I agree about the writing. As for the cover art though: I'm indifferent. It's not an important part of the book.
In the literary world, I would call using AI sentences in your novel a felony, but I'm not sure using it in a cover would even qualify as a misdemeanor.
A decent chunk of the work a student does during a PhD is stuff that their advisor would have done in much less time, but are intentionally delegating to the student to allow them to learn.
So, I don't think AI changes the way expertise is earned. It might change the cost tradeoffs depending on where AI costs eventually settle.
Most (probably all) open model providers implement OpenAI-style API. If your app's already using OpenAI models, it's as simple as swapping the endpoint and the key to switch to these models.
In theory Cerebras have a developer subscription model you can use, but they seem to have stopped new signups. So per sibling, OpenRouter and per-call pricing is the answer for now.
He's saying that a full body MRI is so valuable, that if you got one and then smoked for a year, you'd be in the same place as you were before you started, health wise. No loss.
Obviously you'll come out way ahead if you don't do the smoking part: it's very valuable, in other words.
You know what's going to happen is some budding CEO will come along and read this and conclude, "I know the solution: my company won't give to charity." It will become enshrined as this principle in their company lore, that nothing can detract from The Work. Managers will parrot it, HR may even add it to onboarding. But it will be an empty gesture, because as the company grows it will become more and more multifacted, or 'distracted' if you will.
I'm not sure the process can even be stopped, if the company is successful and the new changes appear to be, and probably are, profitable.
To a physio therapist (the article example) that is a business meeting. That's what's strange here. That person isn't there because their you're friend: they're getting paid to be there, which makes it a business meeting, which makes a secretary, human or AI, appropriate.
I've noticed that many famous billionaires want to be viewed as philosophers: Thiel obviously, Musk arguably.
For this they do need ideological coherency and the ability to order their arguments logically, ideally as part of a larger program. Since it is such a popular destination late in life, you'd think it would be a good choice for a major too.
I don't think it does explain anything. I've seen no evidence that Thiel takes any particular inspiration from Plato. Rather, Thiel seems to be much more focused on Christianity and libertarianism, and those would be the sources of Thiel's anti-democratic predilections, not Plato's Republic. I think philosopher-king is more of a label that other people are trying to pin on Thiel. The Republic actually said that the philosopher-kings should have no private property, and children should be raised by the community.
Moreover, I've seen no evidence whatsoever that Elon Musk is looking to be considered a philosopher. He writes short meme tweets, not treatises.
I think you're reading my comment too literally. The concept of philosopher-king has moved beyond literal reading of Plato and into the broader concept of epistocracy.
> I think you're reading my comment too literally.
Well, I agree that the concept of philosopher-king is applied by people nonliterally to Thiel, though mainly because those people are ignorant of Plato. But if we interpret your comment nonliterally and remove the "from Plato" part, I still don't see how the nonliteral concept helps to explain anything. Unless we're supposed to interpret "It explains a hell of a lot" nonliterally too?
As I see it, calling Thiel a philosopher-king wannabe is nothing more than a hand-wavy insult. He's a politically powerful billionaire, he has an undergraduate philosophy degree, and he likes to spout about politics and apparently the Antichrist. That's really all there is to it. The use of the term philosopher-king has no intellectual value in this context.
In the gentlest way possible you are responding to "he thinks he's Napolean" with minutia about troop movements in Austerlitz. But you do you lapcat, you do you.
No, I was reponding to "It explains a hell of a lot."
You would have had the same problem if you had said, "Look up Napolean. It explains a lot." The problem is that it explains nothing. Neither Plato nor Napolean helps to explain Peter Thiel, or Elon Musk for that matter. "Philosopher-king wannabe" or "Napolean wannabe" is nothing but an insult wrapped in an historical reference, with no intellectual or explanatory value, and no specific connection to Thiel.
I don't think self publishing is dead. But it probably is an end to grabbing new books from unfamiliar names. So self publishing will be harder, since it will take grinding to build human rep, but certainly not dead.
My backlog of pre 2020 fiction that I want to read is huge, so I don't have to worry about it. Non-fiction is a pain. I mostly by these for my kid (Things like dinosaur encyclopedias etc), so I stick to university press, but I have no idea if it's getting through there but I wouldn't be surprised.
In the literary world, I would call using AI sentences in your novel a felony, but I'm not sure using it in a cover would even qualify as a misdemeanor.