Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#291

Post by michaelhoney » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:09 AM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #269

jimmygrapes wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't had the patience or mentality to really absorb "ok but how is this useful" until that thread and your highlighted references. Thank you for the curated highlights, however brief it may be, because it's very hard to find such diamonds without dedicating far too much time wading through the abstract gatekept comments on the topic, in most cases. Real world examples give me much hope!

Lemme give another. I was formerly quite anti-AI but bought a cheap Claude plan just to play around with it a bit. First thing I built with it was this - https://github.com/tylereaves/onscreen-piano , in about an hour and maybe 10 prompt cycles. It replaced, for my specific use case, the 10% of the functionality of an increasingly-unreliable commercial app. That's including building the website, setting up actions fo…

I am very optimistic about people using LLMs to explore their medical issues. Human bodies are complex and doctors are time- and intelligence- limited. An LLM can be a really useful partner.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#292

Post by SlinkyOnStairs » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:13 AM UTC

YZF wrote: post #150

johnfn wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that it's "divided", I wouldn't say "simply". Mentioning AI brings out a sharply negative side of HN that I had not seen before 2023. It is the only subject where, when I have shared that I built something with it, I have gotten derogatory comments claiming I am inexperienced, unintelligent, and that the thing I built (a hobby project) is unimpressive or embarrassing. This has never happened in the deca…

Same experience. But that's simply because you think you're experienced but the OP knows that you're just deluding yourself. Just kidding. More seriously, I think this is a true reflection of a cultural phenomena. All discussions have become more polarized. There is a more of a generational divide in perception and discussion. I would also say there is a loss of nuance. To complicate this even further there is a real…

> There is a more of a generational divide in perception and discussion. I would also say there is a loss of nuance.

The youth are facing an enormous employment crisis. Many have found themselves completely unemployable through no fault of their own.

And then AI leaders go around to commencement speeches to rub it in.

There's no loss of nuance, the situation has just escalated a lot.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#293

Post by trumpdong » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:13 AM UTC

peteforde wrote: post #264

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that HN was at least as sharply negative during the cryptocurrency craze. I recall various submissions asking "Why is HN so anti-crypto?" as well.

The false equivalency in this explanation is off the scale. It wasn't just that crypto was an obvious grift; it was that you didn't need to be an experienced developer to confirm that 99% of the "web 3.0" nonsense that what was being thrown around literally made no technical sense. You might reject LLMs on principle, or find that they don't work for you. But I think we're well past any debate of whether they do anyth…

Crypto also obviously does something at all. If anyone was saying it didn't, they were just as delusional as people saying that AI does nothing at all.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#294

Post by trumpdong » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:16 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #287

Herbstluft wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say the "threat" of local models and user independence is currently (successfully) being fought by cutting off the supply and development of general computing devices and hardware. The mentioned big few are buying up everything regardless of need and making hardware unaffordable and unavailable for normal people (or smaller businesses). And some of the few manufacturers are already being convinced to stop develop…

Forcing people to go through you by buying up the market supply of a commodity at 10x the production cost is a strategy that will inevitably collapse. More DRAM will get made if prices hold.

In 10 years. 5 to realize the new prices are permanent and 5 more to build new fabs.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#295

Post by trumpdong » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:18 AM UTC

wiether wrote: post #273

yieldcrv wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m working with an ideas guy, no skills and no capital but for the first time can deliver code He wants my tech expertise, his code is spaghetti, he is making all the mistakes, he is experiencing AI psychosis, his AI makes md files warning him that its all going to burn him which he forwards to me lackadaisically without reading But can he sale? Yes Its tempting for me to proselytize that he isnt using feature branc…

I've also have to work with a guy like that. It could be okay if it wasn't for the fact that they have a high esteem of themselves and don't learn shit. The first POC they vibecoded and managed to sell was a pile of trash that we couldn't realistically deploy as it. So we spent two weeks to make it something decent enough to have the minimum confidence of the thing being reliable and safe enough to reach staging. Two…

Why not make him vibedeploy it, and then you hack it to prove your point?

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#296

Post by DonaldFisk » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:20 AM UTC

It's in the name "Hacker News". Hackers are people who enjoy doing the programming themselves, because they get satisfaction from it. Often they program in their spare time, and sometimes what they develop has little to no practical value, and is done as a learning exercise. Using AI would defeat the purpose for them. If they're forced to use AI in their job, it decreases their job satisfaction.

There are others who just want a problem solved, and it doesn't matter to them how the program which solves it gets written, as long as the program (appears to) work and it's done as quickly as possible, so they outsource the development to AI. That is not hacking.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#297

Post by trumpdong » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:22 AM UTC

beej71 wrote: post #28

> They care that the product works This reminds me of Anthropic's post where they say they ship 8x as much code as they used to. And I stopped to consider how many times I've used an app and thought, "You know what this needs? More code!"

Is this why Claude Code uses React as a game engine to run a TUI?

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#298

Post by spacebacon » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:22 AM UTC

Why are you so pro AI? I find HN well balanced on the topic. LLMs are consistently referred to in proto-mind or cognitive frames. This is whats truly eye rolling. Push back should be a given. We are not even accurately describing them as semiotic infrastructure yet. We’re just getting started. Expect haters.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#299

Post by Findecanor » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:22 AM UTC

ZenoArrow wrote: post #201

haunter wrote: post #153

The more close you are to the fire the more you understand how dangerous it is. HN always have had a sizable anti-tech crowd (I don't want to say luddite because it's borderline pejorative). If you see the technology from close and you understand the human impacts of it then there is a reason some would rather stay clear from it. I know some FAANG engineers who doesn’t allow their kids to have smartphones or use soci…

> HN always have had a sizable anti-tech crowd (I don't want to say luddite because it's borderline pejorative). It's frequently said that technology is ethically neutral, and whether it's used for good or bad ends depends on how it is applied. What you call the anti-tech crowd is simply the crowd that takes their ethical responsibilities seriously. There are other potential points of view that could be adopted inste…

I have recently begun to call myself a "technorealist". Technorealism is an old movement that I've found my existing views have been aligned with for some time. Technology is meant to serve man, and a solution that involves technology is not always the best one. We must consider the social and political aspects of technology, and discuss how it should best be applied before jumping headlong into using it. Solutions should be made to be sustainable in the long term, even when technology fails.

We've seen many applications of AI lately that aren't particularly sustainable, in several aspects.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the HN crowd so anti-AI?

#300

Post by trumpdong » Sat, Jun 06, 2026, 10:23 AM UTC

queenkjuul wrote: post #272

tehjoker wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not totally anti AI but I don’t use coding harnesses. I see my coworkers using coding harnesses decline in basic engineering mentalities, asking me questions easily answered with a modicum of research or thinking, but claude told them something so they ask me. I don’t think these are bad guys or bad engineers, it’s concerning to me though. Engineers should be getting sharper in their analysis over time not weake…

My boss was fired yesterday, in part because every single document, email, meeting agenda, performance review, and PR he's written for a year has been pure AI slop. His defense was always "everyone uses AI, including you" and I'm like yes i do use it for code but never communications, and my code is always 10x better than the untested slop I was constantly asked to review. This is a guy with 30 years engineering expe…

Interesting. What factors led your boss's boss to this decision? Does he not have AI psychosis? I thought the further up someone was in an organisation, the more AI they used.