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LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

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Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#21

Post by inigyou »

suprjami wrote: post #11
mycall wrote: post #9

Is there not a way to use a transformer that is deterministic in rounds as it is just maths? I thought it was temperature which randomized results but perhaps it is also something else. Of course, the content returned is non-deterministic.

If you specify the random seed and set temperature to zero, you'll always get the same response. As you said, it's just math. That doesn't mean the response is correct though. You've just hard-locked the model to one possible response selection. If you and I do this but we use different seeds, we still have no way to tell whose response will be better for every question or even a class of questions. There will be res…

Actually you don't get the same response. Batching and different evaluation strategies can influence, say, the order that numbers are added together, which changes the output.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#22

Post by inigyou »

the_real_cher wrote: post #15

This person is taking things too literally. By power tool we simply mean speeds up work. And by that definition LLMs are absolutely a power tool of epic proprtions! If you ever coded before LLMs existed its like night and day.

Evidence from listening to slopcoders speak says they feel it's night and day. Evidence from observing reality shows a 20% speed increase at best and 50% speed decrease at worst and almost always a significant reduction in quality.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#23

Post by throw310822 »

camkego wrote: post #5

I've got to give the author credit, it seems like this is written without an LLM. But, there seems to be a lot that is arguable. For example, the article says "Natural language is the interface of last resort." But, is that actually true? Isn't the AI boom happening because N/L is truly available as an interface? Anyway, please keep writing and asking tough questions.

> the article says "Natural language is the interface of last resort."

I wonder why he decided to express this thought in natural language though. Should have tried formalising it.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#24

Post by david-gpu »

pennomi wrote: post #17
vrighter wrote: post #13

i recently heard a colleague telling another "vscode can't really help you when writing yaml files". I said that the yaml lsp supports loading a json schema, all you need is just one comment at the top to point the lsp to it, then you get reliable error reporting with red squigglies on every single keystroke. He just shrugged and said "oh i just use ai". What takes me one keystroke takes him a full minute. And he did…

The very existence of a “do anything” tool causes humans to forgo learning the multitude of tools we already have. I suspect there will be no next generation of software engineers.

The existence of a "do anything" IDE causes humans to forgo learning the multitude of tools we already have. I suspect there will be no next generation of software engineers.

People said stuff like that in the 90s. I was there.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#25

Post by smcg »

camkego wrote: post #5

I've got to give the author credit, it seems like this is written without an LLM. But, there seems to be a lot that is arguable. For example, the article says "Natural language is the interface of last resort." But, is that actually true? Isn't the AI boom happening because N/L is truly available as an interface? Anyway, please keep writing and asking tough questions.

I think it is true, but I think the author underestimates how difficult it is for us to reason in ways other than natural language. We have to be taught it and we have to practice it.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#26

Post by jdmdndndn »

People here take things too literally....

Yes an llm is not a compiler. But both speed things up... That is the point...

An llm is not a power tool but they both speed things up!

I don't care about determinism for something that is a simulacrum of though ... That is a feature not a flaw...

Finally we are getting better at this ... I get that we are going to lose our jobs a devs and I get that it is scary.. But honestly good riddance.. There is much more to do in this world that we can do after we just let go and accept that what we knew is gone ...

Just to be clear .. A correction Will likely come for the AI industry ... But a correction happened 25 years ago and the internet is still here :)

Just remember to not take life too seriously... You'll never get out alive :P

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#27

Post by smcg »

inigyou wrote: post #22
the_real_cher wrote: post #15

This person is taking things too literally. By power tool we simply mean speeds up work. And by that definition LLMs are absolutely a power tool of epic proprtions! If you ever coded before LLMs existed its like night and day.

Evidence from listening to slopcoders speak says they feel it's night and day. Evidence from observing reality shows a 20% speed increase at best and 50% speed decrease at worst and almost always a significant reduction in quality.

Twitter is a rather crude place, but it can be succinct. An exchange I saw recently:

A: "I spent more tokens than the entire OpenCode team combined."

B: "Why aren't you more successful?"

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#28

Post by throw310822 »

inigyou wrote: post #20
rjrje wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Just to add - I’m working on something very novel and LLM’s are absolutely useless at them. It’s actually comical to see the outputs - when you work on novel stuff you quickly see what these models actually are.

Apparently if you show one the recently found counterexample to the Jacobian conjecture, it spins in circles double-checking it because it knows the conjecture is true.

And finally gives up admitting it is a counterexample. Even saying "holy shit". That's what any human expert would do: presented with an extremely improbable fact, it would verify it, then in disbelief verify it again, then change method, then try yet another one, checking its understanding of the problem itself... and finally concede. Because this is what intelligence looks like- understanding the problem, its relevance, its context, self-doubting if the solution looks too simple to be true, double-checking all calculations and trying different approaches, etc.

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#29

Post by [deleted] »

inigyou wrote: post #18
pennomi wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The very existence of a “do anything” tool causes humans to forgo learning the multitude of tools we already have. I suspect there will be no next generation of software engineers.

How many buttons in your IDE's toolbar do you use? Oh wait - that's an anachronism. The older generation of IDEs, like VS and Eclipse, had toolbars. VSCode doesn't have one.

[deleted]

Re: LLMs aren't remotely like compilers or power tools

#30

Post by svieira »

throw310822 wrote: post #28
inigyou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently if you show one the recently found counterexample to the Jacobian conjecture, it spins in circles double-checking it because it knows the conjecture is true.

And finally gives up admitting it is a counterexample. Even saying "holy shit". That's what any human expert would do: presented with an extremely improbable fact, it would verify it, then in disbelief verify it again, then change method, then try yet another one, checking its understanding of the problem itself... and finally concede. Because this is what intelligence looks like- understanding the problem, its relev…

Precisely - except you can get it to do the same thing about the flat earth or faked moon landings or the unity of all being as will or just about anything else.
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