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MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

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61–70 of 83 posts

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#61
post #57

Hey ChatGPT, please generate a Firefox Corp-style apology for this snafu... Be sure to use some bullshit blah blah for our original aim of wanting to enhance user experience and listening to the users' feedback, and some more bullshit blah blah about doing better in the future.

Who owns MDN? I thought it was disbanded by Mozilla few years ago.

It is now maintained by this club, I think: https://openwebdocs.org

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#62
post #36

@dang: Title is clickbait. Perhaps replace with something like: Bug report: MDN's AI Explain feature generates false explanations

The HN guidelines are to use the title of the source article, which this does - and in this case it seems pretty accurate.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#63
post #46
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aye, I agree this sounds like a strange and ill-fitting implementation. And it bums me out, because the more LLMs are used incorrectly, the harder it is to get people to use them at all.

You’re worried about people not using LLM’s _enough_???

On the user side, yes. It's an uphill battle getting most of the people I know to understand and use ChatGPT.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#64

I've never witnessed a github issue where the comments are unanimous like this one. So far there isn't a single naysayer. Could probably build fairly successful political party off of this once-in-a-lifetime momentum. :)

One came along some hours after you wrote that. Xyr reasoning was utterly foolish and dopey, and I'm not going to point xem out; merely observe that even there there wasn't unanimity.

Interestingly, there are more negative comments on Hacker News than on the bug discussion. This probably tells something about the audiences of MDN bug commenters and Hacker News readers.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#66
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I compare them to placebos because they can be effective and they can have zero active ingredient.

That's a fairer comparison that I read it as. I'd say they're more like a pharmacy, usually dispensing medicine. But we don't really know how half the medicine works, and sometimes it hurts people.

Would you shop at such a pharmacy? I wouldn’t and I don’t.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#67
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a fairer comparison that I read it as. I'd say they're more like a pharmacy, usually dispensing medicine. But we don't really know how half the medicine works, and sometimes it hurts people.

Would you shop at such a pharmacy? I wouldn’t and I don’t.

That accurately describes all pharmacies. Medicine is hard.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#68
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you shop at such a pharmacy? I wouldn’t and I don’t.

That accurately describes all pharmacies. Medicine is hard.

Oh, please. Have you never read the little insert that's packed in with all prescription medicine? Whether the mechanism is fully understood or not, it's at least been studied and demonstrated to have some benefit, and has _specific_ warnings about the ways it's been seen to harm people and how often.

Unless you're referring to the scam-filled supplements aisle, in which case I agree wholeheartedly with your comparison.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#69
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a fairer comparison that I read it as. I'd say they're more like a pharmacy, usually dispensing medicine. But we don't really know how half the medicine works, and sometimes it hurts people.

Would you shop at such a pharmacy? I wouldn’t and I don’t.

I was thinking more about SSRI's, which make up over half (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8450889/) of US pharmacy orders. While we do know that they work for some people, they only work for 20% of people (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK361016/). They also come with common side effects that can lower quality of life (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2719451/). And we do not understand how they work in the first place (https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/how-antidepressants-...). Plenty of parallels with the common lamentations over generative AI.

Re: MDN can now automatically lie to people seeking technical information

#70
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you shop at such a pharmacy? I wouldn’t and I don’t.

I was thinking more about SSRI's, which make up over half ( https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8450889/ ) of US pharmacy orders. While we do know that they work for some people, they only work for 20% of people ( https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK361016/ ). They also come with common side effects that can lower quality of life ( https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2719451/ ). And we do not unde…

Your own links demonstrate the fundamental difference. The side effects have been studied and can be identified. I'm at this very moment taking a break from a medication because I was able to recognize a severe side effect that came up. I can't recognize when an LLM has generated a nonsensical piece of technical documentation; if I could, I wouldn't need to use it in the first place.
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