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Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

simonwillison.net

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Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#61

Post by GlacierFox »

hollowturtle wrote: post #46
sshine wrote: post #15

> please do not use AI assistants during the application process. We want to understand your personal interest in Anthropic without mediation through an AI system, and we also want to evaluate your non-AI-assisted communication skills. There are two backwards things with this: 1) You can't ask people to not use AI when careful, responsible use is undetectable. It just isn't a realistic request. You'll have great repl…

Can't disagree more. Talent is built and perfected upon thousands hours practice, LLMs just make you lazy. One thing people with seniority in the field don't realize, as I guess you are, is that LLMs don't help develop "muscle memory" in young practioners, it just make them miserable, often caged in an infinite feedback loop of bug fixing or trying to untangle a code mess. They may extract some value by using it for…

You perfectly encapsulated my view on this. I'm utterly bewildered with people who take the opposing position that AI is essentially a complete replacement for the human mind and you'd be stupid not to fully embrace it as your thought process.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#62

Post by Dylan16807 »

Keyframe wrote: post #48
croes wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how likely is that?

doesn't sound much different than googling and finding a snippet that gets you unstuck. This might be a shortcut to the same thing.

But they asked how likely it is. My guess is it's a pretty small fraction of problems where you need to get unstuck.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#63

Post by weebull »

janalsncm wrote: post #50
croes wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how likely is that?

It was the same way I think a lot of us used textbooks back in the day. Can’t figure out how to solve a problem, so look around for a similar setup in the chapter. If AI is just a search over all information, this makes that process faster. I guess the downside is there was arguably something to be learned searching through the chapter as well.

Homework problems are normally geared to the text book that is being used for the class. They might take you through the same steps, developing the knowledge in the same order.

Using another source is probably going to mess you up.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#64

Post by nhinck2 »

nialse wrote: post #12

It makes sense. Having the right people with the right merits and motivations will become even more important in the age of AI. Why you might ask? Execution is nothing when AI matures. Grasping the big picture, communicating effectively and possessing domain knowledge will be key. More roles in cognitive work will become senior positions. Of course you must know how to make the most out of AI, but it is more interest…

> Grasping the big picture, communicating effectively and possessing domain knowledge will be key

But isn't this all the things AI promises to solve for you?

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#65

Post by GlacierFox »

0x1062 wrote: post #53
hollowturtle wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't disagree more. Talent is built and perfected upon thousands hours practice, LLMs just make you lazy. One thing people with seniority in the field don't realize, as I guess you are, is that LLMs don't help develop "muscle memory" in young practioners, it just make them miserable, often caged in an infinite feedback loop of bug fixing or trying to untangle a code mess. They may extract some value by using it for…

AI is a tool, and tool use is not lazy.

The point he's making is, we still have to learn to use tools no? There still had to he some knowledge there or else you're just sat sifting through all the crap the AI spits out endlessly for the rest of your life. The op wrote his comment like it's a complete replacement rather than an enhancement.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#66

Post by neilv »

Kudos to Anthropic. The industry has way too many workers rationalizing cheating with AI right now.

Also, I think that the people who are saying it doesn't matter if they use AI to write their job application might not realize that:

1. Sometimes, application questions actually do have a point.

2. Some people can read a lot into what you say, and how you say it.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#67

Post by noufalibrahim »

hollowturtle wrote: post #46
sshine wrote: post #15

> please do not use AI assistants during the application process. We want to understand your personal interest in Anthropic without mediation through an AI system, and we also want to evaluate your non-AI-assisted communication skills. There are two backwards things with this: 1) You can't ask people to not use AI when careful, responsible use is undetectable. It just isn't a realistic request. You'll have great repl…

Can't disagree more. Talent is built and perfected upon thousands hours practice, LLMs just make you lazy. One thing people with seniority in the field don't realize, as I guess you are, is that LLMs don't help develop "muscle memory" in young practioners, it just make them miserable, often caged in an infinite feedback loop of bug fixing or trying to untangle a code mess. They may extract some value by using it for…

This is a straightforward position and it's the one I hold but I had to reply to thank you for stating it so succinctly.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#68

Post by saagarjha »

0x1062 wrote: post #53
hollowturtle wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't disagree more. Talent is built and perfected upon thousands hours practice, LLMs just make you lazy. One thing people with seniority in the field don't realize, as I guess you are, is that LLMs don't help develop "muscle memory" in young practioners, it just make them miserable, often caged in an infinite feedback loop of bug fixing or trying to untangle a code mess. They may extract some value by using it for…

AI is a tool, and tool use is not lazy.

Tool use can make you lazy if you're not careful.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#69

Post by rvba »

sshine wrote: post #15

> please do not use AI assistants during the application process. We want to understand your personal interest in Anthropic without mediation through an AI system, and we also want to evaluate your non-AI-assisted communication skills. There are two backwards things with this: 1) You can't ask people to not use AI when careful, responsible use is undetectable. It just isn't a realistic request. You'll have great repl…

You can enforce people to not use AI by making the intrview in the office.

Re: Anthropic: "Applicants should not use AI assistants"

#70

Post by CaptainFever »

> While we encourage people to use AI systems during their role to help them work faster and more effectively, please do not use AI assistants during the application process. We want to understand your personal interest in Anthropic without mediation through an AI system, and we also want to evaluate your non-AI-assisted communication skills. Please indicate 'Yes' if you have read and agree.

Full quote here; seems like most of the comments here are leaving out the first part.

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