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I let Claude Code write an entire book

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Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#51

Post by hombre_fatal »

gosub100 wrote: post #31
vasco wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like we do a great job of that already and the internet is full of people pointing it out from others.

> the internet is full of people This is the part that is about to change. Big time. The Internet is going to be full of bots thanks to LLM. It's going to get to the point where the majority of "people" are fake and the suspicion will overlap onto the actual people. It will reach a point where nobody will believe anybody online. Inb4 "we've had bots forever now". You know what I mean.

I don't think it will be much different than how we already conduct ourselves online.

Consider the thousands of replies to a Reddit submission that probably never happened, or the thousands of replies to a screenshot of a headline/tweet/text post with no source and nobody even asking for one.

Thousands of people voraciously pretending it's the most serious thing in the world so they have an excuse to share their two cents and some emotion over it.

I don't think we very much cared about the veracity of most things we encounter day to day. It's mostly an excuse to engage and socialize.

LLMs seem to perfectly fit into this. Now everyone can find their personal hobby horse to engage with, and there will always be some straw men reply guys to keep you entertained.

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#52

Post by bgwalter »

gokhan wrote: post #36

Just like in blind wine tasting, I suspect people’s perceptions (including many here) would be very different if the author hadn’t told us it was created by AI. There’s a noticeable negativity on HN toward AI when it comes to coding, writing, or anything similar as if these people have been using AI for the past 30 years and have reached some elevated state of mind where they clearly see it's rubbish, while the rest…

There has been an effort to deny all variance in human output or abilities in the last 8 years.

It works, because most humans are mediocre (including their managers). So they gang up on the productive part of the population, harness its output, launder its output and so forth.

Then they say: "See, there are no differences! We are all equal!"

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#53

Post by bgwalter »

cheema33 wrote: post #43
bgwalter wrote: post #19

All issues that are implicitly pointed out as novel in the introduction have been discussed for centuries. Not only by scholars and experts. Literally 50% of Internet discussion is about biases, selective facts, spin etc. The problem with "AI" is that propaganda can be automated and that it wastes our time. The topic is suited for "AI" because it is a soft topic that lends itself to uninhibited preaching. "AI" is als…

> "AI" is also great at writing presidential speeches. It is probably the only thing it is good at. People with this, head in the sand attitude about AI, are in for a rude awakening.

The FOMO argument!

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#54

Post by cheema33 »

chaosbolt wrote: post #26

AI makes things too easy, this will destroy culture. We thought that movies adapting to the tiktok generation wouldn't kill cinema, and that new and better directors would rise... this didn't happen and even the latest movies from good directors like ridley scott are quite bad. Now 3 years ago I typed "lovecraft nietzsche" and would only find 2 videos on youtube that pertain to what I'm looking for, aka the link betw…

> It really does take the beauty out of the whole experience.

Beauty is subjective.

For a long time we were an agrarian society. Getting up early, getting on a horse and tending to your land every day, was probably considered beautiful by some. But we don't do that anymore.

We are probably going to see a similar shift in society. At a much more accelerated pace.

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#55

Post by s1mplicissimus »

cheema33 wrote: post #42
amake wrote: post #16

Why would I read a book that a person couldn't be bothered to write?

You consume many things that a human did not bother to produce.

>> You consume many things that a human did not bother to produce.

apart from maybe at times eating wild growing food - what kinds of things did you have in mind?

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#56

Post by ToValueFunfetti »

amake wrote: post #16

Why would I read a book that a person couldn't be bothered to write?

I find I'm willing to explore a minecraft world or puzzle through a nethack dungeon that nobody bothered to create. You could argue that humans made the biomes or defined the layout constraints, but humans also supplied the training data for an LLM. I guess it comes down to whether the art is any good, with procedural generation being mostly irrelevant? But perhaps a book is different

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#57

Post by fragmede »

debesyla wrote: post #41
gokhan wrote: post #36

Just like in blind wine tasting, I suspect people’s perceptions (including many here) would be very different if the author hadn’t told us it was created by AI. There’s a noticeable negativity on HN toward AI when it comes to coding, writing, or anything similar as if these people have been using AI for the past 30 years and have reached some elevated state of mind where they clearly see it's rubbish, while the rest…

Just like with mass-manufactured furniture, some of us seek hand-made items, as it feels more human, despite its flaws.

Realy? Does having flawws really make four better reading? Okay, I'll admit that hurt me to right (as did that) but writing isn't furniture, and other than a couple of tells which I haven't kept pace with (eg use of the word "delve"), the problem with trying to key off of LLM generated content and decide quality, is that you can't tell if the LLM operator took three minutes to copy and pasted the whole thing (unless they accidentally leave in the prompts, which has happened, and is a dead giveaway that no one even proof skimmed it), or if they took more time with it and carefully considered the questions ChatGPT asked them as to what the writing wood (ouch!) contain.

If you made it this far, does having English mistakes like that make really make for better reading?

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#58

Post by tossandthrow »

gokhan wrote: post #36

Just like in blind wine tasting, I suspect people’s perceptions (including many here) would be very different if the author hadn’t told us it was created by AI. There’s a noticeable negativity on HN toward AI when it comes to coding, writing, or anything similar as if these people have been using AI for the past 30 years and have reached some elevated state of mind where they clearly see it's rubbish, while the rest…

This thing is that it is not worth writing - people should consume the book directly from the LLM.

A project that would rethink the book medium into something backed by an LLM would be worth it.

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#59

Post by tpmoney »

gradus_ad wrote: post #21

The premise is wrong. Humans don't listen to one another and nod unthinkingly. They criticize and validate relentlessly. Friends aren't mistaken for oracles. We have learned to not trust one another, except when one is speaking from deep experience and expertise in a given domain. AI is presented as an expert in every domain though, so we are lulled into a vulnerable state of unvigilance.

> Humans don't listen to one another and nod unthinkingly. They criticize and validate relentlessly. Friends aren't mistaken for oracles. We have learned to not trust one another, except when one is speaking from deep experience and expertise in a given domain.

Do we though? I think a quick jaunt through any of the “-o-spheres” or “-tubes” of the internet would quickly disabuse someone of the idea that we default to not trusting other people. Even before the internet, “urban legends” are effectively “mass social hallucinations”.

Re: I let Claude Code write an entire book

#60

Post by dinfinity »

NameError wrote: post #25
dinfinity wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read more than the opening lines? When you've read it in its entirety, could you indicate on a scale from 1 to 10 what score it would get compared to published books you've read (including of course all the best and the worst ones)?

It seems silly to expect someone to read the whole book before evaluating it when the creator didn't even read the whole book before publishing it

If someone claims "the book is total shit", it is entirely reasonable to ask if they've actually read it, regardless of who or what wrote it.
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