Ape Coding [fiction] • Hacker News Board

Re: Ape Coding [fiction]

#151

Post by lioeters » Tue, Mar 03, 2026, 2:36 PM UTC

pmg101 wrote: post #135

makapuf wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My car is typically used twice a week and (like many others) I mostly ride my bike or walk. I'm not special at all and I certainly use the car, but it has not replaced walking.

I don't think either of us disagree though that the number of miles of non-leisure journeys walked per capita is significantly less in 2026 than it was in 1926 or 1826 though? I always found it pretty remarkable in David Copperfield when Dickens recounts regular walks between London and Canterbury, which he apparently did make in real life

That's a good example, I learned about the Pilgrim's Way between London and Canterbury. It's about 88km, which someone walked recently in 6 days. In the Canterbury tales, someone rides a horse and does it in 2 days. By train it's an hour and a half, and by plane is 6 minutes.

You're right, "ape-walking" is a rare thing, only a small group of people are motivated enough to walk that distance - for religious, athletic, or recreational purpose. I think this does apply to "ape-coding", it's going to be a niche interest for much fewer people than today.

Re: Ape Coding [fiction]

#152

Post by bitexploder » Tue, Mar 03, 2026, 3:23 PM UTC

g-b-r wrote: post #49

bitexploder wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When someone so clearly misses an article written tongue in cheek and uses personal insults to let us know they missed the point, one begins to wonder. Apes code together. Apes stronger together. Return to monke.

The point was to called AI skeptics apes, and you probably know it well.

I think the author very purposefully had no judgment or implications associated there. I think that is the reader's interpretation. The author was purposefully creating a division between AI and Non AI and showing what those two are like. But if you read carefully that division had no implied judgment. So it is interesting if the reader implies a particular judgment isn't it?

Re: Ape Coding [fiction]

#153

Post by g-b-r » Tue, Mar 03, 2026, 5:54 PM UTC

bitexploder wrote: post #152

g-b-r wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point was to called AI skeptics apes, and you probably know it well.

I think the author very purposefully had no judgment or implications associated there. I think that is the reader's interpretation. The author was purposefully creating a division between AI and Non AI and showing what those two are like. But if you read carefully that division had no implied judgment. So it is interesting if the reader implies a particular judgment isn't it?

If you read carefully one of the groups is associated to apes.

And it's said to have been "unable to program with agents" and be affected by "limitations in human neuroplasticity".

And there's an implied judgment that AIs are going to become that good, and a suggestion that they already are good enough to take over coding, if you use them properly ("institutional inertia, affordability (...) were barriers to universal adoption of the new technology", "Effective use of the primitive AIs available at the time demanded a high level of expertise", "speculation on whether the nascent AIs of the period possessed true understanding", "Technical arguments for ape coding did not apply to newer generations of AI software engineers").

Was that (before the last sentence) what an LLM thought about my comment, by the way??

Re: Ape Coding [fiction]

#154

Post by bitexploder » Fri, Mar 06, 2026, 3:31 PM UTC

g-b-r wrote: post #153

bitexploder wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the author very purposefully had no judgment or implications associated there. I think that is the reader's interpretation. The author was purposefully creating a division between AI and Non AI and showing what those two are like. But if you read carefully that division had no implied judgment. So it is interesting if the reader implies a particular judgment isn't it?

If you read carefully one of the groups is associated to apes. And it's said to have been " unable to program with agents " and be affected by " limitations in human neuroplasticity ". And there's an implied judgment that AIs are going to become that good, and a suggestion that they already are good enough to take over coding, if you use them properly (" institutional inertia, affordability (...) were barriers to uni…

No just me, fully human intelligence. I just didn't sense any purposeful negative association. I thought of the article as a metaphor to convey a cautionary tale about AI hype.