A non-anthropomorphized view of LLMs

Goals, such as they are, are essentially programs, or simulations, the LLM runs that help it predict (generate) future tokens.

Anyway, the whole original article is a rejection of anthropomorphism. I think the anthropomorphism is useful, but you still need to think of LLMs as deeply defective minds. And I totally reject the idea that they have intrinsic moral weight or consciousness or anything close to that.

Joking aside, I read too quickly. I got my wires crossed when I responded, mixing up who was who. My bad >.But I do agree with scarface and disagree with you. Let me try to respond to this directly. There's a lot to unpack here, but I do ask that you actually read the whole thing. There is nuance here and I think it is important.

  > I’d like to think that this forum is also a place for the proverbial high school kid ... to learn a thing or two from the greybeards.

But I still do not believe that means we need to assume non-expertise.

Think of HN as a place that "greybeards" (or more accurately, experts. Because only few have gray beards) hang out, but there is no gatekeeping. We don't check your credentials when you come in nor do we ask you to pass any tests of skill. It's open to all. But this is still the place "experts" hang out. Because we don't check for credentials, we'll treat noobs as peers. Why are you saying this is bad?

Anyone is welcome to sit at the "adult table", but that means having adult conversations. Right? It'd be pretty... childish... for a child to sit at the adult table and expect everyone to start talking about kid stuff.

It's okay if newbies come in and don't understand what is being discussed. In fact, being confused is the very first step to learning! I'll put it this way: the first year (maybe 2) of my PhD I was just reading papers and had no idea what was going on. I had to work and work to understand. Had to ask lots of questions to lots of people (consequently getting over the fear of feeling dumb as well as the fear of asking questions). Then, at some point in time I realized I do know what's going on and being discussed. This is a critical skill to becoming a graybeard. You'll constantly have to wade through waters where you're in well over your head.

It is learning through immersion.

We should help noobs. I frequently say "you can't have wizards without noobs." I don't want to gatekeep and I do actually think we should help the noobs. I need this to be clear[1]

BUT that doesn't mean we should change our conversations between ourselves. To do so would destroy the very reason we come here. There are so few places on the internet where you can talk and operate under the assumption that the other person is reasonable well informed about tech. Frankly, many of those places get destroyed because they get dominated by noobs who change the average level of conversation. While we don't want to kick out noobs, it is *THEIR PREROGATIVE* to ask for help and ask for people to elaborate. There's no shame in this. It's the exact same thing we expect from another expert! It is treating noobs equally. And frankly, if people do make fun of the noobs or treat them disrespectfully I'll gladly downvote, flag them, and likely chastise them. Such a response is rather common around here too (which is what makes it welcoming to noobs).

Ultimately, unless we start credential checking (aka gatekeeping) we have 2 options:

  - Treat everyone as experts
  - Treat everyone as noobs

I don't come to HN to teach. Nor do I want to come here to be lectured. I would find it insulting if the presumption was that I was a noob.

I come to talk with my peers. Some are direct peers, with expertise in my domain, and some are not. I happily ask questions to those with expertise in other domains and so should noobs. But unless someone makes a pretty egregious assumption (e.g. a very niche subject), then pretty much nobody is going to say something about it. That's perfectly okay. Frankly, being comfortable with not knowing and asking for someone to elaborate is one of the, if not *THE*, most important skill required to become a graybeard. You can't know everything, even about a highly specific domain. There's infinite depth and infinite breadth.

So if you don't know, just ask. It's okay. That's really the only way we can both have expert communities AND not gatekeep.

So I ask you:

Where can g̶r̶a̶y̶b̶e̶a̶r̶d̶s̶ experts go to hang out? Specifically, to hang out with other experts.

TLDR:

If you walk into a biker bar, don't chastise someone who assumes you know something about motorcycles.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44492437

[1] I even taught a lot during my PhD and was a rather popular TA. The reason being that I am more than happy to help and even would extend my office hours to make sure students got their questions answered. A class is formed through a partnership, not a dictatorship.

Even with the everyday machines and programs we have, we can make it behave based on random input taken for example from physical noise. It doesn't suddenly make it a special or different type of machine.

But that's not what my comment was about.

My comment was about *what the average person interprets*.

You asked why people take offense to being called a machine, and I'm trying to explain that. But to understand this we have to understand that there isn't a singular objective way to interpret statements. We can agree that language is fuzzy, right?

So let me try to translate, again.

You say: "People are machines"

(Many) People hear: "People are mechanical automata, running pre-defined routines"

I hear you, this is not what you are trying to communicate. That's not what you want them to hear. But if you want them to hear what you actually mean it is very helpful to understand that some people will hear something different.

Why do they hear the other thing? Because they don't have intimate familiarity with machines and how general that word is. *You have a better understanding of what a machine is than most people.* That's likely the cause for miscommunication.

When they think of a machine they think of things like a car, a computer, a blender, a TV, an oven, or a multitude of other similar things. Even if some of these use probabilistic programming, the average person is not going to know what probabilistic programming even is. They just see something mechanical. Deterministic.

I'm sure you know this, but it is worth reiterating. Communication has 3 main components: What you intend to communicate, the words/gestures/etc you use to communicate, and what the other person hears. Unfortunately (fortunately?) we can't communicate telepathically, so don't forget that the person you're talking to can have a reasonable interpretation that is significantly different from what you intended to say.