The Rise of Whatever • Hacker News Board

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#181

Post by rasur » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:18 AM UTC

chrismorgan wrote: post #100

> Like, just to calibrate here: you know how some code editors will automatically fill in a right bracket or quote when you type a left one? You type " and the result is "|"? Yeah, that drives me up the wall. It saves no time whatsoever, and it’s wrong often enough that I waste time having to correct for it. I have not yet figured out why anyone would choose this behaviour in a text editor. You have to press somethin…

Emacs user here, and the whole "electric-mode" stuff (for matching parens or other balanced pairs of things) I find really quite useful. And closing a pair is usually something like shift+enter, which is quite simple (but also - at least in Emacs - generally completely configurable). I think the benefits outweigh the pitfalls, personally.

Can't speak to other editors though.. I don't want to sound like I'm trolling, but they generally feel quite clunky, compared to Emacs (ducks, runs ;p )

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#182

Post by quonn » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:18 AM UTC

dofubej wrote: post #157

zpeti wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this sentence. It's pretty damn hard sending money in the EU too. We only had SWIFT and CHAPS too like in the USA. The EU isn't some banking haven with ultrafast transfers. If they are talking about the new legislation about fast transfers (SEPA), that came 1 decade after paypal.

We currently (as in the for the last months) have instant transfers but for the longest time we didn’t and had to use PayPal as well if we wanted to send somebody money instantly without paying the bank an extra for it. I’m confused as to what the article means. It’s possible the author is misinformed.

Instant transfers have been available for many years. they were not free, but most banks supported doing them.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#183

Post by qsort » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:19 AM UTC

elric wrote: post #175

zpeti wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this sentence. It's pretty damn hard sending money in the EU too. We only had SWIFT and CHAPS too like in the USA. The EU isn't some banking haven with ultrafast transfers. If they are talking about the new legislation about fast transfers (SEPA), that came 1 decade after paypal.

What do you mean? Europe has had SEPA payments pretty much since the Euro came out. And most of Europe had functional bank transfers using online banking (including international ones) long before the Euro was a thing. Edit: Do you mean that the speed of the transfers was the problem?

SPC Inst transfers up to 15,000EUR take 10 seconds, literally.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#184

Post by Cthulhu_ » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:20 AM UTC

raincole wrote: post #44

gyomu wrote: post #10

Broadly agreed with all the points outlined in there. But for me the biggest issue with all this — that I don't see covered in here, or maybe just a little bit in passing — is what all of this is doing to beginners, and the learning pipeline. > There are people I once respected who, apparently, don’t actually enjoy doing the thing. They would like to describe what they want and receive Whatever — some beige sludge th…

People will write lengthy and convoluted explanation on why LLM isn't like calculator or microwave oven or other technology before. (Like OP's article) But it really is. Humans have been looking for easier and lazier ways to do things since the dawn of civilization. Tech never ever prevents people who really want to hone their skills from doing so. World record of 100m sprint kept improving even since car was invente…

> People will write lengthy and convoluted explanation on why LLM isn't like calculator or microwave oven or other technology before. (Like OP's article) But it really is.

No it's not (like OP's article says). With a calculator you punch in 10 + 9 and get 2 immediately, and this was 50+ years ago. With an LLM you type in "what is 10 + 9" and get three paragraphs of text after a few seconds. (this is false, I just tried it and the response is "10 + 9 = 19" but I'm exaggerating for dramatic effect). With a microwave you yeet in food and press a button and stuff happens the same way, every time.

Sure, if you abstract it to "doing things in an easier and lazier way", LLMs are just the next step, like IDEs with built in error checking and code generation were since 20 years ago. But it's more vague than press button to do a thing.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#185

Post by aredox » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:20 AM UTC

>Also, making your own website is kinda hard? You have to, like, learn things.

That seems snarky ("you don't want to learn things") when the reality is that the problem, the finite ressource that is the bottleneck, is _time_.

This is also why hyperlinks are underused: few people go through every single one of the words in their last post to try to add appropriate hyperlinks.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#186

Post by bigstrat2003 » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:20 AM UTC

raincole wrote: post #96

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>LLM isn't like calculator or microwave oven or other technology before. (Like OP's article) But it really is. I would not buy a calculator that hallucinated wrong answers part of the time. Or a microwave oven that told you it grilled the chicken but it didn't and you have to die from Salmonella poisoning.

Microwave oven does quite unexpected things when you cook a shelled egg or a dish on metal plate. We teach our kids about microwave oven safety for this reason.

On the contrary, those things are quite predictable. Once you know those issues exist, you can reliably avoid them. But with LLMs you can't reliably avoid hallucinations. The unreliability is baked into the very nature of the tool.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#187

Post by elric » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:20 AM UTC

qsort wrote: post #183

elric wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean? Europe has had SEPA payments pretty much since the Euro came out. And most of Europe had functional bank transfers using online banking (including international ones) long before the Euro was a thing. Edit: Do you mean that the speed of the transfers was the problem?

SPC Inst transfers up to 15,000EUR take 10 seconds, literally .

I'm aware, but I think zpeti was saying that this is a recent thing, whereas fast PP payments were already a thing ages ago.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#188

Post by Cthulhu_ » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:21 AM UTC

raincole wrote: post #96

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>LLM isn't like calculator or microwave oven or other technology before. (Like OP's article) But it really is. I would not buy a calculator that hallucinated wrong answers part of the time. Or a microwave oven that told you it grilled the chicken but it didn't and you have to die from Salmonella poisoning.

Microwave oven does quite unexpected things when you cook a shelled egg or a dish on metal plate. We teach our kids about microwave oven safety for this reason.

Except that we know that it does that when you put those things in, so they aren't "quite unexpected".

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#189

Post by matsemann » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:21 AM UTC

chrismorgan wrote: post #100

> Like, just to calibrate here: you know how some code editors will automatically fill in a right bracket or quote when you type a left one? You type " and the result is "|"? Yeah, that drives me up the wall. It saves no time whatsoever, and it’s wrong often enough that I waste time having to correct for it. I have not yet figured out why anyone would choose this behaviour in a text editor. You have to press somethin…

> and it’s wrong often enough

How is it ever wrong, though? If I insert a (, and then a {, and the editor appends so that it's ({}), that's always ?correct. Can it ever not be.

Maybe because on a Norwegian keyboard { is a bit awkward, but I like it. Then even if we're 5 levels deep with useEffect(() => {(({[{[ I can just press ctrl+shift+enter and it just magically finishes up everything and put my caret at the correct place, instead of me trying to write ]}]})) in the correct order.

Re: The Rise of Whatever

#190

Post by zpeti » Fri, Jul 04, 2025, 8:21 AM UTC

elric wrote: post #175

zpeti wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this sentence. It's pretty damn hard sending money in the EU too. We only had SWIFT and CHAPS too like in the USA. The EU isn't some banking haven with ultrafast transfers. If they are talking about the new legislation about fast transfers (SEPA), that came 1 decade after paypal.

What do you mean? Europe has had SEPA payments pretty much since the Euro came out. And most of Europe had functional bank transfers using online banking (including international ones) long before the Euro was a thing. Edit: Do you mean that the speed of the transfers was the problem?

SEPA came 10 years after paypal.