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Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

bcantrill.dtrace.org

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Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#261

Post by andai »

jeremyjh wrote: post #62

These are all important points and I love the analogy. But there is an even bigger issue with having LLMs write for you: Writing is thinking. Thinking and deciding. There have been many times when I start out writing something substantial - could be an email, a blog post, a software design document, anything - when my own views substantially changed during the writing process. Writing forces you to serialize your tho…

Yeah, I often find that I think I understand something perfectly until I try to explain it.

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#262

Post by andai »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #233
CamperBob2 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still write code, I just write it in English now. It's still rock and roll to me.

That... isn't writing code.

Real programmers use a magnetized needle and a steady hand!

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#263

Post by a2ff6eeb0 »

jeremyjh wrote: post #243
a2ff6eeb0 wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, you believe that Sam Altman understands the code?

No, but he also doesn't steer technical architecture & engineering, does he?

Given that OpenAI is largely vibecoded these days, do you think anyone there really understands the code?

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#264

Post by JoshTriplett »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #242
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That... isn't writing code.

Sigh. It's like watching somebody about to be hit by a bus. You yell, you wave your arms, but they either don't hear you, or they don't believe you. The last thing that goes through their head is a Greyhound's hood ornament.

Yes, it is. But the important question is, which person is the one standing in front of the bus?

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#265

Post by hitekker »

vehemenz wrote: post #176
jeremyjh wrote: post #62

These are all important points and I love the analogy. But there is an even bigger issue with having LLMs write for you: Writing is thinking. Thinking and deciding. There have been many times when I start out writing something substantial - could be an email, a blog post, a software design document, anything - when my own views substantially changed during the writing process. Writing forces you to serialize your tho…

> Writing is thinking. This way of phrasing it is needlessly confusing. Writing is a kind of thinking--one of many--but it's not equivalent to thinking. Dialectical thinking, for example, produces similar results.

It’s a flattering phrase, not a thoughtful one. It gives the illusion of higher level thinking that’s beyond our actual ability. The phrase also justifies writing without thinking, i.e. most internet comments.

The best thinkers I know mostly use writing for refinement, distillation— as a tool. The worst thinkers I know are owned by writing; they require its fixation & stimulation upfront to compensate for limited attention spans.

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#267

Post by CamperBob2 »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #264
CamperBob2 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh. It's like watching somebody about to be hit by a bus. You yell, you wave your arms, but they either don't hear you, or they don't believe you. The last thing that goes through their head is a Greyhound's hood ornament.

Yes, it is. But the important question is, which person is the one standing in front of the bus ?

That would be bigstrat2003. He's not a big fan of updating his priors.

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#268

Post by raincole »

bcantrill wrote: post #155
raincole wrote: post #24

(2025) Also in the author's latest post[0], they took this[1] self-reported preference poll seriously, which makes it very hard for me to take their articles seriously. [0] https://bcantrill.dtrace.org/2026/09/05/the-revolt-of-the-re... [1] https://writethatblog.substack.com/p/dev-reaction-to-ai-blog...

And in that piece, I think I explained why it's important to take it seriously even though (and in fact, because!) it's self-reported?

No, you explained why the selection bias doesn't matter, which I agree. The self-report data still is completely worthless in the first place though.

People are really, really good at lying to themselves, let alone to an online poll. They'll tell you that they prefer imperfect or even bad writing as long as it's not AI slop, just like how they'll tell you they like healthier food, they prioritize personality instead of look for potential dates, how they use LLM "only as a spellchecker", and how they use tiktok for educational videos. As long as there is no stake, people will just say what make they feel better.

Self-reporting data for human behavior is just noise.

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#269

Post by fwip »

jgrahamc wrote: post #35

I think the most important line in this post is: But LLMs are also lousy writers and (most importantly!) they are not you. When I was editing the Cloudflare blog I imposed very little in terms of style so that the style of each individual writer could come through. It was almost as important as the actual content that the reader could feel that an actual individual wrote the text (with all their personal quirks intac…

The Cloudflare blog used to be great to read, so thanks for your work there.

Re: Your intellectual fly is open when you use an LLM to author a post (2025)

#270

Post by lelanthran »

zero_shift wrote: post #133
jeremyjh wrote: post #62

These are all important points and I love the analogy. But there is an even bigger issue with having LLMs write for you: Writing is thinking. Thinking and deciding. There have been many times when I start out writing something substantial - could be an email, a blog post, a software design document, anything - when my own views substantially changed during the writing process. Writing forces you to serialize your tho…

I have found this extremely relevant as a (primarily) non-verbal thinker. I don't, generally, think in words, more in - I guess I would call it something like meta-shapes? A sense of a shape but not things I can exactly visualise. (You might be surprised to read this and then hear I have an English degree. Surely I thought about Shakespeare in words?! Nope. Shapes, movement, structures) For me, having to write is cri…

> I don't, generally, think in words,

Don't worry, no one does.

That's why it is so common for people to forget a specific word they want to use ("it's on the tip of my tongue").

If we thought in words that will never happen.

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