Researcher mocks Jevons-paradox AI hype: a quarter to do what a TI-86 could

RexDouglass · x · 2026-09-19

Researcher Rex Douglass mocks the increasingly influencer-flavored discourse around Jevons-paradox AI claims: "It only costs a quarter to do something that checks notes would run on a TI-86."

In a follow-up he argues the discourse is weirdly hype-driven, with people rediscovering things the field used to do with BERT and an LM head — implying many celebrated lightweight AI applications rest on long-existing techniques.

Related event: Researcher Mocks AI Hype and Benchmark Culture in Time-Series Prediction(2 posts)→

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