240 - Distressed by the AI stuff around

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Hello everybody, welcome to the Fire Science Show.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Today we will be talking about AI, but this is not your normal fire science show episode.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There's no fire science in it.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's not a scientific record of research or anything.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's just some of my thoughts that about stuff that happened with the within the AI in the last week and they have genuinely frightened me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So I thought, well, I I feel an urge to record this and share those thoughts with you.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I thought about such an episode already when MoldBots came out, but then uh I was just a gimmick.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I thought uh no point in doing this, but last week, wow, that that was crazy.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh if this is your first Fire Science Show episode, that's probably a poor choice of starting your journey with a podcast.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There are 239 instances of real science in the podcast, so you'll find them below.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And if you're a long-term listener, I think uh you may actually uh enjoy this.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I felt the need to talk about uh AI because I feel somehow connected to the topic.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Perhaps I'm not a creator, I'm not uh I'm not the leader, I'm not someone driving the AI efication of the world, but uh I'm at least an active observer or maybe an early adopter and uh in in that, or at least people put me in in such a bracket, if I may.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>In the Fire Science show, if you look at the podcast, in the first 10 episodes we had two AI episodes.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh episode 20 something was one with Mz Nasser about how to enter the world of AI.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That was way, way before chatbirds and when it was so much more difficult.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And actually, uh Nasser, what he said back then, it was that he claimed that he's uh just a few years ahead of everyone else and he's just trying.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And today, look, five years later, he's uh the undisputed industry leader in AI, not just in fire safety engineering, but in civil engineering.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Actually, I have good news because he's coming back to the podcast in very, very, very soon.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So we'll have a scientific view over AI, not just my rambling very, very soon.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But let's let's continue with rambling.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We have uh shown you chatbots very early.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Well, just after they came, we're discussing how chatbots could be used for the benefit of fire safety engineering.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We've discussed implementation of other AI tools, we've discussed how to set up your own AI LLM models.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I've presented my own view on where it's heading and where it's gonna be useful, where it's not gonna be useful.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So a lot of stuff has been shown about AI in the Fire Science Show and and by myself around in different places where I show up.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh I'm usually extremely enthusiastic about it.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Or if not enthusiastic, I'm realistic that it's gonna be used for a good and it it gives us opportunities.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That that's what I see, opportunities.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and this week, two things have happened that that frightened me really.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like I my view has shifted.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Perhaps I should start farming.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Maybe Bronze Age was not that bad, actually.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like really 180 perception shift.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's I've recovered, I'm a bit better now, but this was quite strong for me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So one is uh a fishing attack on IFSS, quite a big attack, to be honest, and uh it involved me to a level uh way, way, way beyond my comfort zone.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh second thing was uh a report, an online report essay novel, I don't know, with fiction work by Citrini.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I mean it it's a work of fiction, but so is uh 1984 by Orwell and look at the world today.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So yeah, sometimes those things materialize, and if that Citrini reports materialize, that would be a hell of a shock for economy.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's a report on on the uh disruption by AI into the economy, and basically quite catastrophic in its view, and this prompted me to think about uh what AI means for fire safety engineering again, and and what it means for the broader economy, and at broader economy point of view, what does it mean for fire safety engineering?

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So, those two things I would love to share with you in this podcast episode.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>If you stayed with me this long, there's a good chance that what's gonna show up after the intro will be interesting uh to you.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So if you would like to hear my views on those topics, uh stay with me, let's spin the intro and jump into the episode.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Welcome to the Firescience Show.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>My name is Voycze Vingzinsky, and I will be your host.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>The Firescience Show podcast is brought to you in partnership with OFR Consultants.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>OFR is the UK's leading independent multi-award-winning fire engineering consultancy with a reputation for delivering innovative safety-driven solutions.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We've been on this journey together for three years so far, and here it begins the fourth year of collaboration between the Fire Science Show and the OFR.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And now let's head back to the episode.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So in the intro, I've mentioned MoldBot Revolution.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I'm not sure if you followed that one.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh those revolutions come and go very quickly these days, but basically, one person has created an AI agent tool that you run over your own computer, MacBook Mini, actually.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh basically what it does, it's uh like a self-uh guiding agent that just lives in that computer and does tasks that you do, like kind of a person.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh what was interesting is that uh one of people were giving them uh access to sensitive information, you know, like credit cards, etc., like ridiculous stuff has happened with that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And also another thing was that uh someone has created an online forum for those mold bots to chat uh with each other, and that was also quite a thing.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But then I thought, yeah, okay, that's an AI gimmick, that's uh you know, just a funny thing, just an interesting thing, uh, but not really world-shifting thing.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh interestingly, since then, that happened like literally two, three weeks ago.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's really recent.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And the person that was an open uh source project, but that person has uh apparently has been acquired by OpenAI for like one billion dollars or something, and they're just developing it now, and uh it caused an MacBook mini shortage all over the world.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So yeah, that's a ripple effect in the economy, which is kind of relevant to what has scared me this week.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So I I said uh I was frightened, uh I was generally frightened, uh, and two things have happened that cost that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I'll I'll give you a story.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>The first one, uh it was Friday morning.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I woke I woke up and uh I had an early morning meeting, and uh, as I move into the meeting, I see my mail inbox flooded with messages.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Well, flooded, that's probably a big word, but I see at least five different uh messages from my colleagues uh from the IFSS um members advisory council board and the trustees of the IFSS, so let's say the leadership of organization, and uh those emails range from hey Wojciech, there has been a scam uh attempt with your name in it, to uh hey, I'm really sorry for your loss.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>If there's anything I can help you with, uh like let me know.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And I'm like, like, what the hell is happening?

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Apparently, IFSS has been a target of a large-scale phishing attack.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Um, not the first time, it has happened before, not particularly difficult because all we do is public, so the names of the advisors and trustees are well known.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>The relationships between them are well known as who is who.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There's a lot of public information that allows to track us and that allows to you know link us together.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and basically the phishing attempt the what was disturbing is that the phishing attempt was surprisingly well crafted.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There was someone impersonating Professor Nayan Lu, who is the president of the IFSS.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh, and uh in that email, the impersonator was letting know the people who received the email that I am in distress, that I am flying to a country, and there was the name of the country from which this particular person was coming from.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So people from Japan got an email that I'm heading to Tokyo, and people from Australia got an email that I'm heading to Brisbane.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And in this email, I'm in the distress, I'm stuck in the Philippines or or something, and uh stopped by the border, and I'm heading for a funeral, and I really need help, and he cannot help me because he's flying to Canada.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And if that person who was a target of attack could call, uh, and there was like phone numbers to Philippines uh and and and help me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I was decently crafted uh email, like not your usual Nigerian prince scam thing that included a lot of genuine information, like someone injected a lot of genuine information into that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And this was targeted to a person.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It was not like a generic message sent to everyone, it had information specific to that particular person, like the country, um, the direction, etc.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like it it it was frighteningly well-crafted message, I would say.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh when I first saw chatbots, my initial I I I I kid you not, my first thought about Chatbot was my god, scammers are gonna get good.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and this felt like like that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like this phishing attack felt like a a much bigger improvement over the the scamming attempts that I've seen in the past.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But this is not enough to frighten me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I mean, it's it's a just a phishing attack.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I've replied uh to IFSS that we are under attack, I've issued a warning, uh, we've sent an email to the membership, uh I thought case closed.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But then I was chatting with some colleagues because more people were reaching out to me, and actually two people said that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But one person told me, like, Voczy, but are you sure you are safe?

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Because because they are now calling me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And I'm like, no, I'm sure I'm safe, don't answer.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And then another person said, You know what?

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I just got a call from Philippines, and it was with your voice, and you were very convincing in that call, and that that's when I broke.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like, seriously, that is when I broke.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like, I I joked with some people that wow, this phishing attempt is really good, but imagine if they could clone the voice or use AI, you know, to enhance the scam and uh etc.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and I was thinking, yeah, that's a hypothetical scenario in three years, but no, that was the scenario that was in the play right now.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like they did that, they cloned my voice, they started playing those messages to people.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh and wow, this this was like really bad.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I mean, I I was nowhere no way connected uh to that attack, but I somehow feel bad if if if someone lost money or or was uh a victim of a larger attack uh because of their you know relationship with me, because they trust me, because they like me, because they felt uh they would like to help me.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I mean that's horrible.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like that is truly, truly horrible, and this made me sick to my stomach.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh I was not the only one.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There was uh later in the day Europeans started receiving messages with my friend Sinan Huang in the same kind of sequence of of stuff.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Not sure if they they cloned Cinean's voice as well, but uh it it appears it has been a part of a larger you know attempt just targeting our small association.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But man, this like this is ridiculous.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And it it it is it is so so easy to to make an artificial voice.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It is very easy to create artificial voice, one that sounds quite real.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>This is in fact an AI-generated sample made straight from a text.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Like this one was not even good, but it it took me like 10 seconds to create that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That's how easy it is.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And you know, my job uh speaking at a podcast makes me especially vulnerable uh to those uh identity theft uh attempts.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So uh one thing that I really really really need you to know is that if I ever call you and ask for money, don't give to them.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Man, that's gonna backfire one day.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But if I ever call you and I ask you for money, uh please, please, for love of God, do not give me more money.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Please be vigilant.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>This the way how this is accelerating, the way how this is spinning up, and this connects you know to the cloud bots, this connects to the agentic AI because today it's not a single person who has to sit down and send those messages.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>No, you can set a friggin' MacBook Mini and tell it a scam 1,000 people and create an AI-generated voice to convince them to do that and just reach out to them.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That's that's how easy it is, and this will unfortunately be better and better with time.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's already frighteningly good, and it will be better.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I'm really speechless about that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's uh please please stay safe online and and uh you know we we all have to be at a higher level of vigilance compared to just a few years ago.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So yeah, that was my Friday that set a mood for the entire weekend, as you can imagine, and uh I was dealing with this kind of backlash of this fishing attack for the rest of the day.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And then I think on Saturday I had a pretty disturbing read.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So I found an online piece, an online paper uh called the 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It was written by someone calling themselves Citrini Research, apparently some some sort of financial uh equity investing uh firm that provides some financial research and commentary.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh it's obviously a work of fiction because uh basically what it is uh they provide you a report written in 2028, which is a year in which the humanity is in a crisis and they trace back how the crisis has happened.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That's that's the the the way how the stories build.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's linked in the show notes if you would like to read it.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I think it's quite a decent read, and uh while I appreciate the fact it's a work of fiction, as I said in the intro, uh 1984 of Orwell is also a work of fiction, and yet uh in many places of the world it exactly unravels.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>A lot of uh Netflix Black Mirror episodes are works of fiction, and disturbingly a lot of those are coming to life in the real world in real technologies.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So um while I appreciate this is a word work of fiction, it is disturbing because I'm not saying this is something that will happen, but I cannot exclude the possibility of their predictions coming to reality, maybe not at a full scale, because I I still think there are bottlenecks, which I will I will discuss later, but uh the it's it's the direction is is probably quite realistic.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Um so why the why this particular report has uh has frightened me and and why I I started reviewing my position on AI after that.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>The thing is, if if you ask me that one and a half year ago, one and a half year ago I was giving you some predictions on AI for the future.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Usually those things don't really work out well.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh the ability to predict future is not that easy.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>If you asked me one and a half year ago about my views on using AI for programming, I would say that it's pretty damn good.

00:16:23.279 --> 00:16:24.399
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's pretty damn useful.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I I'm using it all the time.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Since the chatbots came up, I am using AI in my Python programming for my scientific research, scientific work, and uh always felt this tool is really really strong and really really useful.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But uh I'm quite primitive in the way how I use it because uh if you look at the environment right now, the whole field of software engineering is currently replaced by AI.

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<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's not that person goes to a chatbot and asks them, Dear chatbot, please write me a software for financial analysis of SP 500 or whatever.

00:17:01.519 --> 00:17:02.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It doesn't work like that.

00:17:02.559 --> 00:17:05.200
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But people s today set up agents.

00:17:05.519 --> 00:17:09.200
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Agent is like an AI tool that has kind of a life of its own.

00:17:09.359 --> 00:17:31.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>You give it, you know, a set of rules, you give it uh a goal, a task, a bigger task, like you tell it, write me a software to analyze SP 500 live, and this agent is self-guided, so it knows what's the task, it assigns the goals or intermediate goals to itself, steps of of the process.

00:17:31.920 --> 00:17:46.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It it it figures out the process and then does it step by step, and for those steps it crafts its own prompts and uses LLMs to you know build up chunk by chunk, and you don't really supervise it, it's just doing it on its own.

00:17:46.640 --> 00:17:53.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It can take you and it can take an hour, it can take five hours, but eventually it comes back to you with with a working thing.

00:17:53.680 --> 00:17:57.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And this is not yet enough to replace a whole field of software engineering, of course.

00:17:57.599 --> 00:18:00.640
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's it's a more complicated gimmick but gimmick.

00:18:00.799 --> 00:18:29.039
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But now people have found that you could technically set one agent to create the code, then you create a second agent to review the code, a third agent to criticize the code, a fourth agent to optimize the code, a fifth agent to integrate the code and test it, and then you know you you're running an entire team of software engineers on one task, and they're talking to each other and they're working on it without your supervision.

00:18:29.200 --> 00:18:33.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>All you did is send uh a prompt to them on what they're supposed to deliver.

00:18:33.759 --> 00:18:51.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It costs quite a lot because they are burning through tokens, and tokens is the currency of uh using AI through interfaces, so it's it's quite costly to run that, but still that's like a small fraction of costs you would have if you wanted to hire real people to do the same goal.

00:18:52.000 --> 00:18:58.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And largely the outcomes are are really good, like they are on the human programmer level outcomes.

00:18:58.799 --> 00:19:07.759
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Now, even the AI companies they said they're moving towards this type of engineering rather than having old school humans writing code.

00:19:08.000 --> 00:19:13.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And this kind of disruption, this is changing the entire field of software engineering.

00:19:14.240 --> 00:19:20.640
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Similar thing, maybe not on that scale, has happened to uh artists and and graphics designers, etc.

00:19:21.039 --> 00:19:24.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So easy to create good graphics today with AI.

00:19:24.319 --> 00:19:35.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and today the coding it this is is uh strongly, strongly influenced by by this uh flow of agentic AI, which does the jobs of those uh of those people.

00:19:35.519 --> 00:19:37.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And this goes into this citruni report.

00:19:37.599 --> 00:19:41.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>This is basically the start of that citrunny report because you see two things.

00:19:41.680 --> 00:19:47.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One one is that you can automate jobs and replace people doing those jobs, that that's one thing.

00:19:47.599 --> 00:19:51.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But the second thing is the uh economic impact that replacement has.

00:19:51.839 --> 00:20:07.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So basically, when uh Anthropic, which is the company behind the cloud or uh an AI agent, if they drop a new functionality of their software, suddenly there's like drops on the stock market of companies which will be disrupted.

00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:15.039
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Literally, like yesterday, I IBM has dropped because uh Anthropic has mentioned they can program in cobble.

00:20:15.359 --> 00:20:20.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So it has really two avenues in which it's dis disrupting the economy.

00:20:20.640 --> 00:20:23.599
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One is directly, one is through replacing opportunities.

00:20:23.920 --> 00:20:31.440
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And it's quite easy to replace human workforce with AI when you kind of specialize it for the task.

00:20:31.599 --> 00:20:36.640
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And once this happens, it disrupts the space within it, which it happened.

00:20:36.799 --> 00:21:00.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>What I mean by that is that if there's you know an industry that uh charges you one thousand dollars for a service and it hires two hundred thousand people, each of them earning a hundred thousand bucks a year, and suddenly you create an agating AI tool that can do the same job almost at the same level, but for a small fraction of costs.

00:21:00.559 --> 00:21:17.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One is that suddenly those two hundred thousand people are perhaps going to be unemployed or will have to significantly change their lives, and two, I don't think you're you're able to charge a thousand bucks anymore because now you're competing with others who also do it for a fraction of cost.

00:21:17.920 --> 00:21:22.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So the cost of the service falls down drastically.

00:21:22.319 --> 00:21:34.720
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh the whole Citrini report is is that this is actually what's happening right now to some of the services, and when it happens to one service, that's pretty bad for that service.

00:21:35.039 --> 00:21:43.200
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But when it happens to the entire economy, like the white collar economy, all the jobs imagine all the jobs that could be automated become automated.

00:21:43.599 --> 00:21:51.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We are talking about the majority of workforce out there, which is victim to disruption.

00:21:51.680 --> 00:21:58.960
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We're talking about insane amount of companies who absolutely shift their revenue streams and suddenly this revenue is not going to them.

00:21:59.039 --> 00:22:02.880
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I mean the the Services become cheaper, the money is going elsewhere.

00:22:03.200 --> 00:22:13.599
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>This is a large-scale economy disruption that can pull banking and housing and other stuff collapsing to one uh one after another.

00:22:13.759 --> 00:22:18.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>A whole like systematic change in the world uh way how the world lives.

00:22:18.400 --> 00:22:24.880
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And you know, uh Elon was uh speaking about such things some time ago.

00:22:25.039 --> 00:22:35.039
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh Elon Musk has said that it's pointless to say for your retirement because we will be living in the world of uh abundance.

00:22:35.200 --> 00:22:36.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That that's what he said.

00:22:36.640 --> 00:22:38.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>A world of abundance.

00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:51.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh and and his logic was that everything is gonna be so cheap and so well developed through the AI tools and AI support, then there will be a very limited need for human jobs and human work.

00:22:51.839 --> 00:23:08.960
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And actually, the wealth created by this AI revolution will be distributed among the human population in some sort of universal income, and basically you're gonna have everything you could ever need and want, like utopian world of abundance.

00:23:09.279 --> 00:23:17.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh yeah, that's that's kind of cute, but uh I like observing the world around me, I don't think that's how the world works.

00:23:17.599 --> 00:23:23.440
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh Charlie Mungo said that the world is not even driven by greed, it's it's driven by envy.

00:23:23.839 --> 00:23:34.960
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and what I see is you know, those optimizations they don't lead to create a little utopia for software engineers, they don't lead to create little utopias for anyone.

00:23:35.200 --> 00:23:41.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's about you know directing revenue streams to smaller and smaller groups of people and you know profiting.

00:23:42.079 --> 00:23:46.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And those people who lose their jobs, that's just you know, as a cost.

00:23:46.400 --> 00:23:49.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That that's they're they're the victims of the process.

00:23:49.519 --> 00:23:50.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Who cares about them?

00:23:50.640 --> 00:23:54.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Now, if this happens to the entire economy, we're we're kind of screwed.

00:23:54.400 --> 00:23:56.960
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>This this kind of frightened me in that Citrunny report.

00:23:57.119 --> 00:23:58.000
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Is it fake?

00:23:58.160 --> 00:24:00.000
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Is it like unrealistic?

00:24:00.319 --> 00:24:02.720
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Is it hyper-optimistic about this assumption?

00:24:02.960 --> 00:24:07.119
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Probably it is, it's it's it's quite strong, and I think there are bottlenecks.

00:24:07.440 --> 00:24:09.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One really strong bottleneck is energy.

00:24:10.079 --> 00:24:24.720
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That's you need a lot of power to support those uh AI tools to train them in the new fields, and uh if everyone is using them in an increasingly large scale, we're basically gonna run out of electricity to power that.

00:24:24.880 --> 00:24:30.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So there's a hard cap on how much we can automate with AI based on an electricity power.

00:24:30.720 --> 00:24:40.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And I would assume some legislation, perhaps some taxation will come up to soften the blow and perhaps move the world a little bit into that uh general abundance.

00:24:40.400 --> 00:24:49.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But indeed, this scenario is something that that could realistically happen, that could realistically unravel.

00:24:50.079 --> 00:24:53.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So now why I'm talking about this, why why this is relevant?

00:24:53.440 --> 00:25:13.119
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Because immediately after I've read this paper and I had a chain of thoughts about you know the future and the AI and how it is disrupting the world we know, I started thinking, okay, if those software engineers have been replaced by AI largely, can fire safety engineers be replaced by AI at large?

00:25:13.279 --> 00:25:14.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That that was my thought.

00:25:14.240 --> 00:25:15.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That was my immediate concern.

00:25:15.920 --> 00:25:17.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>How about my job?

00:25:17.599 --> 00:25:21.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Am I at risk of being replaced like that?

00:25:22.079 --> 00:25:34.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And this chain of thought has led me to, let's say, an optimistic view that I don't think it's very realistic in the close time span, whatever foreseeable time span.

00:25:34.319 --> 00:25:36.319
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And there are reasons are a few.

00:25:36.559 --> 00:25:40.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One, uh we're kind of unknown to the larger society.

00:25:40.720 --> 00:25:46.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Show me a work list, uh, list of jobs that counts as fire safety engineer as a job.

00:25:46.480 --> 00:25:50.000
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh we're hidden in the shadow, the society doesn't know about us.

00:25:50.160 --> 00:25:57.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So we're unlikely to be uh an obvious target for automation, you know, because we don't really exist in the heads of those people.

00:25:57.440 --> 00:26:01.759
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh so uh that that's that's what gives us uh a little bit of safety.

00:26:01.839 --> 00:26:04.000
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh this not being exposed.

00:26:04.240 --> 00:26:18.799
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But uh joke jokes aside, in terms of software engineering, one you had an abundance of resources online, like you had Stack Overflow where people would be creatively solving each other's problems in programming.

00:26:18.960 --> 00:26:22.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That's a gold mine to train AI models on.

00:26:22.799 --> 00:26:27.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We had um abundance of code, a lot of softwares that work.

00:26:27.920 --> 00:26:34.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>You know, we we had that all available in the cyberspace where you could steal it.

00:26:34.799 --> 00:26:43.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Let's be clear, those AI models are built on theft, so you could easily steal that and train your models on that.

00:26:43.440 --> 00:26:53.839
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And once you did that, you received a model, and then you could run rounds of improvement on that model because in software engineering you can create software, you can test it.

00:26:54.079 --> 00:27:12.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>What works you can keep, what doesn't work, you can drop, and you know, in in a kind of evolutionary way, you're able to optimize the product to receive a really well-working one in the end, in a very short span of time, because those iterations can come very quickly.

00:27:12.640 --> 00:27:18.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh, if you think about fire safety engineering, there's not that much of that particular problem solving.

00:27:18.640 --> 00:27:37.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There is a lot of knowledge, there is a lot of information about how stuff works, there is a very sound and solid theoretical foundation of the discipline which you can uh go for, but there is not that much case study problem-solving things available online easily.

00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:41.440
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So there's not such an abundance as there was for software engineers.

00:27:41.599 --> 00:27:45.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Therefore, it makes training your initial models so much harder.

00:27:45.599 --> 00:27:50.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And the second thing is the iterative, you know, recursive loops, they're not easy.

00:27:50.319 --> 00:27:52.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>We're talking about buildings, we're talking about projects.

00:27:52.480 --> 00:27:58.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>You cannot implement it and expect the next day you're gonna have outcomes and improve and improve and improve.

00:27:58.160 --> 00:28:03.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Now it takes years to get buildings approved, accepted, built, tested.

00:28:03.519 --> 00:28:07.599
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So those feedback loops also are kind of much slower.

00:28:07.839 --> 00:28:11.200
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So I think there are mundane tasks that could be automated.

00:28:11.359 --> 00:28:19.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I think I know the ability to read code, like the whole code consultancy, this is perhaps endangered.

00:28:19.519 --> 00:28:34.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>There are design tasks that could be automated, like distribution of pipings or cablings, or or even jobs like uh locations of sensors and sprinklers, etc., that this this could potentially be automated.

00:28:34.720 --> 00:28:38.880
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But at large, you know, the the FAR strategies, the FAR scenarios.

00:28:38.960 --> 00:28:48.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh I'm not sure if this is easily is it's possible to easily automate that because of how much they are connected to the project.

00:28:48.400 --> 00:29:00.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So um despite you know this this uh kind of interesting outcome for software engineers, I still think that fire safety engineers are still to some extent safe.

00:29:00.240 --> 00:29:16.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>They're definitely safer than many, many other jobs, which would be high on the job ranking, which would be very visible, which would have those resources to train the models and solid economic incentives to kind of work and replace them.

00:29:16.319 --> 00:29:19.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>But now uh that's just one side of the story.

00:29:19.680 --> 00:29:29.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>The other side of the story of that of the Citrini report is that but what happens to the fire safety engineering if there is truly a massive global economic crisis?

00:29:29.839 --> 00:29:32.799
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>How how does fire safety engineering work?

00:29:32.960 --> 00:29:38.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And you know, I I know some people who worked in 2008 uh in the last major economic crisis.

00:29:38.720 --> 00:29:39.680
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It was tough.

00:29:39.920 --> 00:29:47.519
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>In Poland, I personally we had some smaller crises 2012-13, was not many jobs back then.

00:29:47.680 --> 00:29:48.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It was tough.

00:29:48.799 --> 00:30:04.799
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I think uh if if this scenario to some extent the travels and the economy is generally in a bad place, fire safety engineering is not gonna be in a great place either because the construction world will be a victim of the economic circumstances around us.

00:30:04.960 --> 00:30:16.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>That that's perhaps even though if we may not get automated, uh this may be a thing that uh causes a little bit of suffering to us and makes our lives harder.

00:30:16.319 --> 00:30:18.880
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh I'm I'm a little worried that it's gonna unravel like that.

00:30:19.200 --> 00:30:39.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>One more thing about the uh civil engineering or or built environment, engineering at large and uh AI is that uh I remember I seen some report uh about the state of digitalization in EU of 20-something key areas of uh economy.

00:30:40.160 --> 00:30:54.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And actually, I think construction was like either the last one or among the the last ones with like very, very, very low score of how digitalized it is, and it was worse than agriculture.

00:30:54.400 --> 00:30:59.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And and then I thought, oh man, we're so lagging behind, we're so bad in in digitalization.

00:31:00.079 --> 00:31:07.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And today I'm like, oh hell yeah, that's good because it's uh if we're not that digital, it's not that easy to train on us.

00:31:07.440 --> 00:31:16.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So uh perhaps uh our reluctance to BM2 digitalization is actually something that uh saves us in in the end.

00:31:16.559 --> 00:31:21.359
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I'm not calling to drop the attempts to digitalize the civil engineering.

00:31:21.440 --> 00:31:40.400
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I still see massive opportunities in doing that in a good way, but you know it's kind of a circumstance that our inability to transition into the digital age as an entire industry kind of worked out for us in the end as the AI revolution unravels.

00:31:40.960 --> 00:31:44.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So yeah, the this report really stressed me out.

00:31:44.559 --> 00:31:50.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I spent like half of the weekend thinking about this and uh you know creating scenarios in my head.

00:31:50.400 --> 00:32:03.119
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I have children, I want the children to live in a world where it's great for them to live, not in a world where people compete for the most basic jobs because all other well-paying jobs have been automated already.

00:32:03.359 --> 00:32:06.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So yeah, it was kind of stressful.

00:32:06.559 --> 00:32:08.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Probably overacting.

00:32:08.160 --> 00:32:22.319
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh, probably it's not as bad as uh the report says, but still I think it was a valuable exercise to read through that and think about uh how the future will look like.

00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:24.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh, I wonder if you've read it.

00:32:24.319 --> 00:32:26.880
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I wonder what are your thoughts about it.

00:32:27.039 --> 00:32:29.440
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh I just really wanted to share this with you.

00:32:29.599 --> 00:32:39.920
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Those two things that happened over the weekend uh that they caused me to view the world of AI in a slightly different way.

00:32:40.400 --> 00:32:48.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Uh still seeing the opportunities, but a little bit more frightened about the consequences of what's uh going around.

00:32:48.720 --> 00:32:51.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Um that would be it for this podcast episode.

00:32:51.359 --> 00:32:57.119
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>I think I've achieved my goal of rambling and speaking out on the stuff that distressed me.

00:32:57.279 --> 00:32:58.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Please stay safe online.

00:32:58.720 --> 00:33:00.720
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Please do not send me any money.

00:33:00.880 --> 00:33:02.160
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Really, like seriously, don't.

00:33:02.480 --> 00:33:15.119
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>If if I reach to you, especially from a suspicion, number suspicious number, especially from Philippines, please do not uh answer and do not uh do not send me anything in any condition.

00:33:15.519 --> 00:33:32.000
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh stay safe online and uh as promised, uh very soon I'll have a proper AI revolution episode with the opportunities, with the possibilities uh with the person who is the undisputed leader of the Adam Zenoser.

00:33:32.319 --> 00:33:42.559
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>So uh if you lacked fire science or science in general in this podcast episode, I will make sure that you will get the double dose in the one where we do it properly.

00:33:42.720 --> 00:33:44.079
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Thanks for being here with me.

00:33:44.160 --> 00:33:50.799
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>It's it's really great to have uh people that you can speak up with or to and share stuff like that.

00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:56.480
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>And uh I hope uh one day we meet at a beer and we can uh take this conversation further.

00:33:56.720 --> 00:33:58.240
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Thanks for being here with me today.

00:33:58.400 --> 00:33:58.799
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Cheers.

00:33:58.960 --> 00:33:59.279
<v Wojciech Wegrzynski>Bye.