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Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

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Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#11

Post by butILoveLife »

bee_rider wrote: post #7
gtowey wrote: post #5

LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture -- that the real work of good software is balancing a hundred different constraints in a way that produces the optimal result for the humans who use it. It's not all that different from the state of big corp software today! Large organizations with layers of management tend to lose all abiliy to keep a consistent strategy. They tend to go all in o…

Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? I mean, a lot of companies have most of their information available in a digital form at this point, so it could be consumed by the LLM. I think if anything, we have a better chance in the little picture: you can go to lunch with your engineering coworkers or talk to somebody on the factory floor and get insights that will never touch the computers. Giant systems of constrai…

I basically just posted the same response. I generally agree with everything you said.

Only thing to add, maybe we have the most senior of seniors verifying the decisions of AI.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#12

Post by troupo »

bee_rider wrote: post #7
gtowey wrote: post #5

LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture -- that the real work of good software is balancing a hundred different constraints in a way that produces the optimal result for the humans who use it. It's not all that different from the state of big corp software today! Large organizations with layers of management tend to lose all abiliy to keep a consistent strategy. They tend to go all in o…

Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? I mean, a lot of companies have most of their information available in a digital form at this point, so it could be consumed by the LLM. I think if anything, we have a better chance in the little picture: you can go to lunch with your engineering coworkers or talk to somebody on the factory floor and get insights that will never touch the computers. Giant systems of constrai…

> Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture?

Because LLMs don't understand things to begin with.

Because LLMs only have access to aource code and whatever .md files you've given them.

Because they have biases in their training data that overfit them on certain solutions.

Because LLMs have a tiny context window.

Because LLMs largely suck at UI/UX/design especially when they don't have referense images.

Because...

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#13

Post by gtowey »

butILoveLife wrote: post #10
gtowey wrote: post #5

LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture -- that the real work of good software is balancing a hundred different constraints in a way that produces the optimal result for the humans who use it. It's not all that different from the state of big corp software today! Large organizations with layers of management tend to lose all abiliy to keep a consistent strategy. They tend to go all in o…

>Good software is about creating longer term value and takes consistent skill & vision to execute. >Those software engineers who focus on this big picture thinking are going to be more valuable than ever. Not to rain on our hopes, but AI can give us some options and we can pick the best. I think this eliminates all middle level positions. Newbies are low cost and make decisions that are low stakes. The most senior or…

> Not to rain on our hopes, but AI can give us some options and we can pick the best.

But that's kind of my point. A bunch of decisions like that tend to end up with a "random walk" effect. It's a bunch of tactical choices which don't add up to something strategic. It could be, but it takes the human in the loop to hold onto that overall strategy.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#14

Post by gtowey »

troupo wrote: post #12
bee_rider wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? I mean, a lot of companies have most of their information available in a digital form at this point, so it could be consumed by the LLM. I think if anything, we have a better chance in the little picture: you can go to lunch with your engineering coworkers or talk to somebody on the factory floor and get insights that will never touch the computers. Giant systems of constrai…

> Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? Because LLMs don't understand things to begin with. Because LLMs only have access to aource code and whatever .md files you've given them. Because they have biases in their training data that overfit them on certain solutions. Because LLMs have a tiny context window. Because LLMs largely suck at UI/UX/design especially when they don't have referense images. Because...

Yeah, it's strange to me that the default assumption is that current LLMs are already human-level AGI.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#15

Post by bee_rider »

butILoveLife wrote: post #11
bee_rider wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? I mean, a lot of companies have most of their information available in a digital form at this point, so it could be consumed by the LLM. I think if anything, we have a better chance in the little picture: you can go to lunch with your engineering coworkers or talk to somebody on the factory floor and get insights that will never touch the computers. Giant systems of constrai…

I basically just posted the same response. I generally agree with everything you said. Only thing to add, maybe we have the most senior of seniors verifying the decisions of AI.

Most senior could make sense (although I’d like to see a collection of independent guilds coordinated by an LLM “CEO” just to see how it could work—might not be good enough yet, but it’d be an interesting experiment).

Ultimately, I suspect “AI” (although, maybe much more advanced than current LLMs) will be able to do just about any information based task. But in the end only humans can actually be responsible/accountable.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#16

Post by bee_rider »

troupo wrote: post #12
bee_rider wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? I mean, a lot of companies have most of their information available in a digital form at this point, so it could be consumed by the LLM. I think if anything, we have a better chance in the little picture: you can go to lunch with your engineering coworkers or talk to somebody on the factory floor and get insights that will never touch the computers. Giant systems of constrai…

> Why can’t LLMs understand the big picture? Because LLMs don't understand things to begin with. Because LLMs only have access to aource code and whatever .md files you've given them. Because they have biases in their training data that overfit them on certain solutions. Because LLMs have a tiny context window. Because LLMs largely suck at UI/UX/design especially when they don't have referense images. Because...

> Because LLMs don't understand things to begin with.

Ok, that’s fair. But I think the comment was making a distinction between the big picture and other types of “understanding.” I agree that it is incorrect to say LLMs understand anything, but I think that was just an informal turn of phrase. I’m saying I don’t think there’s something special about “big picture” information processing tasks, compared to in-detail information processing tasks, that makes them uniquely impossible for LLM.

The other objections seem mostly to be issues with current tooling, or the sort of capacity problems that the LLM developers are constantly overcoming.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#17

Post by pixl97 »

gtowey wrote: post #8
pixl97 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture While I do tend to believe you, what evidence based data do you have to prove this is true?

> While I do tend to believe you, what evidence based data do you have to prove this is true? IMO the onus is to prove that they can be strategic. Otherwise you're asking me to prove a negative.

Saying the tiger has to prove it can eat you is not a great strategy to survive a tiger attack.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#18

Post by AlotOfReading »

butILoveLife wrote: post #10
gtowey wrote: post #5

LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture -- that the real work of good software is balancing a hundred different constraints in a way that produces the optimal result for the humans who use it. It's not all that different from the state of big corp software today! Large organizations with layers of management tend to lose all abiliy to keep a consistent strategy. They tend to go all in o…

>Good software is about creating longer term value and takes consistent skill & vision to execute. >Those software engineers who focus on this big picture thinking are going to be more valuable than ever. Not to rain on our hopes, but AI can give us some options and we can pick the best. I think this eliminates all middle level positions. Newbies are low cost and make decisions that are low stakes. The most senior or…

    Not to rain on our hopes, but AI can give us some options and we can pick the best.
a.k.a. greedy algorithms, a subject those of us on HN should be well-acquainted with. You can watch the horizon effect frequently play out in corporate decisionmaking.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#19

Post by slibhb »

> It was a nice little feature that I knew exactly how to do, but I hadn’t prioritized getting done yet because there were a bunch of other things on my plate. But with a little assist, it was quick to implement.

Exactly how I feel. AI has allowed me to work on projects that I've wanted to work on but didn't have the time/energy for.

Re: Greg Knauss Is Losing Himself

#20

Post by vonneumannstan »

gtowey wrote: post #8
pixl97 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>LLMs can't be strategic because they do not understand the big picture While I do tend to believe you, what evidence based data do you have to prove this is true?

> While I do tend to believe you, what evidence based data do you have to prove this is true? IMO the onus is to prove that they can be strategic. Otherwise you're asking me to prove a negative.

Task Time horizons are improving exponentially with doubling times around 4 months per METR. At what timescale would you accept that they "can be strategic"? Theres little reason to think they wont be at multi week or month time horizons very soon. Do you need to be strategic to complete multi month tasks?
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