Live data from Hacker News

The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

researchagenda.news

191–200 of 308 posts

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#191
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The absolute trolling that goes on here is related to the point. You are entirely capable of checking what I wrote but insist on trying to drag this out with straw men and misinterpretations. Of course people like you have a problem with AI since it will help everyone else move on and ignore you.

You are reacting emotionally and making baseless accusations about how I’m somehow going to be “left behind” based on nothing much in particular. And this is in response to me questioning it’s not a bit absurd to dismiss thousands of members of the public turning up and participating in local democracy opposing data centres with “faceless bureaucrats”. I’d take your flailing insults to heart if I respected your opini…

> reached for the boring “luddite” accusations.

Where? Straw manning, again.

Don’t feed the troll.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#193
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wanted you to be wrong, and to be able to make this an example of us over-reacting to certain trigger words created by AI, but unfortunately I just scanned the first couple paragraphs with pangram and it reported 100% AI, so you're probably correct. I get a funny feeling in my stomach over the idea that common and effective means of communication (i.e. it's not X it's Y) have become faux pas to use because of AI. I…

Fwiw, I only did the first 300 words (signed into pangram) and it seemingly correctly noted that there were 2 (mostly) human-authored sentences in there What's wild to me is that: 1. People are responding to this article like it's hitting a nerve 2. In most Ubers you already don't talk to the driver (yellow cabs are higher variance in NYC). Doesn't seem like anything's being lost in that case. 3. There are enormous s…

Have you actually read the article? They point out multiple times that they like the Waymo ride and would use one again and loved it. It's not a Waymo-bashing article, it cautions against the long term effects on research.

And here you have it — I used an LLM-ism. Oh, and now another one! Time to downvote me for supposed LLM use! (Which I obviously didn't, I'm typing this on an ancient smartphone waiting for a train, but that doesn't deter the witch hunters.)

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#194

LLMs hand people confident-sounding answers in domains they can't judge. The problem isn't the model being wrong, it's that the person can't tell.

Sometimes you can tell though even if you don't understand the code. E.g. if AI makes a game, just play it. Sometimes code doesn't have to be 100% bug free and in fact humans can't achieve that anyway.

I've been using Astra a lot recently and it's really mad good. If you are currently in the "I'm still better than AI" camp (which I was until now) it might change your mind.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#195
I’m an introvert who hates small talk, yet across countries; I’ve found the value of human drivers to far outweigh the small ‘cost’.

From knowing the area and telling me the Alamo location has moved (and not updating their address on their official website!); to coming back and returning an item I forgot to retrieve; these incidents have helped me so much; not to mention occasionally having deep and meaningful conversations that enriched my life and perspectives.

I’ve had some occasional bad experiences too; but that’s life. I took a Waymo twice, and I still go for Uber or Didi every time.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment was perhaps written by an LLM that has learned it can karma farm by pointing out all of the articles that have LLM usage while everyone still thinks that is a novel contribution.

If you check my comment history here, I have not written this before. I like LLMs and use them daily, but I don't really like when people use them undisclosed for long-form prose writing.

Me neither, but just running around accusing random folks of things is not going to help. To the contrary. If a real author doing real work with a lot of effort risks being accused of things they didn't do and just dismissed, you'll get less of genuine content, not more.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#197
I think we should describe a new effect infecting mainstream society:

- AI companies and the rich have increasingly pushed an agenda on the populace that most people didn't want, and the foundation of work in AI was formed by theft.

- Theft of creative work from millions of people, and a selective enforcement of law and compromise of investigatory authorities has demonstrated the law, morals, and the welfare of most people doesn't matter for people in power.

- This is the real "less collaborative" nature of the world where we find ourselves in. Add to that the increasing push for war by our leaders and rich too, people often shielded from the consequences, and you have a net less collaborative world.

It actually isn't even AI, but the same people pushing it are the same ones compromising collaboration for most people.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#198
post #41
post #32

I work at an intersection of tech, applied research, and science. Something I’ve noticed in collaboration that does occur is an increased confidence in people outside their domains to say things with conviction. I have people who have limited experience with software pushing out layers and layers of abstracted code that’s fairly sophisticated but often misguided in intent who will say what they’re doing is correct, w…

Yup, the arrogance when barging into unfamiliar domain that was previously reserved mainly to physics grads seems to have spread everywhere. I also had people opining on my expert area via their LLMs and the problem is they can't even ask the model the right question, let alone evaluate the nuance of their answer.

>arrogance when barging into unfamiliar domain

describes nearly every tech attempt at "disruption"

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#199
The notion that "every human interaction is worth preserving" is probably not right, and Waymos are showcasing this. As the author mentions, many people don't enjoy the forced small talk with Uber drivers. Interacting with people from different backgrounds and perspectives is important, but I doubt the forced interactions like taxi rides are where we were getting those until day.

Re: The Waymo effect: how AI is quietly making research less collaborative

#200
post #32

I work at an intersection of tech, applied research, and science. Something I’ve noticed in collaboration that does occur is an increased confidence in people outside their domains to say things with conviction. I have people who have limited experience with software pushing out layers and layers of abstracted code that’s fairly sophisticated but often misguided in intent who will say what they’re doing is correct, w…

Wow, oddly similar thing happened to me. Anecdotally, I was working with a non-developer. She was building a reporting dashboard with Claude. I pointed out that the system she built was using the filesystem to store one line notes about the report, and I said "I would probably tell the agent to use a database for that, but it's not the end of the world if it works". And she replied "Claude said the developer's right, a database would be a better fit..."

So, a non-developer, who has no understanding of the underlying systems they are working with, fact-checked a developer with years of experience.

I'm not against fact checking, but it absolutely felt like a punch in the gut coming from a non-dev. There was no "trust" there. She couldn't rely on my expertise, she had to go back to her "source of truth" (Claude) and asked for a second opinion on something that she wouldn't be able to verify.

This is why collaboration exists. I trust my colleagues to give me insight+advice on things that I do not know. I don't ask AI to vet their decisions, because at some level there are judgement calls, and I WANT to trust them because it makes my life easier.

Treating AI as if the output is factual is just a misuse of the tools, I think. It's significantly more effective when given expert direction and the output can be verified by... an expert.

Post reply on HN