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Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

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Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#201

Post by MichaelZuo »

SecretDreams wrote: post #197
moffkalast wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was reading some posts on r/locallama the other day and apparently it's a common problem that when people try to use Qwen to develop something that hosts a server, it'll try to use the same port as vllm, see that it's already being used, then it'll try to remove the process that is using it and promptly commit suicide. The self awareness of missile tasked with blowing up its own control center.

> then it'll try to remove the process that is using it and promptly commit suicide. Not unlike a child trying to take the safety cover off a plug so that they can stick a fork into it. LLMs need that "world model" view that most people have acquired by their 20s where they (hopefully) stop to ask "why" before they "do".

That is a pretty good analogy. Like exceedingly smart 5 year olds.

Or whatever the age is before children typically develop object permanence, a theory of mind, and so on.

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#202

Post by themafia »

Brendinooo wrote: post #36

It's hardly a tech CEO thing, and I dunno if "psychosis" is a fair or accurate way to talk about it. I worked with someone who was kind of a Shopify power user, managed the store, could do a lot of things, but wasn't a programmer. She showed me how Shopify does that AI block generator now to deliver something that was like 65% done in a minute. I also have a friend who knows enough code to be dangerous in WordPress:…

> I dunno if "psychosis" is a fair or accurate way to talk about it.

> And that's very...intoxicating!

Would you prefer if we say they're suffering from AI-holism?

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#203

Post by themafia »

john_strinlai wrote: post #12

whats being described is in no way unique to ai. " In other words, Levie’s theory posits, CEOs don’t really understand processes well enough to know what really can and can’t be automated. But that lack of knowledge doesn’t stop them from acting on their beliefs. " i have been in the workforce for a long time. this "theory" has been theorized since as far back as i can remember. its the premise of undercover boss. it…

It's the same as any other bad information entering the decision loop. In this case they were promised "AI" can do things it cannot. They're having trouble rectifying what they were told versus what they experience.

It's not unique to AI. It's common to many other organizationally risky and dangerous scenarios.

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#204

Post by aurareturn »

cyberax wrote: post #73
spprashant wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AI psychosis just a lazy term, much like Trump Derangement Syndrome. It sounds hostile while also removing any scope for productive discourse. Once you call someone a 'psycho', they are less likely to engage with you, and more likely to double down on their views.

I saw that psychosis happening in real time with a coworker. It absolutely is a real phenomenon. After a while, he started presenting ChatGPT's replies as the absolute truth. I don't think there ever has been something that can _answer_ you back and reinforce your delusion. This is a new thing.

I'm one of the biggest AI bulls on HN. I think given to the right people, it's immensely powerful and I think people in general underestimate how powerful it will get.

However, AI psychosis in 2026 is definitely real. I have a non-technical high ranking (nepotism) coworker who discovered vibe coding and is now absolutely wild. He thinks he can build anything and he questions why our dev team isn't moving fast enough. Why aren't we changing the UI to a newer, more modern one every single week? Why aren't we vibe coding this new feature in 2 hours? This guy generates massive amount of text and calls it a roadmap or a spec.

It's honestly maddening working with people under AI psychosis.

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#205

Post by apercu »

glaslong wrote: post #63
gopalv wrote: post #53

If you manage 500+ people organization, most of the headaches with agents already exists with you - you set directions, ask people to go run fast in those directions, check in frequently and course correct on results without actually understanding those people do. Those aren't the deal breakers. They entirely rely on the competence of the folks they hired and cross-match enforcers with the drivers they have - they de…

Yes this is why the higher level org functions are in love with AI. It's very similar to the levers they had already, but is faster and more directly actionable. The downsides being that the AI loses important control levers like "self preservation" via paycheck, career advancement, staying out of jail, etc. that were mitigations on catastrophic outcomes. It will delete your prod db faster and with a bigger smile tha…

"Yes this is why the higher level org functions are in love with AI. "

Interesting, I thought it was because so few of them have any idea how their organizations actually function, because so much of their work is performative.

(I have been a developer, sysadmin, director (x2), and president).

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#206

Post by niccl »

prerok wrote: post #145
Brendinooo wrote: post #36

It's hardly a tech CEO thing, and I dunno if "psychosis" is a fair or accurate way to talk about it. I worked with someone who was kind of a Shopify power user, managed the store, could do a lot of things, but wasn't a programmer. She showed me how Shopify does that AI block generator now to deliver something that was like 65% done in a minute. I also have a friend who knows enough code to be dangerous in WordPress:…

Well, yes, but here the Pareto principle comes to mind, though.

I think it's more like the old adage 'the first 50% of the job takes the first 90% of the time, and the other 50% of the job takes the other 90%'.

Except that with vibe-coded AI stuff it's more like there's yet another 50% of the job to deal with the edge cases that takes yet another 90% of the time

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#207

Post by hunterpayne »

WalterBright wrote: post #95
IAmGraydon wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The quote literally from Levie is "CEOs are uniquely prone to AI psychosis because they’re sufficiently distant from the last mile of work that still has to happen to generate most value with AI".

The author calling it "psychosis" discredits the author.

Would using anthropomorphize be better? Because that's what they are really doing. The problem is that the folks being described then go on step farther to think LLMs are a digital engineer and thus we don't need (most) devs anymore. This is what we describe as psychosis. If you have a better word for this phenomenon, I would love to hear it.

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#208

Post by photochemsyn »

Replacing the CEOs and shareholders with AI is the way forward. Just have to take the capital away from the current capital owners and give the new AI C-suite team control of it. All major decisions go to the employees for votes (but I’d argue for scaling the vote by expertise in some manner; the ten-year veteran might get three votes to the new hire’s one vote).

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#209

Post by hunterpayne »

AndrewDucker wrote: post #135
WalterBright wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We could drive energy prices down to nothing. Not when you're paying people to coat their properties in solar panels. As you noted, that would cost plenty. Solar panels also degrade over time. By the time the "free" electricity has paid for the installation, you'll need to replace it.

Payback time in Scotland is 6-ish years. Same seems to be true in Massachusetts. Solar Panels have a lifespan of around 25 years. Inverters may need to be replaced sooner than that, but still last at least a decade. So it pays for itself 3-4 times over.

There is no way that is true unless those solar panels are very subsidized. The energy needed to make a PV is 2x what that panel would harvest over its entire lifetime in Scotland for example. Scotland is a terrible place for PV. The numbers you give are probably accurate for central Mexico though. Also, the mean lifetime of a PV panel is 20 years.

Re: Tech CEOs are apparently suffering from AI psychosis

#210

Post by rwhitman »

Having doubled down on using mostly Claude (+GPT and Gemini) professionally in strategic consulting work for about 2 1/2 years I can say with certainty that the irrational exuberance of the tech leadership echo chamber towards abdicating management responsibility to Claude, while in the honeymoon period, is going to be regarded as very foolish in hindsight.
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