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The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

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Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#361

Post by obirunda »

handfuloflight wrote: post #355
obirunda wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing that's assumed in "proompting" as the new way of writing code is how much extrapolation are you going to allow the LLM to perform on your behalf. If you describe your requirements in a context-free language you'll have written the code yourself. If you describe the requirements with ambiguity you'll leave enough of narrowing it down to actual code to the LLM. Have it your way, but the current workflow of pr…

Vibe coding is something other than what I'm referring to, as you're conflating natural language programming, where you do everything that a programmer does except reading and writing syntax, with vibe coding without understanding. Traditional programming also requires iteration, testing, and debugging, so I don't see what argument you're making there. Then when you invoke 'token burn' the question is then whether de…

LLMs do not revoke ambiguity from the English language.. Look, if you prefer to use this as part of your workflow and you understand the language and paradigms being chosen by the LLM on your behalf, and can manage to produce extensible code with it, then that's a matter of preference and if you find yourself more productive that way, all power to you.

But when you say English as a programming language, you're implying that we have bypassed its ambiguity. If this was actually possible, we would have an English compiler, and before you suggest LLMs are compilers, they require context. Yes, you can produce code from English but it's entirely non-deterministic, and they also fool you into thinking because they can reproduce in-training material, they will be just as competent at something actually novel.

Your point about waiting on an engineer for a PR is actually moot. What is the goal? Ship a prototype? Build maintainable software? If it's the latter, agents may cost less but they don't remove your personal cognitive load. Because you can't actually let the agent develop truly unattended, you still have to review, validate and approve. And if it's hot garbage you need to spin it all over and hope it works.

So even if you are saving on a single engineer's cost, you have to count your personal cost of baby sitting this "agent". Assuming that you are designing the entire stack this can go better, but if you "forget the code even exits" and let the model also architect your stack for you then you are likely just wasting token money on proof-of-concepts rather than creating a real product.

I also find interesting that so many cult followers love to dismiss other humans in favor of this technology as if it already provides all the attributes that humans possess. As far as I'm concerned cognitive load can still only be truly decreased by having an engineer who understands your product and can champion it foward. Understanding the goal and the mission in real meaningful ways.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#362

Post by svantana »

daishi55 wrote: post #62

ChatGPT is the 5th most-visited website on the planet and growing quickly. that’s one of many popular products. Hardly call that unwilling. I bet only something like 8% of Instagram users say they would pay for it. Are we to take this to mean that Instagram is an unpopular product that is rbi g forced on an unwilling public?

The post is not about ChatGPT (and its like), it's about "AI" being forced into services that have been working just fine without AI for a long time.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#363

Post by suddenlybananas »

leptons wrote: post #349
suddenlybananas wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That happened like nearly 200 years after the printing press arrived in Europe.

I qualified it with this: > was still getting popular.

I think it was very well established 200 years later. There weren't a lot of illuminated manuscripts being made in the Netherlands in the 1630s.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#364

Post by easyThrowaway »

const_cast wrote: post #306
ryandrake wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if your company is privately owned, it has at least 1 investor (possibly just the founder), and this urge to cram AI is no doubt coming from him.

Why are investors so stupid? I mean this genuinely. Every time I hear about investors and what they want, it seems to me like they make dumb decisions that implode on themselves. I mean, you would think someone very rich who invests in companies would be somewhat smart. But, I'm convinced, a lot of them would do much better if they made no decisions at all and left everything up to entropy.

They're not stupid, or at least there's method in their madness. They treat the market as a big Texas Hold'em game and everyone is trying to bluff everyone and no-one wants to "fold" yet on AI, no matter which cards have on their hand.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#365

Post by bsenftner »

noduerme wrote: post #356
bsenftner wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are being stubborn, the method is absolutely reproducible. But across models, of course not, that is not how they operate. > It's not reproducible according to any useful logical framework that could be generally applied to other cases. It absolutely is, you are refusing to accept that natural language contains this type of logical structure. You are repeatedly trying to project "magic incantations" allusions, wh…

I'm not angry, I'm just extremely skeptical. If a programming language varied from version to version the way LLMs do, to the extent that the same input could have radically different consequences, no one would use it. Even if the "compiled code" of the LLM's output is proven to work, you will need to make changes in the "source code" of your higher level natural language. Again it's one thing to divorce memory manag…

This is the disconnect, no where do I say use them to make apps, in fact I am strongly opposed to their use for automation, they create Rube Goldberg Machines. But they are great advisors, not coders, but critics of code and sounding boards for strategy, that one when writes their own code to perform the logic they constructed in their head. It is possible and helpful to include LLMs within the decision support roles that software provides for users, but not the decision roles, include LLMs as information resources for the people making decisions, but not as the agents of decision.

But all of that is an aside from the essential nature of using them, which far too many use them to think for them, in place of their thinking, and that is also a subtle aspect of LLMs - using them to think for you damages your own ability to critically think. That's why understanding them is so important, so one does not anthropomorphize them to trust them, which is a dangerous behavior. They are idiot savants, and get that much trust: nearly none.

I also do not believe that LLMs are even remotely capable of anything close to what software engineers do. That's why I am a strong advocate of not using them to write code. Use them to help one understand, but know that the "understanding" that they can offer is of limited scope. That's their weakness: they can't encompass scope. Detailed nuance they get, but two detailed nuances in a single phenomenon and they only focus on one and drop the surrounding environment. They are idiots drawn to shiny complexity, with savant-like abilities. They are closer to a demonic toy for programmers than anything else we have..

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#366

Post by CuriouslyC »

i_love_retros wrote: post #354
CuriouslyC wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a huge AI supporter, and use it extensively for coding, writing and most of my decision making processes, and I agree with you. The AI features in non-AI-first apps tend to be awkward bolt-ons, poorly thought out and using low quality models to save money. I don't want shitty bolt-ons, I want to be able to give chatgtp/claude/gemini frontier models the ability to access my application data and make api calls for…

> I am a huge AI supporter, and use it extensively for coding, writing and most of my decision making processes If you use it for writing, what is the point of writing in the first place? If you're writing to anyone you even slightly care about they should wipe their arse with it and send it back to you. And if it's writing at work or for work then you're just proving you are an employee they don't need.

I just wiped my arse with your reply, here it is, enjoy.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#367

Post by atemerev »

ruszki wrote: post #300
atemerev wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In mid-90s, people who are now in their 30s were about 5 years old. Their formative age was from 2005 to 2015, and yes, things were staying relatively the same during this time.

Smart phones? Mobile internet? Streaming? Steam? Almost none of these were used, or very-very few people in 2005, if they existed at all. The internet of 2005 was completely different than 2015. But heck even in real life. My home country’s weather was very different in 2005 than 10 years later. Cheap flight tickets started to change our travelling pattern completely. Even my parents started to not watch TV before 20…

I got my first smartphone in 2004, in 2007 there was already iPhone and everyone was on Facebook.

All these things you mention are completely minor compared to the seismic changes in 1995-2001 and 2016-2025.

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#368

Post by i_love_retros »

CuriouslyC wrote: post #366
i_love_retros wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am a huge AI supporter, and use it extensively for coding, writing and most of my decision making processes If you use it for writing, what is the point of writing in the first place? If you're writing to anyone you even slightly care about they should wipe their arse with it and send it back to you. And if it's writing at work or for work then you're just proving you are an employee they don't need.

I just wiped my arse with your reply, here it is, enjoy.

Did you have to brainstorm that response with chatgpt?

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#369

Post by DocTomoe »

DrillShopper wrote: post #342
ryandrake wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the thing I hate most about the whole AI frenzy: If it doesn't work, it's horrible, and if it does work, it's also horrible but for different reasons. The whole thing is a giant shit sandwich, and the only upside is for the few already-rich people serving it to us.

And regardless of whether or not it works - it's pumping giant amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere which isn't a strictly local problem.

Any time a new technology makes people uncomfortable, someone pulls the CO₂ card. We've seen this with cryptocurrencies, electric cars, even the internet itself.

But curiously, the same people rarely question the CO₂ footprint of things like gaming, streaming, international sports, live concerts, political campaigns, or even large-scale scientific research. Methane-fueled rockets and the LHC don't exactly run on solar-powered calculators, yet they're culturally or intellectually "approved" forms of emission.

Yes, AI consumes energy. So does everything else we choose to value. If we're serious about CO₂, then we need consistent standards — not just selective outrage. Either we cut fairly across the board, or we focus on making electricity cleaner and more sustainable, instead of trying to shame specific technologies into nonexistence (which, by the way, never happens).

Re: The force-feeding of AI features on an unwilling public

#370

Post by ruszki »

atemerev wrote: post #367
ruszki wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Smart phones? Mobile internet? Streaming? Steam? Almost none of these were used, or very-very few people in 2005, if they existed at all. The internet of 2005 was completely different than 2015. But heck even in real life. My home country’s weather was very different in 2005 than 10 years later. Cheap flight tickets started to change our travelling pattern completely. Even my parents started to not watch TV before 20…

I got my first smartphone in 2004, in 2007 there was already iPhone and everyone was on Facebook. All these things you mention are completely minor compared to the seismic changes in 1995-2001 and 2016-2025.

Give me examples. Also the way you use smartphone was used only by marketing people, and it was not widespread usage at all before iPhone, also the first “smartphone” by marketing people came before your timeline.
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