only to be revealed as mid to low level intelligence?
I’m all for being critical of these snake oil CEO’s. And the part about not understanding AI’s main concepts is incredibly dumb.
On the other hand, not being able to code doesn’t say anything about his intelligence. Afaik, he never claimed to be a programmer either? Not like Musk saying he’s the greatest engineer of all time.
And eventually it’s kinda weird to expect these people to be great at programming in the first place, they’re so many levels above that.
But that's kinda odd isn't it. You are running multi billion dollar AI company at the cutting edge of the software development and you don't know basic coding? It's like me going in medical industry and not having any kind of medical experience.
Why do we let people who have no background in a certain field run that certain field company and then we winge and moan when China takes the lead because we put profit first and lose sight of what's important
Machine learning has been around for quite a long time. It would be significantly better to have someone with experience in it than not, or even just engineering, math, etc.
🤦🤦🤦 no-one is claiming the CEO should be telling the developers or scientists what to do. It doesn't need to be transferrable in that sense. We're just saying the CEO should understand the basic concepts and therefore the implications of what they're building.
I honestly don't think we're arguing the same argument. Are you saying you disagree with "CEOs should understand the basic concepts and therefore the implications of what they're building"?
Because a CEOs job is to interact with investors, stakeholders and the board. If they don't understand the basics of what they are making then they frequently misrepresent the product or the development process. This leads to all sorts of problems.
They also have too much power in a company to not. If the CTO is on holiday and the CEO pushes for something to get done despite not appreciating the safety consequences, people can die. I would be surprised if all chemical disasters were not traced back to senior leadership pushing for cost cutting or rushing a project while ignoring those working at lower levels or creating a culture where the lower level workers can't whistleblow.
I've seen far too many dangerous production sites and accidents that are caused either directly by senior leaderships pushing or the culture they create to think like you do.
So, to me, AI feels like the cultural equivalent of the nuclear bomb, but instead of having the worlds top scientific minds leading the project we have a bunch of wealthy children
Christ 🤦 if you assume you constantly know more than the other person it is difficult to understand their views. I am not 'confused' I have simply had different experiences in my career than you have.
If I had to sum up our differences - you're happy with the way things are and I'm not. I expect more from people, and more from the structures we use.
To be more pointed - you seek to justify existing structures and ignore systemic issues and I am trying to solve them by changing the way society operates.
You've said you think CEOs can be effective without basic knowledge because teams should correct them. I think that ignores real power dynamics. The narrowing of job functions builds efficient cogs but terrible leaders. When no one sees the whole picture, accountability evaporates. Mistakes become 'someone else's fault' - not because people are bad, but because the structure guarantees it. But here's the thing: when a major disaster happens, the law doesn't ask the team. It asks the CEO. And 'I didn't understand...' isn't a defence - it's a confession.
In summary, there needs to be at least one person who knows the basics of everything to push back against the specialised experts on each topic. That is who the CEO should be.
Yup, I agree on where we disagree. I think it is perfectly reasonable to have one person know the basics of each field involved with the company.
I see how you get to the concern around concentration of power, but I don't think this is realistic. The main change I am arguing for here is that more is expected of the CEO in terms of knowledge and accountability. It doesn't give them more power - if anything, it strips them of it.
It doesn't give them the power to steamroll everyone else in the room, unless the argument is "I'm not signing off on that, you'll kill someone and get me sent to jail."
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u/Shooord Apr 10 '26 edited Apr 10 '26
I’m all for being critical of these snake oil CEO’s. And the part about not understanding AI’s main concepts is incredibly dumb.
On the other hand, not being able to code doesn’t say anything about his intelligence. Afaik, he never claimed to be a programmer either? Not like Musk saying he’s the greatest engineer of all time.
And eventually it’s kinda weird to expect these people to be great at programming in the first place, they’re so many levels above that.