Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

"Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

jkap.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 249 posts

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#41

Post by 8note »

roblh wrote: post #29
ctoth wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes I will go out and I will plant a pepper plant and take care of it all summer long and obsessively ensure it has precisely the right amount of water and compost and so on... and ... for some reason (maybe I was on vacation and it got over 105 degrees?) I don't get a good crop. Does this mean I should not garden because it's a variable reward? Of course not. Sometimes I will go out fishing and I won't catch a…

It's a not a binary thing, it's a spectrum. There are many elements of uncertainty in every action imaginable. I'm inclined to agree with the other commenter though, the LLM slot machine is absolutely closer on that spectrum to gambling than your example is. Anthropic's optimization target is getting you to spend tokens, not produce the right answer. It's to produce an answer plausible enough but incomplete enough th…

im on a subscription though.

they want me to not spend tokens. that way my subscription makes money for them rather than costing them electricity and degrading their GPUs

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#42

Post by baq »

biophysboy wrote: post #40
baq wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

try codex 5.3. it's dry and very obviously AI; if you allow a bit of anthropomorphisation, it's kind of high-functioning autistic. it isn't an oracle, it'll still be wrong, but it's a powerful, completely different from claude tool.

Does it get numbers right? One of the mistakes it made in reading the paper was swapping sets of numbers from the primary/secondary outcomes.

it does get screenshots right for me, but obviously I haven't tried on your specific paper. I can only recommend trying it out, it's also has a much more generous limits in the $20 tier than opus.

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#43

Post by ErroneousBosh »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #13
ErroneousBosh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the "back and forth" thing normal for AI stuff, then? Because every time I've attempted to use Claude or Copilot for coding stuff, it's been completely unable to do anything on its own, and I've ended up writing all of the code while it's just kind of introduced misspellings into it. Maybe someone can show me how you're supposed to do it, because I have seen no evidence that AI can write code at all.

Step 1: deposit money into an Anthropic API account Step 2: download Zed and paste in your API Key Step 3: Give detailed instructions to the assistant, including writing ReadMe files on the goal of the project and the current state of the project Step 4: stop the robot when it's making a dumb decision Step 5: keep an eye on context size and start a new conversation every time you're half full. The more stuff in the c…

> Step 4: stop the robot when it's making a dumb decision

Yeah I can't stop myself when I'm about to make a dumb decision, just look at my github repo. I ported Forth to a 1980s sampler and wrote DSP code on an 8-bit Arduino.

How am I going to stop a robot making dumb decisions?

Also, this all sounds like I'm doing a lot of skivvy work typing stuff in (which I hate) and not actually writing much code (which is the bit I like).

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#45

Post by verdverm »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #13
ErroneousBosh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the "back and forth" thing normal for AI stuff, then? Because every time I've attempted to use Claude or Copilot for coding stuff, it's been completely unable to do anything on its own, and I've ended up writing all of the code while it's just kind of introduced misspellings into it. Maybe someone can show me how you're supposed to do it, because I have seen no evidence that AI can write code at all.

Step 1: deposit money into an Anthropic API account Step 2: download Zed and paste in your API Key Step 3: Give detailed instructions to the assistant, including writing ReadMe files on the goal of the project and the current state of the project Step 4: stop the robot when it's making a dumb decision Step 5: keep an eye on context size and start a new conversation every time you're half full. The more stuff in the c…

Step 1 is where Anthropic lost me.

1. If you don't use it soon enough, they keep it (shame on them, do the things you need to in order to be a money transmitter, you have billions of dollars)

2. Pay-go with billing warning and limits. You can use Claude like this through Google VertexAI

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#46

Post by 8note »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #6
htfu wrote: post #3

Probably the best we can hope for at the moment is a reduction in the back-and-forth, increase in ability to one-shot stuff with a really good spec. The regular human work then becomes building that spec, in regular human (albeit AI-assisted) ways.

Is the "back and forth" thing normal for AI stuff, then? Because every time I've attempted to use Claude or Copilot for coding stuff, it's been completely unable to do anything on its own, and I've ended up writing all of the code while it's just kind of introduced misspellings into it. Maybe someone can show me how you're supposed to do it, because I have seen no evidence that AI can write code at all.

there's a lot of back and forth for describing what you actually want, design, the constraints, and testing out the feeback loops you set up for it to be able to tell tell if its on the right track or not.

when its actually writing code its pretty hands off, unless you need to course correct to point it in a better direction

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#47

Post by bonoboTP »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #18
ctoth wrote: post #11

The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection. Slot machines have variable reward schedules by design — every element is optimized to maximize time on device. Social media optimizes for engagement, and compulsive behavior is the predictable output. The optimization target produces the addiction. What's Anthropic's optimization target??? Getting you the right answer as fast as possible! The variability in…

> The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection. Slot machines have variable reward schedules by design — every element is optimized to maximize time on device. Social media optimizes for engagement, and compulsive behavior is the predictable output. The optimization target produces the addiction. Intermittent variable rewards, whether produced by design or merely as a byproduct, will induce compulsive be…

And that's only bad if it's illusory or fake. This reaction evolved because it's adaptive. In slot machines the brain is tricked to believe there is some strategy or method to crack and the reward signals make the addict feel there is some kind of progress being made in return to some kind of effort.

The variability in eg soccer kicks or basketball throws is also there but clearly there is a skill element and a potential for progress. Same with many other activities. Coding with LLMs is not so different. There are clearly ways you can do it better and it's not pure randomness.

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#48

Post by Aurornis »

ctoth wrote: post #11

The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection. Slot machines have variable reward schedules by design — every element is optimized to maximize time on device. Social media optimizes for engagement, and compulsive behavior is the predictable output. The optimization target produces the addiction. What's Anthropic's optimization target??? Getting you the right answer as fast as possible! The variability in…

> The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection.

The analogy was too strained to make sense.

Despite being framed as a helpful plea to gambling addicts, I think it’s clear this post was actually targeted at an anti-LLM audience. It’s supposed to make the reader feel good for choosing not to use them by portraying LLM users as poor gambling addicts.

Re: "Token anxiety", a slot machine by any other name

#50

Post by [deleted] »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #18
ctoth wrote: post #11

The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection. Slot machines have variable reward schedules by design — every element is optimized to maximize time on device. Social media optimizes for engagement, and compulsive behavior is the predictable output. The optimization target produces the addiction. What's Anthropic's optimization target??? Getting you the right answer as fast as possible! The variability in…

> The gambling analogy completely falls apart on inspection. Slot machines have variable reward schedules by design — every element is optimized to maximize time on device. Social media optimizes for engagement, and compulsive behavior is the predictable output. The optimization target produces the addiction. Intermittent variable rewards, whether produced by design or merely as a byproduct, will induce compulsive be…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN