Why Did Microsoft Admit That AI Is Making Us Dumb? https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/a...did-microsoft-admit-that-ai-is-making-us-dumb Microsoft Corp. plans to spend $80 billion on artificial intelligence this year, reinforcing its position as a leading vendor. So why did it recently publish a research paper showing an erosion of critical-thinking skills among workers using generative AI tools such as ChatGPT? If we were being generous, we could say it was genuine scientific enquiry. More likely, it wants to keep ahead of the curve as AI disrupts certain jobs, and ensure that its tools remain useful to businesses. At a time when Big Tech is racing to make AI models bigger, that’s a refreshingly thoughtful approach both to the industry’s business model and its social outcomes. The study, carried out in conjunction with researchers at Carnegie Mellon University, surveyed 319 knowledge workers about how they used AI, including a teacher generating images for a presentation about hand-washing to her students using DALL-E 2 and a commodities trader generating strategies using ChatGPT. The researchers found a striking pattern: The more participants trusted AI for certain tasks, the less they practiced those skills themselves, such as writing, analysis and critical evaluations. As a result, they self-reported an atrophying of skills in those areas. Several respondents said they started to doubt their abilities to perform tasks such as verifying grammar in text or composing legal letters, which led them to automatically accept whatever generative AI gave them. And they were even less likely to practice their skills when there was time pressure. “In sales, I must reach a certain quota daily or risk losing my job,” one anonymized study participant said. “Ergo, I use AI to save time and don’t have much room to ponder over the result.” A similar recent study by Anthropic, which looked at how people were using its AI model Claude, found that the top skill exhibited by the chatbot in conversations was “critical thinking.” This paints the picture of a future where professional workers ultimately become managers of AI’s output, rather than the originators of new ideas and content, particularly as AI models get better. OpenAI’s latest “Deep Research” model, which costs $200 a month, can conduct research across the internet, scouring images, PDFs and text, to produce detailed reports with citations. One result is that cognitive work is going to transform, and quickly, according to a Feb. 12 note to investors from Deutsche Bank AG. “Humans will be rewarded for asking their AI agent the right questions, in the right way, and then using their judgment to assess and iterate on the answers,” research analyst Adrian Cox writes. “Much of the rest of the cognitive process will be offloaded.” As frightening as that sounds, consider that Socrates once worried that writing would lead to the erosion of memory, that calculators were once expected to kill our mathematical skills and that GPS navigation would leave us hopelessly lost without our phones. That last one might be somewhat true, but by and large humans have managed to other uses for their brains when they outsource their thinking, even if our math and navigating skills become lazier. What’s different with AI is that it encroaches on a much broader part of our everyday cognition. We’re put in positions to think critically far more often than we are to calculate sums or chart routes—whether crafting a sensitive email or deciding what to flag to our boss in a report. That could leave us less able to do core professional work, or more vulnerable to propaganda. And it leads back to the question of why Microsoft—which makes money from sales of OpenAI’s GPT models—published these findings. There’s a clue in the report itself, where the authors note that they risk creating products “that do not address workers’ real needs,” if they don’t know how knowledge workers use AI, and how their brains work when they do. If a sales manager’s thinking skills go downhill when they use Microsoft’s AI products, the quality of their work might decline too. A fascinating finding in Microsoft’s study was that the more people were confident in the abilities of their AI tool, the less likely they were to doublecheck its ouput . Given that AI still has a tendency to hallucinate, that raises the risk of poor-quality work. What happens when employers start noticing a decline in performance? They might blame it on the worker — but they might also blame it on the AI, which would be bad for Microsoft. Tech companies have loudly marketed AI as a tool that will “augment” our intelligence, not replace it, as this study seems to suggest. So the lesson for Microsoft is in how it aims future products, not in making them more powerful but in somehow designing them to enhance rather than erode human capabilities. Perhaps, for instance, ChatGPT and its ilk can prod its users to come up with their own original thoughts once in a while. If they don’t, businesses could end up with workforces that can do more with less, but also can’t spot when their newfound efficiency is sending them in the wrong directions.
Sort of Fuzzy in which thread this belonged in, so I picked this one and went with it. I need to search for another source to verify, but ABC 13 just said a facility with 250,000 Square Feet which is on the high end for current Walmart Supercenters. A large Walmart Supercenter typically ranges between 180,000 to 250,000 square feet, with the average size being around 187,000 square feet. Apple bringing thousands of jobs to Houston area Apple on Monday announced plans to invest more than $500 billion in the U.S. and hire 20,000 people over the next four years, with construction of a massive facility planned in Greater Houston. Why it matters: Apple's announcement — which the company calls its largest-ever "spend commitment" — is the kind of win President Trump has been looking for with his push to move manufacturing back to the U.S. Apple's new investment — much of it in red states — lets Trump say to other companies: Apple can do it. Why can't (or won't) you? State of play: Apple will build a new advanced AI server manufacturing factory near Houston, according to the company. The 250,000-square-foot facility, slated to open in 2026, "will create thousands of jobs," the announcement says. "The servers that will soon be assembled in Houston play a key role in powering Apple Intelligence, and are the foundation of Private Cloud Compute, which combines powerful AI processing with the most advanced security architecture ever deployed at scale for AI cloud computing," per the announcement. Zoom out: Most of the new jobs will focus on research and development, silicon engineering, software development, and AI and machine learning. Apple plans to greatly expand chip and server manufacturing in the U.S., plus skills development for students and workers across the country. Apple CEO Tim Cook said in the announcement: "We are bullish on the future of American innovation, and we're proud to build on our longstanding U.S. investments with this $500 billion commitment to our country's future." The backstory: Trump met with Cook on Thursday in the Oval Office, then got so excited that he revealed the plans prematurely. Trump said on-camera while meeting with governors that Cook is "investing hundreds of billions of dollars. I hope he's announced it — I hope I didn't announce it, but what the hell? All I do is tell the truth — that's what he told me. Now he has to do it, right?"
We'll see about that. AI is causing a boom in nominal electricity demand on a very short timeline -- so short that it's laughable to think it'll happen. Building power plants and interconnecting them to the grid takes years. There is legislation being considered this year in Texas and many other states (most notably Virginia, the biggest data center state) about how to handle these very large loads. Because if you just let the market solve for it, the data centers will hog so much juice that power prices will escalate for everyone else and politicians will lose their jobs. I looked around and have not seen any discussion in the news about how Apple will power this Houston data center, but if they want to be open in 2026, they better break ground right now on a big power plant they can keep behind-the-meter. Because I doubt they will be allowed to interconnect to the grid in 2026 if they don't bring their power generation.
To my understanding, what Apple is building in Houston isn't an AI data center, it's a manufacturing facility to build servers that may be used in AI-related facilities/data centers. BTW, does anybody know where in Houston this will be built?
I have looked around a bit and haven't found anything about a location. I have Apple as not piddling around and already having most of the details nailed down on location and what needs to be done for a facility. So there are very likely some Locals that know at least some details and are staying quiet because of some type of NDA stuff. 250,000 Square Feet is 5.75 acres (approximately), so will round up and call it six acres of Single Story under a Roof. Figure another six acres for parking, roadway etc. and that brings the total to 12 acres for buildings and infrastructure. If they want to have a decent sized buffer from the public, then at least another 8 acres and probably a minimum of 12 acres for a buffer. Round up and call it 25 acres for Buildings + Infrastructure + Buffer. Rail access probably isn't going to be a critical item, but freeway access might matter some. Electricity reliability could matter. When Ercot (or whomever) decided to cut power when they were short of electricity during the Big Freeze several years ago, some areas were considered essential and either didn't lose power or had minimal intervals without power. Other areas were designated as non essential and were without power for an extended period of time. Even though it doesn't appear destined to be a facility for hosting Servers, I still have them wanting to have minimal downtime because of power issues. So expect them to locate in an area with a low probability of having Ercot (or whomever) cut their power for an extended period of time. I also having them opt for backup generators and/or onsite storage of electricity. Another thing on their Checklist would be the Labor Force. Those that worked for Compaq on the Northwest side decades ago have moved on with their lives and not all would have the appropriate skillsets for what Apple plans to do going forward. There is still plenty of open land West of Katy near I-10, but no idea how difficult it is for Igloo and similar businesses in that area to find the workers that they need. If the Engineering work is going to be done elsewhere (California?), then the Houston area facility will be tasked with assembly - production and thus won't have a need for a large number of Engineers and similar well educated folks. Brown & Root used to have a large campus in Alief - Chinatown. I haven't been that way in a while, but it was mostly vacant land the last time that I went that way. It is just West of The Sam Houston tollway and roughly 8 miles South of I-10, so it does check some boxes in regards to Freeway access. When Brown & Root was there, their buildings were located well away from the public, so the site should easily provide a good sized buffer from the public. Fluor has/had a large Campus in Sugar Land, but I don't know what their current situation is. There are other parts of Metro Houston that could/should be suitable for the new Apple facility, but I will leave it for others to cover.
Upon more reading, you're right. That first article isn't very clear. Changes things for power because it probably still requires a ton of electricity, but doesn't have the high load factor requirements of a data center-- in other words, they can probably stand to lose power sometimes. They would still need backup gen, but only for critical systems.
I think the thing to keep in mind is this would be a server manufacturing facility. I don't know how much engineering and/or R&D would go on there. From poking around Reddit and HAIF, there was a NYT article last year that said Foxconn had bought property that appears to be in NW Houston (9625 Fallbrook Pines Drive, Houston, Harris County, TX 77064) and Foxconn will be involved with this. There's a general mention of the location in this article, too.
It makes sense for Foxconn to be involved, but then the news reports about it being Apple are wrong because the ones that I have seen don't mention that Apple is subbing out the manufacturing - assembly to Foxconn. I don't think that there will be a significant amount of Engineering and/or R&D at that facility. Just enough to follow through on reconfiguring the assembly - manufacturing process when there are design changes - improvements in the products. The location isn't far from where Compaq was decades ago and will be more convenient to the Airport for incoming air shipments than most other parts of Metro Houston would be. Speaking of the former Compaq Campus... Former Compaq Computer campus gets $40m investment for AI data center upgrade (September 23, 2024) Will house 774,000 sq ft data center A Houston, Texas, facility has received $40 million in investment to be retrofitted as an artificial intelligence (AI) data center. First reported by Bisnow, the former Compaq Computer site set to be upgraded is located at 11445 Compaq Center W. Drive and is part of the 66-acre Viva Center campus at State Highway 249 and Louetta Road. Lone Star PACE and Nuveen Green Capital have secured $40 million in clean energy financing for the first phase of retrofitting the facility which spans 774,000 sq ft (71,907 sqm). Known as C-PACE financing, commercial property-assessed clean energy financing is a long-term low-cost financing solution that incentivizes developers to make efficiency upgrades to properties. The $40 million will be used at the recently rebranded "Viva Center" to install energy-efficient windows, LED lighting, new HVAC systems, and high-efficiency plumbing upgrades for the first phase of the data center. The first phase is currently around "50 percent complete" and should be operational in the next six to nine months, according to Sean Ribble senior director of originations at Nuveen Green Capital. At full buildout, Viva Center will offer 250 megawatts of power, a chilled water plant, and a natural gas pipeline for energy generation. The site specifically set to become a new data center was built in the 1980s and was previously the headquarters of Compaq Computer prior to its acquisition by Hewlett Packard Enterprise. in 2002 HPE began building a new campus in 2020, and launched a new HQ in April 2022 shortly after selling off 11445 Compaq Center W. Drive to MFI, an affiliate of Mexcor International. Eduardo Morales, CEO of Mexcor is also head of Morales Capital Group. The major retrofit is being led by VivaVerse Solutions, a subsidiary of Morales Capital Group. The company is redeveloping the entire Viva Center which includes more than a dozen buildings that consist of offices, manufacturing, and distribution facilities. VivaVerse plans to turn the campus into a tech hub with public gathering areas, events and apartments. “At Viva Center, our commitment to technological innovation and forward-thinking design drives the integration of state-of-the-art building systems,” Freddy Vaca, president of VivaVerse Solutions, said. “Partnering with Nuveen Green Capital and Lone Star PACE has been instrumental in aligning our advanced sustainability objectives with our investment returns.” In May 2024, power solution provider RPower partnered with VivaVerse Solutions to build a 17MW microgrid at the Viva Center campus. RPower’s microgrid will use natural gas generators to deliver ‘Resiliency-as-a-Service’ (RaaS) to ViVaVerse’s colocation data center operations during outages. ********** Maybe some of the production from the Apple (Foxconn) facility is going to be sent to the Data Center on the former Compaq Campus.
I think they produce chips at a factory in Arizona that is actually owned by TSMC, so from what I read, I believe this would be similar. I don't now who would actually do the building of the servers. It could be Foxconn helps to build the infrastructure only. I don't know what the relationship with TSMC and Apple on the Arizona plant is.
I’ve come to the conclusion that the longer you use a ChatGPT session the more its lies and assumptions will become more and more recursive. It’s a hard tool to use. The best way to describe it is like those live plate spinning balancing acts that stand on one foot while adding more and more plates to their hands and head. Eventually the whole thing comes crashing down. It’s a good mental exercise, though. You have to keep a constant point of truth and sift through the bullshit, and know when to hit the eject button and start a new session. It’s definitely a skill.
i also noticed it starts learning about me... when i asked a networking question..it said "since you use unifi.." b****. who told you this?
lol. I just asked it about me and it doesn't remember anything. I have Memory turned off and am too poor to pay for a premium subscription, so I also have the free service. I even asked if it remembers anything about me from previous sessions and it said it didn't. I trust it because it's my friend.
well...this works. delete previous history of me ChatGPT said: Got it! Let me know how I can help. You said: Tell me what you know about me ChatGPT said: I don't have any saved information about you now. But I'm happy to get to know you—tell me something about yourself!
