bot jobs. They don’t require a lot of intuitive thought. They don’t require a lot of critical thinking. And they don’t require a lot of problem-solving or innovation beyond simply applying something that already exists.
So, guess what’s going to happen to all of those jobs whenever you have a machine that can apply anything to anything, effectively instantaneously? All of those bot jobs are going to get replaced. The low-skilled Uber drivers, the fast-food workers, the secretaries, the data-entry workers, and everybody else working these very easy jobs, a lot of these people are going to lose their jobs, and those jobs aren’t coming back. They’re not.
And there’s a reality here that a lot of people might not want to talk about, but it’s true. You’re not going to be able to take some borderline illiterate Uber driver and retrain him for a job that requires substantial critical thought and independent decision-making in the same way that you might be able to retrain somebody who’s a doctor into understanding engineering. There is just certainly an IQ cap that a lot of people have. There is an intelligence cap that they have. And you’re not going to be able to retrain all of these people.
So ultimately, we’re running into a very big problem. You’re going to have more and more people whose jobs simply don’t exist anymore, and there’s not only no end in sight, but there might not even be a solution waiting for them afterward. There’s no light at the end of the horizon. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, sure, but it’s the train. It’s coming toward you, and you’re going to be dead. That’s what’s going to happen.
There are probably five or six different outcomes to AI and technology replacing the majority of workers’ jobs in general and only one of them is really good. All the rest of them are just different forms of dystopia. And I think we’re probably going to get the dystopia. I don’t really want to go into all of those outcomes here because I don’t want to sound like a crazy person.
But my point is that I think we’re entering into a realm where more and more people are acquiescing to the reality that general purpose AI actually is something very powerful and extremely effective, and that it will eventually be able to edge out a vast majority of people in the workforce.
And this brings me back to what I was saying earlier about this manufactured consensus surrounding AI in the West, and here in India.
How do I know that this consensus isn’t nearly as universal as people pretend it is? Because I can go on TikTok or Twitter or basically anywhere else, and it doesn’t matter what gender, ethnicity, race, nationality, or political affiliation somebody has. I can find these people making AI videos, and those videos are getting 100,000 likes.
Whether it’s an AI video of Donald Trump kicking all the illegals out of America, an AI video of Donald Trump going to jail, or an AI video of Donald Trump, P. Diddy, Jeffrey Epstein, and Charlie Kirk playing Minecraft together, all of these videos are extremely popular. And what that goes to show is that a lot of this dislike toward AI is largely performative. These videos wouldn’t be getting millions of views if there were actually some massive movement and genuine consensus against AI.
So, when I see artists and other types of creatives on social media trying to manufacture this false consensus and force everybody into thinking that AI is bad, with potential help from foreign actors, maybe; I don’t know about that, it’s possible, I’d even believe it I just don’t think it’s working anymore. And that’s a good thing, by the way. The democratization of creation, media, and everything else, giving ordinary people more tools and more resources to create things, is a good thing.
And this is the other thing I really want to focus on: the goal of a lot of these people isn’t to improve the lives of their consumers. It isn’t to make anything better for anybody other than themselves. Their goal is very simple: preserve their job. Preserve their job and maintain their social position as something of prestige, or whatever else you want to call it.
So what does that mean in reality? It means everybody else has to suffer through weakened technology and a weakened global economic position just so these artists don’t have to worry about going back to Starbucks.
And ultimately, that’s what all of this comes down to: the global market. It doesn’t matter whether America, the West, or people in the U.S. are interested in AI. What matters is whether somebody else in the world is. Because if this tool is as effective as it appears to be, and it’s very clearly effective, because if it weren’t this effective, these people wouldn’t be getting this mad about it, then somebody somewhere is going to use it.
If people are this adamant and this upset about AI, there’s probably a reason for that. And what you’re already seeing is other markets emerge. One of the best examples is video games.
A lot of Western video games are dogshit now. They’re garbage. I look at the new Wolverine game coming out, and it’s one of the most pathetic pieces of shit I’ve seen in probably five or six years. It’s like something just slightly better than Concord.
How does something like this happen? Well, the ideologies and the people making these games are simply not involved in it for the best interest of the consumer. And that matters because AI is a process. AI is a tool. The user, the customer, → doesn’t really care about AI that much. Sure, there’s probably a certain level at which some people care, but look at how popular all of these AI videos are. It’s very clear that the level of concern isn’t nearly as high as people pretend it is.
These companies in the West are being massively outcompeted by non-Western companies making games that are willing to use these technologies and build at scale effectively infinitely faster than Western companies are able to. And they’re even being beaten by smaller Western companies willing to use these tools themselves.
Ultimately, even if somebody is against AI, this will naturally select itself out of the free marketplace of commerce. Anybody who refuses to use these tools to create at scale and effectively build a product is rendering themselves noncompetitive. They simply will not be able to compete with somebody who does.
Let’s think about this logically, right?
If you have one guy who can do the job of five guys, and you have to hire five guys to do that same job because you refuse to let the one guy use the tool, think about how much more money that’s going to cost you. Think about how many more resources that’s going to take. And then think about all the secondary resources that come along with those additional employees: hiring managers, HR managers, payment processing, administration, and everything else that comes out of employing five people instead of one.
There are always these second- and third-order effects of employing another person. So companies that categorically refuse to use these tools will effectively render themselves obsolete. They simply won’t sell their products.
Their products will be inferior in the marketplace because everybody is competing in a global marketplace. The companies using these tools will simply outperform them, and eventually the companies that refuse to adapt will go out of business. You’re already beginning to see that happen.
You’re seeing other companies, primarily Eastern companies, that are actually hiring people for development and hiring people to make games. So what’s the difference? That’s a really big one. Some people view this technology as parasitic. Other people view it as a passion, a resource, and an advantage.
And if you’re not looking at technology and resources as an advantage, if instead you’re trying to hide from technology, history has an almost 100% chance of those people losing.
It’s kind of like a nuclear bomb, I guess you could say. Even if you don’t want to build a nuclear bomb, if the people on the other side are building the nuclear bomb and you’re not, you’re going to have a really, really bad time if there’s ever a disagreement between the two of you.
So you either build the bomb or they win. That’s about it.
And AI is kind of the same thing, which is funny to say, but ultimately we’re entering into a realm where very few people are still as adamantly against AI as they were before. More importantly, the arguments against AI have changed. They’ve gone from “it’s not very good” to “I don’t want this to take my job; we need protections against it,” which, in a way, is a good thing, because at least now the argument is focused on reality.
Because what you can see with GPT6 is that one day there’s going to be a GPT-9. There’s going to be another one after that. And when that day comes, a lot of these people probably aren’t going to have jobs anymore.
Ultimately, this technology will improve just like every other technology in the world has improved. And I’m really happy to see that. This is going to be for the betterment of most people. But obviously, there will also be a lot of people who lose their jobs because of it.
And this is especially going to happen in creative industries. I don’t think there’s anything you can really do to stop it. YouTube already parses things out with AI. Translation used to be this enormous thing where you needed somebody who actually knew another language. Now you can literally use a tool and have it automatically translate your words into another language.
We’re on the verge of another pretty big breakthrough with AI, and GPT6 Astra is another great example of that. I constantly see this anti-AI sentiment on social media, especially Western social media. And it’s crazy to me that people can be this adamant about voluntarily removing themselves from a competitive marketplace. It really is.
I just cannot see that boding well for any of these people. And if that means we’re going to have to play Japanese, Korean, and Chinese video games forever, then that’s probably what’s going to happen. Because if you’re not using these tools and somebody else is, they’re going to beat you. And then people are going to choose the winner.
That’s all there is to it.
So ultimately, all of the virtue signalers who made being anti-AI into some moral crusade → never let them forget it. Never let them forget it. These were the people going around trying to force everybody into believing that some new technology wasn’t the future, and so much of it was self-serving. It was for appearances. It wasn’t about helping anybody. It was about making themselves feel good, preserving their jobs, or preserving their position.
And I understand wanting to preserve your job. Of course I do. But we don’t have nearly as many coal miners anymore. We don’t have everybody out there manually plowing fields anymore. Technology replaces jobs, and the world becomes a better place overall because of that.
Ultimately, you can either go along with it, or it will take you along with it.