Open AI and the next Productivity Revolution
How more intuitive coding interfaces have the potential to bring about the greatest productivity spike ever seen.
In my last post, I talked about spatial software, and how a more intuitive system of interacting with our virtual world might spur an economic growth spurt akin to that of the Industrial Revolution. Recently, I saw something that blew my mind. The OpenAI Codex is a system that translates natural language into code. In the demo below, the Open AI team shows how given an API, the OpenAI Codex is able to effectively learn how to take spoken commands and code a program to fulfill their request.
Apart from the AI’s amazing ability to parse the English language, which is reminiscent of GPT-3, it has the impressive ability to parse that language into logic, which can then be turned into working code through a given API.
The implications of this are nearly impossible to predict. Not only will coding become a much more efficient occupation, but it will also become more accessible. With Codex, the days of learning java as a second language are numbered. And with such a huge barrier to entry dissipating, the floodgates of the programming world will open to anyone who can dictate or type.
Similar to how the near mythical creation of Hangul (often described as the easiest alphabet to learn in the world), drastically improved Korean literacy rates, the advent of AI logic transcription will revolutionize and accelerate innovation by bringing previously code illiterate people into the fold of software development. Currently, only .5% of people on earth have the ability to code, and most of these people are not proficient enough at it to make it as developers, who may number as few as 18.5 million. However, 47.1% of worldwide households have access to a computer, and even more have mobile phones.
Everyone is capable of thinking in logic patterns. In many ways, it is the defining ability of humanity. This means that not accounting for advancements in computer and technological access, there are roughly 3.7 Billion minds on the cusp of an effective alternative to code literacy. That is nearly a 200 fold increase in brainpower that will be able to alter and manipulate the virtual world in new and powerful ways. If I were to predict what people in the year 2100 look back upon as the most pivotal moment of the century, I would choose this in a heartbeat.
I think it shows how excited I am about this invention, so much so that I’ve already requested access to the OpenAI Codex Beta, to which I’ve included a link here:
-Connor, Of All Trades
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