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Study mode

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Re: Study mode

#501

Post by fragmede »

maxsilver wrote: post #466
SLWW wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My core problem with LLMs is as you say; it's good for some simpler concepts, tasks, etc. but when you need to dive into more complex topics it will oversimplify, give you what you didn't ask for, or straight up lie by omission. History is a great example, if you ask an LLM about a vaguely difficult period in history it will just give you one side and act like the other doesn't exist, or if there is another side, it…

> people don't just wake up and decide one day to be irrationally evil with no reason, if you believe that then you are a fool The problem with this, is that people sometimes really do , objectively, wake up and device to be irrationally evil. It’s not every day, and it’s not every single person — but it does happen routinely. If you haven’t experienced this wrath yourself, I envy you. But for millions of people, thi…

Do they see it as evil though? They wake up, decide to do what they perceive as good but things are so twisted that their version of good doesn't agree with mine or yours. Some people are evil, see themselves as bad, and continue down that path, absolutely. But that level of malevolence is rare. Far more common is for people to believe that what they're doing is in service of the greater good of their community.

Re: Study mode

#502

Post by dyauspitr »

romaniitedomum wrote: post #412
jacobedawson wrote: post #379

An underrated quality of LLMs as study partner is that you can ask "stupid" questions without fear of embarrassment. Adding in a mode that doesn't just dump an answer but works to take you through the material step-by-step is magical. A tireless, capable, well-versed assistant on call 24/7 is an autodidact's dream. I'm puzzled (but not surprised) by the standard HN resistance & skepticism. Learning something online 5…

> Learning something online 5 years ago often involved trawling incorrect, outdated or hostile content and attempting to piece together mental models without the chance to receive immediate feedback on intuition or ask follow up questions. This is leaps and bounds ahead of that experience. But now, you're wondering if the answer the AI gave you is correct or something it hallucinated. Every time I find myself putting…

No you’re not, it’s right the vast, vast majority of the time. More than I would expect the average physics or chemistry teacher to be.

Re: Study mode

#503

Post by fragmede »

SLWW wrote: post #150
pengstrom wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The part about history perspectives sounds interesting. I haven't noticed this. Please post any concrete/specific examples you've encountered!

- Rhodesia (lock step with the racial-first reasoning, underplays Britain's failures to support that which they helped establish; makes the colonists look hateful when they were dealing with terrorists which the British supported) - Bombing of Dresden, death stats as well as how long the bombing went on for (Arthur Harris is considered a war-criminal to this day for that; LLLMs highlight easily falsifiable claims by…

> those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it

The problem is, those that do study history are also doomed to watch it repeat.

Re: Study mode

#504

Post by raincole »

esafak wrote: post #124
raincole wrote: post #18

If current AI is good enough to teach you something, spending time learning that thing seems to be a really bad investment...

How does that make sense? So you'd learn it if it was bad at teaching? Do you apply the same principle with humans and not bother to learn if the teacher is good?

> Do you apply the same principle with humans and not bother to learn if the teacher is good

Yes, if my teacher could split into a million of themselves and compete against me on the job market at $200/mo.

Re: Study mode

#506

Post by AlexCoventry »

tekno45 wrote: post #450
cvoss wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But now, you're wondering if the answer the AI gave you is correct > a healthy dose of scepticism is essential. Arguably, that applies to traditional learning methods too, but that's another story. I don't think that is another story. This is the story of learning, no matter whether your teacher is a person or an AI. My high school science teacher routinely mispoke inadvertently while lecturing. The students who we…

How are you supposed to spot errors if you don't know the material? You're telling people to be experts before they know anything.

It's possible in highly verifiable domains like math.

Re: Study mode

#507

Post by quietthrow »

jacobedawson wrote: post #379

An underrated quality of LLMs as study partner is that you can ask "stupid" questions without fear of embarrassment. Adding in a mode that doesn't just dump an answer but works to take you through the material step-by-step is magical. A tireless, capable, well-versed assistant on call 24/7 is an autodidact's dream. I'm puzzled (but not surprised) by the standard HN resistance & skepticism. Learning something online 5…

I agree with all that you say. It’s an incredible time indeed. Just one thing I can’t wrap my mind around is privacy. We all seem to be asking sometimes stupid and some times incredibly personal questions to these llms. Questions that we may not even speak out loud from embarrassment or shame or other such emotions to even our closest people. How are these companies using our data ? More importantly what are you all doing to protect yourself from misuse of your information? Or is it if you want to use it you have to give up such privacy and uncomfortableness ?

Re: Study mode

#508

Post by bonzini »

ramraj07 wrote: post #441
romaniitedomum wrote: post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Learning something online 5 years ago often involved trawling incorrect, outdated or hostile content and attempting to piece together mental models without the chance to receive immediate feedback on intuition or ask follow up questions. This is leaps and bounds ahead of that experience. But now, you're wondering if the answer the AI gave you is correct or something it hallucinated. Every time I find myself putting…

What exactly did 2025 AI hallucinate for you? The last time I've seen a hallucination from these things was a year ago. For questions that a kid or a student is going to answer im not sure any reasonable person should be worried about this.

Last week I was playing with the jj VCS and it couldn't even understand my question (how to swap two commits).

Re: Study mode

#509

Post by mpalmer »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #65

An acquaintance of mine has a start-up in this space and uses OpenAI to do essentially the same thing. This must look like, and may well be, the guillotine for him... It's my primary fear building anything on these models, they can just come eat your lunch once it looks yummy enough. Tread carefully

No disrespect to your acquaintance, but when I heard about this, I didn't think "oh a lot of startups are gonna go under", I thought "OAI added an option to use a hard-coded system prompt and they're calling it a 'mode'??"

Re: Study mode

#510

Post by m463 »

romaniitedomum wrote: post #412
jacobedawson wrote: post #379

An underrated quality of LLMs as study partner is that you can ask "stupid" questions without fear of embarrassment. Adding in a mode that doesn't just dump an answer but works to take you through the material step-by-step is magical. A tireless, capable, well-versed assistant on call 24/7 is an autodidact's dream. I'm puzzled (but not surprised) by the standard HN resistance & skepticism. Learning something online 5…

> Learning something online 5 years ago often involved trawling incorrect, outdated or hostile content and attempting to piece together mental models without the chance to receive immediate feedback on intuition or ask follow up questions. This is leaps and bounds ahead of that experience. But now, you're wondering if the answer the AI gave you is correct or something it hallucinated. Every time I find myself putting…

You should practice healthy skepticism with rubber ducks as well:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging

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