Smaller is better – shifts in hiring suggest AI impacts and productivity shifts


Source: Gergely Orosz Last updated 21 FEBRUARY 2025. Originally published 20 Feb 2025. Writing The Pragmatic Engineer Newsletter. Author of The Software Engineer’s Guidebook. Previously at Uber, Microsoft, Skype, Skyscanner. Amsterdam, Netherlands ——/——-//——-/——- Interesting data from jobs site Indeed shows the change in the number of active software developer job listings on the site. For context, Indeed is the largest job aggregator portal in the US and in several countries, and it crawls vacancies on other sites, too. This means that Indeed aims to track most of the posted jobs across a given region (via crawling and processing them) – not just the … Continue reading Smaller is better – shifts in hiring suggest AI impacts and productivity shifts

Valuing the Deep State: A Nine-Part Series by Francis Fukuyama


Francis Fukuyama’s nine-part series on the advantages, dangers, and complications of bureaucratic autonomy. Francis Fukuyama A compilation of Francis Fukuyama’s nine-part series on valuing the deep state, originally published on his Frankly Fukuyama column via Persuasion. Part I: Valuing the Deep State Why the hostility towards the “deep state”? In the first installment of his series, Francis Fukuyama pushes back on anti-bureaucracy sentiment and makes the case that a high-capacity, professional, and impersonal state is critical to the success of any society. Part II: The Origin of States To understand the deep state, start by exploring human nature. Fukuyama traces how humans have … Continue reading Valuing the Deep State: A Nine-Part Series by Francis Fukuyama

True understanding and reasoning in AGI emerges through several fundamental mechanisms:


Causal Understanding AGI achieves genuine comprehension by grasping cause-and-effect relationships rather than merely identifying statistical correlations[1]. This causal nature enables the system to understand why things happen, not just that they happen. Contextual Processing Deep Context Integration: The system processes information by considering the complete context, as the same actions can produce different effects in different situations[1]. Adaptive Framework: AGI builds understanding from the bottom up without predetermined models or human-imposed structures, allowing it to: Cognitive Architecture The system achieves true reasoning through: This architecture enables AGI to solve problems in their exact context while understanding both the derivation and … Continue reading True understanding and reasoning in AGI emerges through several fundamental mechanisms:

AGI represents a theoretical leap beyond Generative AI with several key distinguishing characteristics:


Core Capabilities True Understanding: AGI would genuinely comprehend context and meaning, unlike GenAI which merely predicts patterns without real understanding[1][3]. Adaptive Learning: AGI can learn from limited information and apply knowledge across different situations through transfer learning, while GenAI requires extensive data for specific tasks[1]. Sensory Integration: AGI would perceive and interpret its environment holistically through multiple senses, understanding the broader context of sensory inputs[1][4]. Advanced Functions Problem-Solving: AGI can tackle unfamiliar tasks and find novel solutions, unlike GenAI’s limitation to specific trained domains[4][8]. Cognitive Abilities: AGI would possess: This represents a fundamental shift from GenAI’s pattern-matching capabilities to true … Continue reading AGI represents a theoretical leap beyond Generative AI with several key distinguishing characteristics:

What Does It Mean to Align AI With Human Values?


By MELANIE MITCHELL December 13, 2022 Making sure our machines understand the intent behind our instructions is an important problem that requires understanding intelligence itself. December 13, 2022 Introduction Many years ago, I learned to program on an old Symbolics Lisp Machine. The operating system had a built-in command spelled “DWIM,” short for “Do What I Mean.” If I typed a command and got an error, I could type “DWIM,” and the machine would try to figure out what I meant to do. A surprising fraction of the time, it actually worked. The DWIM command was a microcosm of the more … Continue reading What Does It Mean to Align AI With Human Values?

Meta Plans Major Investment Into AI-Powered Humanoid Robots


Company is aiming to be the engine powering humanoid market Ex-Cruise CEO Marc Whitten to run new group in Reality Labs Mark GurmanFebruary 14, 2025 at 11:00 AM EST Meta Platforms Inc., after pushing into augmented reality and artificial intelligence, has identified its next big bet: AI-powered humanoid robots.  The company is making a significant investment into the category — futuristic robots that can act like humans and assist with physical tasks — and is forming a new team within its Reality Labs hardware division to conduct the work, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Meta plans to … Continue reading Meta Plans Major Investment Into AI-Powered Humanoid Robots

Sam Altman – Three Observations


Three Observations Our mission is to ensure that AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) benefits all of humanity.  Systems that start to point to AGI* are coming into view, and so we think it’s important to understand the moment we are in. AGI is a weakly defined term, but generally speaking we mean it to be a system that can tackle increasingly complex problems, at human level, in many fields. People are tool-builders with an inherent drive to understand and create, which leads to the world getting better for all of us. Each new generation builds upon the discoveries of the generations … Continue reading Sam Altman – Three Observations

CIO Roundtable: Modernization and cloud migration lessons learned


56 views Nov 21, 2024“The Modernization Imperative: Becoming Future-Ready” CIO roundtable highlights Featuring: Charles Lewis, Vice President Information Technology, Canada Life Scott Silk, Chairman & CEO, Astadia: An Amdocs Company Dan Broten, Chief Technology Officer, Equitable Bank Gini Wong, Head of Information Technology, MUFG Canada Andrew Wood, EVP, Technology, CAPREIT Paul Bellack, Executive Advisor, EY Stephen Ellis, Division President, Amdocs ITMG Website: https://theitmediagroup.com Continue reading CIO Roundtable: Modernization and cloud migration lessons learned

Why BigBear.ai Stock’s 415% Surge Isn’t Enough To Catch Palantir Yet


Peter Cohan2024-12-11 Did you miss out on the rise in Palantir’s stock? If so, perhaps you are among the beneficiaries of the 415% rise in shares of data analytics service provider BigBear.ai – which is touted as the next Palantir. To be sure, really good news has propelled BigBear.ai’s stock. The U.S. Department of Defense has contracted to use the company’s artificial intelligence to “improve geopolitical risk assessments,” according to TipRanks. Can BigBear.ai stock – which has a whopping 22.6% short interest ratio, according to the Wall Street Journal – rise further? Analysts see the stock as too pricey and Palantir appears to … Continue reading Why BigBear.ai Stock’s 415% Surge Isn’t Enough To Catch Palantir Yet