Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage • Hacker News Board

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#281

Post by Dban1 » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:11 AM UTC

kypro wrote: post #277

shiomiru wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the economic problem that programmers had until recently been highly regarded because steps 2-3 were hard. "Open source" solved this partially by utilizing the labor such (relatively) well-paid people gave away "for the love of it", but it was not nearly enough to put most out of work. Now there is a plagiarism machine built on top of decades of this work that seemingly solves 3 and promises to solve 2 (…

This is unfortunately just the result of technological progress. People for centuries have crafted extremely hard to acquire skills over decades only to find their labour being made completely worthless due to automation or better alternatives disrupting their industry. Carpenters, hatters, cobblers, miners, weavers, calculators, etc... We can get mad about it, but it just is what it is. Ultimately for most people th…

Until humanity achieves Godhood there's still a lot of work to be done.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#282

Post by mcv » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:13 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #224

Programming has five phases effectively: 1) You figure out what problem to solve. 2) You figure out HOW to solve the problem. 3) You actually implement the solution. 4) You see the solution work, for yourself. 5) You ship/deploy/publish the program. This means you see people be happy users and/or you get paid for it and so on. If you're an entrepreneur type, you probably enjoy the first and last steps most, and you s…

Nice analysis. I really love diving into 2 and 3, but I also notice I'm pretty good at 1; at several companies I kept identifying problems we should address, and also how to address them, though quite often they just wanted me to focus on 3 and 4.

Currently I'm in the process of starting my own business solving a problem my last employer underestimated, and I find myself focusing much more on 1 and 5, which I also enjoy, and I use LLMs a lot for 3 and parts of 2. The LLM and I often disagree about 2, but that often results in a better solution than if I'd just trusted either myself or the LLM. I iterate a lot between 2 and 4, letting the LLM do almost the entirety of 3, and advising on 2.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#283

Post by sharperguy » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:15 AM UTC

draftsman wrote: post #196

Schnitz wrote: post #166

Because people that enjoy programming for programming's sake don't want an LLM to do the programming for them - isn't it obvious? It's just like with any other hobby, people who like car racing created rules that force you to drive yourself, even though they'd get faster lap times with electronic driver aids. People who enjoy grappling created rules that force you to grapple, even though striking could win a fight fa…

Writing code without an LLM is akin to cooking a meal yourself, as opposed to something in between hiring a private chef and pulling a slot machine lever. When I cook a meal for myself or my loved ones, I become deeply familiar with the ingredients and the recipe. I am a good cook. Every decision, small and large, I make myself. Using feedback, I can tweak the components and the process. However, if I order food and…

I don't see it the same way. I see it as akin to building a machine which can do the cooking for you. There is a lot of experimentation in terms of how you can construct that machine and how you can set it up, and for some people the payoff is in exactly this process.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#284

Post by pigpop » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:21 AM UTC

shiomiru wrote: post #251

alkonaut wrote: post #224

Programming has five phases effectively: 1) You figure out what problem to solve. 2) You figure out HOW to solve the problem. 3) You actually implement the solution. 4) You see the solution work, for yourself. 5) You ship/deploy/publish the program. This means you see people be happy users and/or you get paid for it and so on. If you're an entrepreneur type, you probably enjoy the first and last steps most, and you s…

There's also the economic problem that programmers had until recently been highly regarded because steps 2-3 were hard. "Open source" solved this partially by utilizing the labor such (relatively) well-paid people gave away "for the love of it", but it was not nearly enough to put most out of work. Now there is a plagiarism machine built on top of decades of this work that seemingly solves 3 and promises to solve 2 (…

Maybe I'm just old but people talking about being in programming for "status" or to be "highly regarded" really irks me. I'd rather see the entire field burnt to the ground and replaced by robots than to have it become a status profession like lawyering.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#285

Post by samiv » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:22 AM UTC

kypro wrote: post #277

shiomiru wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the economic problem that programmers had until recently been highly regarded because steps 2-3 were hard. "Open source" solved this partially by utilizing the labor such (relatively) well-paid people gave away "for the love of it", but it was not nearly enough to put most out of work. Now there is a plagiarism machine built on top of decades of this work that seemingly solves 3 and promises to solve 2 (…

This is unfortunately just the result of technological progress. People for centuries have crafted extremely hard to acquire skills over decades only to find their labour being made completely worthless due to automation or better alternatives disrupting their industry. Carpenters, hatters, cobblers, miners, weavers, calculators, etc... We can get mad about it, but it just is what it is. Ultimately for most people th…

"It's not clear how civilisation functions if humans become effectively useless and the only thing of value is one's ownership of wealth producing assets."

You can get a hint of this by looking at the developing countries with high income inequality. Few rich people who typically own all the countries wealth (and access to it's natural resources) while everyone else lives in a slum.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#286

Post by mibsl » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:23 AM UTC

ang_cire wrote: post #255

mibsl wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say, in this analagy, step two is filling in half the numbers by gut feeling, and then three is seeing how wrong the guesses were and actually solving it.

Perhaps I'm uncommon in that I make diagrams and even sometimes pseudo-code (mostly in the form of mapping out function names, because they serve as a proxy for program flow paths) before I write actual code, but I don't find myself really going off gut feeling. I have a pretty good idea of what the program is going to look like and do before I start, and with e.g. Claude I give those to it, so it mostly looks like w…

For me, unstructured things (like non-formal diagrams, notes, pseudocode) are close to useless. I much prefer sketching the API surface in code right away and then iterating on it, building abstractions which cut the shapeless thought blob into neat, predictably interacting parts. The code is my notepad and the compiler is with me, every step of the way, catching contradictions and handwavyness.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#287

Post by LunicLynx » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:24 AM UTC

draftsman wrote: post #196

Schnitz wrote: post #166

Because people that enjoy programming for programming's sake don't want an LLM to do the programming for them - isn't it obvious? It's just like with any other hobby, people who like car racing created rules that force you to drive yourself, even though they'd get faster lap times with electronic driver aids. People who enjoy grappling created rules that force you to grapple, even though striking could win a fight fa…

Writing code without an LLM is akin to cooking a meal yourself, as opposed to something in between hiring a private chef and pulling a slot machine lever. When I cook a meal for myself or my loved ones, I become deeply familiar with the ingredients and the recipe. I am a good cook. Every decision, small and large, I make myself. Using feedback, I can tweak the components and the process. However, if I order food and…

This is actually a great analogy. And I think it works very well. Because what llms deliver is not the exquisite dish, the carefully crafted solution.

It’s just a solution that might scratch the itch but never fully blow you away. One time use software essentially.

If that is good or bad remains to be seen.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#288

Post by gliall_err » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:30 AM UTC

kypro wrote: post #277

shiomiru wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the economic problem that programmers had until recently been highly regarded because steps 2-3 were hard. "Open source" solved this partially by utilizing the labor such (relatively) well-paid people gave away "for the love of it", but it was not nearly enough to put most out of work. Now there is a plagiarism machine built on top of decades of this work that seemingly solves 3 and promises to solve 2 (…

This is unfortunately just the result of technological progress. People for centuries have crafted extremely hard to acquire skills over decades only to find their labour being made completely worthless due to automation or better alternatives disrupting their industry. Carpenters, hatters, cobblers, miners, weavers, calculators, etc... We can get mad about it, but it just is what it is. Ultimately for most people th…

This is a sophomoric oversimplification.

The US and Europe might have lost a lot of craftsmanship knowledge at a social level. Yet, what is left is so far ahead of what has ever existed in countries in South America for example. And China has gained a lot. Witness that youtuber trying to make grill brushes in the US. These differences have an impact in terms of opportunities and competition.

It's easy to sit at home, watch documentaries and picture history progressing along logical lines and imagine that the "industrial revolution" was this massive shift from craftsmanship to automation. Look closer and you'll see that what happened in the UK in the 1700s was in fact enabled by a long and deep tradition of craftsmanship that only got enriched by the rise of new power sources. Craftsmanship today is vastly more advanced than it ever was before industry.

And there is a lot to lose in the decline of craftsmanship, and it is by no means some sort of historical inevitability.

When you really start digging deep into history you realize most arguments of logical trends therein are mostly just misconceptions.

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#289

Post by r_lee » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:32 AM UTC

senor_digimon wrote: post #178

croes wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Warhammer figurines painting, let’s buy them already painted

You can take already painted warhammer figurines, pose them, take a photo, prompt an AI to make that your first scene, and generate a hollywood level scene in about a minute or two. Yes, sure, you can buy the figurine and get the joy of painting it. But there's new things you can do now too, things you couldn't dream about before. But I'll grant you this, the AI coding extinction event is so severe that I do believe…

> You can take already painted warhammer figurines, pose them, take a photo, prompt an AI to make that your first scene, and generate a hollywood level scene in about a minute or two.

if that's so awesome then why isn't everybody doing it?

I never dreamt about stuff like that, but are there actually people who are like "oh thank God I can finally make my AI movies with my figurines and other stuff I have laying around"

honestly you sound too enthusiastic about this, like Sam Altman "AI podcast about your kids" tier enthusiastic

Re: Born Against, or why hobby programming communities are against LLM usage

#290

Post by bananaflag » Thu, Aug 06, 2026, 10:35 AM UTC

pigpop wrote: post #284

shiomiru wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the economic problem that programmers had until recently been highly regarded because steps 2-3 were hard. "Open source" solved this partially by utilizing the labor such (relatively) well-paid people gave away "for the love of it", but it was not nearly enough to put most out of work. Now there is a plagiarism machine built on top of decades of this work that seemingly solves 3 and promises to solve 2 (…

Maybe I'm just old but people talking about being in programming for "status" or to be "highly regarded" really irks me. I'd rather see the entire field burnt to the ground and replaced by robots than to have it become a status profession like lawyering.

Could you elaborate?

I think back in the 90s when I was a teenager I thought it to be a good thing that there is a rise in status for a class of people characterized by clear thinking.