this post was submitted on 13 Dec 2023
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I've also found (I'm a teacher) this generation is far less proficient at search. They (generalisation) type a whole question into Google, and read the Google created text box to get their answer, taking it as gospel - regardless of if Google has completely gone off the mark.
Contrast this to a generation that grew up with needing to refine search terms with key words, who can find far more relevant info quicker.
It's hard to get them out of the rut and teach them to be more critical of sources. They're so used to having what they need served straight up for them. LLMs (AI) are feeding into this more - they struggle to believe that AI hallucinations exist until I show them.
Again all this is generalisation - when I say 'they' I don't mean 'all'.
Couple of years back I used to help this kid with computer related stuff, and it really baffled me how he was nearly computer illiterate. He had no idea what make his laptop was, no idea what OS he was on, or any of the specs.
He called it a gaming laptop because he played games on it, but it was a pretty decent school/work thing without a dedicated GPU.
I’d always envisioned the younger generations getting better and better with tech, but it makes sense that won’t be the case as tech moves to be easier to use, more reliable, and less intrusive.
Modern iPads are nothing like the BS DOS/98 I grew up with.
Similar thing happened with cars. My grandpa would take them apart and reassemble them. my dad (somewhat generalizing to generations a bit) were really into cars and engines and would do some basic diy. I know nothing about them and don’t care to learn much.
I think computers are doing a similar thing. Millennials sit in the middle of the adoption and saw it emerge from more of a technology wild Wild West to being central to modern society. We could take the time to delve into details (since they mattered), but now it’s more taken for granted and things are there.
I guess, I’m just thinking it’s some sort of technology adoption thing that naturally plays out in a “victim if it’s own success” way.
That’s such a good point. Kind of blew my mind with it haha.
I would guess that's it's a combination of what you mentioned and also the generation rasing it not bothering to actually teach them properly about that sort of stuff. I never learned about car stuff, never had anyone to teach me. Now as an adult I know enough to do the basic oil change stuff but nothing more.
Yes but unlike ChatGPT giving you made up answers, cars don't drive you to 200 km away from where you wanted to go on their own. At least not yet.
Oh, that's definitely happening when the five-years-away promise of fully self-driving vehicles as promised a decade ago make their appearance in 2050.
Don't forget they'll be optimising the route to pass the store fronts of 3 paying businesses along the way.
I think the situation is also somewhat different with cars. Old cars used to be much simpler to take apart and tinker with than modern cars. Computers and operating systems are still just as easy to pry apart (since the fundamentals haven't changed since the 90s lol).
My theory is that as tech came to a wider appeal and became more user-friendly, more people are using it who don't run into issues that need technical knowledge. Early OSes needed highly technical knowledge to use. Modern OSes can be operated by a monkey. Therefore, their inclination to learn about the computer is less because it just fades into the background.
I think you have some good points, but I’m not 100% sure I agree though. Modern computers are much more complex than earlier ones if the 80s and 90s. (I guess I’m ignoring the earlier VAXs and stuff and thinking more of personal computers.) I saw a keynote from an OS conference which was pointing out that there are very few actual os papers, as the hardware is so much more complex and actually multiple smaller os’s managing the various system on chip components.
Also, Mac has over the years gone to great lengths to hide how things actually work. Like 5 years ago I remember getting really confused just attaching a debugger to a c simple C program I was toying with.
At the end you say that OSs are so easy monkeys could use them, and I think that’s my point too. They intentionally get easier to use and fade into the background and don’t really encourage tinkering with the lower level stuff.
You are correct that the basics of computers are similar and that’s why arduino and other microcontrollers are still basically the same as they were years ago, just the main difference I’ve seen is moving to more and more RTOS and trading off a bit of speed and memory, whereas a decade ago it was a lot more low level assembly optimization.
Good points though! I appreciate them. I teach some computer engineering stuff and I think about a lot of this and how best to talk about some of the lower level stuff.
Fr I think this is my problem with the new “advancements” and why I find myself more drawn to Linux as time passes. The “foolproof” of modern tech is also troubleshoot resistant and difficult as hell to do anything with.
I often say I am lucky that I grew up in the narrow window between when computers became a household commonality and when running and repairing them was affordable, because in that narrow window it was learn or buy. Learn to fix it or shell out for a new one, and they weren’t stable enough for buy to be an option for most households for what was basically a toy. So fam being broke, I learned. I’m not in IT or anything (don’t have the credentials to get hired and entirely unwilling to get them when I already know how to do all the things, I’d rather be unemployed than spend more on worthless credentials.. see? Millennial.) but I love running my own hosting and stuff, which means constant learning how to maintain. If I didn’t grow up at that exact time, would I bother, considering this isn’t a job for me and never will be? Probably not, honestly.
I hated the iMac lockdown (and deleted the hard drive registries from every iMac I came across while it was an option to do so, essentially bricking every device I came across, because that’s just piss poor management to allow a group user to brick the entire device… 😅) I hate the windows forced-maintenance (11 doesn’t give a fuck what my active hours are, because I have them set to everything but a 6 hour span of morning when I actually won’t be using it. Still does updates mid afternoon, breaking everything I host on it until I’m home to confirm login even with all security disabled and resume settings enabled…)
I just hate everything except DIY, and I grew up with that. It so difficult to get it to do what -you-want it to do without bowing to the overlords who dictate how it can be used and I’m so over it.
(The swap off Linux was of necessity 2x, the Beast died due to mobo failure and I bought an off the shelf win tower to replace it, but also needed to run the VM for work and Linux couldn’t manage the niche client they went with.. but now I’m not employed, buh bye windows! Nevah again.)
What is a hard drive registry? Or: a properly managed Mac can’t be bricked by a user 🤷🏻
Unfortunately this generation google is getting less proficient at search as well. It’s like it treats the search term as a vague idea and any syntax as a non binding suggestion.
And many sites use seo to attract traffic but dont have any content you are actually looking for. And ads.
And Google has moved on to simply deciding what to search for you by changing your search terms in the background.
Good question. I doubt us normies can get access to that.
Google have been offering SEO courses for more than a decade now. They are largely responsible for this fucking mess.
That is as much monetary as it is a response to consumers.
I read an article a few weeks ago that - ironically - now I can’t find when searching for it, because all the search results are crowded by SEO blogspam. (Even though I’m using exact phrases I recall from the article!)
The gist of the article was that while your search terms are displayed in the address bar, Google will opaquely substitute words, add ‘invisible’ search terms in that it doesn’t tell you it’s added, or otherwise alter its search metrics to return results that are more heavily laden with advertisements and/or sites that advertise with Google Ads.
If a straightforward search no longer renders straightforward results, then there’s not a good feedback mechanism for users to learn how to be better at searching. We all are just getting rolled by the algorithm to look at advertisements.
I imagine folks who remember when the internet was good will take this as Google now being bad, but folks who don’t/aren’t of that age will just assume the internet always worked poorly. It might be why LLM’s are acceptable as “AI” despite their flaws.
How do you demonstrate a hallucination?
Ask it esoteric questions on something you are intimately familiar with. Heck it doesn’t even need to be esoteric. I asked Bing who won the 2023 World Series and it confidently told me that it was Astros vs the Phillies that the Astros won in 5 games.
I asked Llama 2 the same question and here is the answer. Idk if it is acually right, I don't watch sports.
Sure! Here's the answer to your question:
According to the search results, the Texas Rangers won the 2023 World Series. They defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks in the championship series, winning four games to one.
Wikipedia confirms that info.
I generally get ask it to provide sources for its work, and then show the students that most of the time those sources don't actually exist.
Like it'll have a real author, and a real journal, but a fake article name that the author supposedly wrote.
Or a real website that 404's - once is fair enough, websites change, but when ten of the sourced websites are all 404s that's not right. You also try to search for the article that's meant to be on the website, but even the website doesn't think it exists.
I've even been in an argument with Bing where it was adamant that an article existed on a university website, and it shut down the conversation with me when I kept pointing out I couldn't find it.
Ask it for something non-existent.
Like a town full of mimes in Croatia.
Let it create a simple quizgame with easy question amd tell it to create some backround info on the correct answers.
It will claim the wrong answer correct and tell you the opposite in the backround info quickly
To play a devil's advocate: could this be them learning how to use a search engine? When I was a young teen learning to use a computer for the first time I would type full on sentences into Google and not get any results.
Another teacher here. Teaching English for the first time. I didn't realise their skills were this bad unless I saw with my eyes. Glad I'm not alone in this battle!