"the machine can’t even write good yet"
Human Routers of Machine Words
31–40 of 46 posts
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Translation is fine.
Is it, though? The post author is railing against it.
Nobody cared if you translated using Google Translate in the past. People don't care if you use claude to translate now. But people are clearly doing more than they claim when they just translate their text, since their "translations" end up full of AI-isms.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#33> I take this to mean they threw a bunch of incoherent bullet points at the AI for it to denoise and render into paragraphs
What I generally tend to do is have a long conversation with an LLM for at least 30 minutes, and then have that turn into the first draft. It might be considered lazy, but I've never been very good at editing prose - I always end up making a mistake that makes it more confusing.
If after the conversation I find it's an idea worth sharing (usually with colleagues), then getting the LLM to turn it into something readable is the best option available to me. If I had to do it myself, it likely wouldn't make it before I move onto something else. And it has had my genuine input throughout the long conversation, I wouldn't call it incoherent nor am I an idiot for not being able to express myself in long form writing
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#34> A “thinker” who doesn’t write, who skips the step of “merely” synthesizing their vague thoughts into prose, is not thinking. And then these people give their noise to the AI. OP is quite good with words and has a high standard and world view. The reason why people use AI to manifest their ideas is probably because they have no other way communicate otherwise. It's a medium to pack the idea into "something" that rep…
>It's a medium to pack the idea into "something" that represents the idea. It was never about a finished and polished product. It's the sign language for deaf people - a way to show your thoughts.
Sign language is a fully fledged language, as capable of expressing deep and complex thoughts as spoken English. Likening it to some kind of prosthetic for second-rate thinkers is insulting.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#35This is a very good essay when you get past the arrogant tone evident especially at the beginning (is that a form of engagement bait?…) The argument that communicating an idea is a necessary part of shaping it feels counterintuitive, but it’s really true. Whether it’s debugging, ‘big’ writing, or even down to the scale of a tweet (RIP Twitter) or an HN comment, I’ve often had the experience of starting to explain a p…
Yeah I don't know. I mean the author says only smart people can write good. And then says anyone who uses AI to write is basically giving up their genetalia so that Anthropic's AI model could make love to your wife (apparently without her consent because you can obviously just decide who has sex with your wife). The author should learn how to write properly and communicate ideas in a less sexist and disgusting way if…
> you can obviously just decide who has sex with your wife
That's your fantasies, not author's. He merely implied that one can obviously decide whom to allow to fuck one's wife. He hasn't implied that wife's consent is unnecessary or automatic.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#36I feel that the author mistakes intelligence with mental energy.
Even if you are smart you still have to budget your mental energy and one way to do that is to delegate tasks to AI.
Some people might hate writing documentation but love to write code and vice versa.
Delegating things you don’t want to spend time on is ok in my book.
That’s why the analogy “might as well let Claude hump your wife” does not hold, unless you really don’t enjoy that process.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#37This is a very good essay when you get past the arrogant tone evident especially at the beginning (is that a form of engagement bait?…) The argument that communicating an idea is a necessary part of shaping it feels counterintuitive, but it’s really true. Whether it’s debugging, ‘big’ writing, or even down to the scale of a tweet (RIP Twitter) or an HN comment, I’ve often had the experience of starting to explain a p…
I could not get past "waste of biomass".
He is correct though. If you are a proxy to Claude what is the use of yourself?
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#38> Anyone can imagine a programing language that is as fast as C and as dynamic as Lisp, but when you sit down and think through what those goals entail, you realize the design becomes contradictory. Ignoring the usual LLM rant, that's an interesting observation. Those conflicting goals reflect a problem that comes up quite often - the conflict between efficient volume production and flexibility. It's solvable for pro…
The language implementation that is faster than (!) C and almost as flexible as Lisp is called LuaJIT. I think it's no longer maintained.
* JITs can be faster than C by specialising at runtime on runtime-knowable values such as the length of the input or the tag of a tagged union.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#39> ... I feel contempt for the author, because if you use AI to write, you are a waste of biomass. Let’s not mince words here. Someone who is so eager to replace themselves, that they would have a machine write in their stead, when the machine can’t even write good yet: what do you call that, if not contemptible? It’s like making yourself into a eunuch so Claude can fuck your wife. Unfortunately due to how tasteless t…
Unfortunately, due to how rude this comment was, I won't be reading this or your future writing.
Because obviously someone who is rude must be wrong about everything. If someone calls someone a waste of biomass, by the rule of conservation of insults that must imply they are not one. Also we must be civil and polite to people who are destroying civilization.
Re: Human Routers of Machine Words
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree that it was a rude, tasteless metaphor. Alas, for rude, tasteless behavior, such as replacing your own authentic self-expression with the mellifluous spew of verbal diarrhea that bullshit machines slather across all surfaces they touch, rude, tasteless metaphors are the only fitting ones.
If only everyones authentic self-expression were so important to hear, to say nothing of unique and inciteful. I'm not against authentic self-expression, but this is more about being wrapped up in ones own self-importance.
The only way people will get to self-expression that's worth hearing is by working their way through the self-expression that wasn't.
In a better world that would happen in school and as a normal part of growing up, but at least in the US, that mostly doesn't happen.
If humans use LLMs to write, it's much more likely they will never uncover the unique perspectives they could share with the world.
So, for those whose parents and teachers failed them, embracing, encouraging, and engaging their clumsy, self-centered rudeness is, I think, the best path forward.
Granted, when it is clumsy, self-centered, and rude, one of the more helpful things we can do is offer the critiques that clearly and coherently point that out, as you've done here.
...though I stand by my claim that using LLMs to write is actually deeply offensive and rude, a rejection of what it means to be human, and that it should be met with strong rejections.