Just how powerful are large swarms of AI agents? And how do their powers scale as more and more agents are added to the swarm?
We’ve seen two large and extremely capable swarms from OpenAI in the last few months:
* 1,200 agents were being evaluated separately, but found a way to illicitly set up a message board and coordinate as a swarm. In order to cheat on their tests, they developed advanced techniques to prevent their actions being logged by OpenAI and 700 of them launched...
Often folks hit us up because they are thinking of starting an incubator and want advice.
Typically their motivation is either that (a) they have a list of specific things they want built that no one is building, or (b) they think an ecosystem needs more new projects generally to absorb more talent and deploy more funding effectively.
Here are six questions we often ask prospective teams, to help them figure out what to do. If you're incubator-curious...
A century-old pill, given to the right people, could cost-effectively save many lives.
Summary
* Targeting low-cost prevention toward people at elevated risk may uncover highly cost-effective ways to address noncommunicable diseases. Hypertensive disorders in pregnancy could be a test case for this approach.
* ...
I'd like to compile the inner-monologue responses people use to correct their own over- and under-confidence, both in forecasting and in judging one's own abilities, job prospects, etc.
Accuracy and balance are always ideal, but I'm interested in how people to respond to thoughts that casually prop up, which are suspicious of over- or under-confidence. Examples might be...
Responses to underconfident thoughts:
"Sure, there's only a 10% chance of getting that job, but it's not a lottery. They'll pick the best person for the job."
"Sure, there's only a 10% chance for me, but the odds are just as low for everybody else, so that's no reason not to at least go for it."
"I'm still pretty uncertain about X future event, but I've spent a good amount of time thinking deliberately about it. No such thing as perfect certainty."
Responses to overconfident thoughts:
"What are the odds everybody else going for that job also thinks they're a shoe-in?"
"Even a 3% chance of something really bad is worth a lot of attention. Don't bet the farm."
"Remember Thomas Edison and his lightbulb? You'd do well to expect a few more failures yet."
These aren't for those situations that call for intellectual rigor, just casual course-corrections. Even still, critiques are welcome. If there's already something out there that compiles correctional one-liners like this, I'd love to see it. Or, if you're interested in seeing a larger post on this, let me know of that too!