A leading theory in neuroscience is that human brains are fundamentally prediction machines too, constantly predicting sensory input, other people’s behavior, the next word in a sentence. “it’s just prediction” isn’t the gotcha you think it is. Prediction and attention turn out to be a surprisingly powerful foundation for intelligence.

The “just a text predictor” framing was fair a couple years ago but hasn’t kept up. Current models can genuinely identify untested edge cases even when coverage is 100%. You're definitely using the latest and greatest models?

The architecture started as next-token prediction, sure, and yes, human judgment is still required, but that judgment is being captured and integrated too. Every time millions of people use these models, their feedback feeds the next round of improvements.

Also, these models don’t need to replace your best engineers to be disruptive. They just need to outcompete the bottom of the bell curve. For a lot of junior-level work, we’re already getting close.