Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes • Hacker News Board

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#651

Post by YeGoblynQueenne » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 11:23 AM UTC

27183 wrote: post #337

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the useful intuition is that LLMs haven't somehow magickally learned to implement any of the algorithms we know that we have used to make strong chess engines: alpha-beta minimax and Monte-Carlo Tree Search on the one hand, and obviously the ability to learn accurate evaluation functions by self-play. I mean we've done all this before in a task-specific fashion. It's useful to know that LLMs haven't managed to…

But it speaks in words, therefore it must be super duper extra smart!!11 /s Sarcasm aside, I think this is an easy cognitive trap to fall into. It does sometimes feel like the LLM must have some world model because it converses somewhat coherently. Examples like this failure to understand chess, or to count the number of Rs in "strawberry", seem difficult to explain if the models are intelligent. But that doesn't sto…

I think your sarcasm is justified. I, too, am tired by the big claims that are only based on hype.

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#652

Post by YeGoblynQueenne » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 11:29 AM UTC

minraws wrote: post #382

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I don't agree it's the norm. There is though a general tendency to opine with strong views on subjects posters have no expertise on. I think that's because many are software engineers (or equivalent) and they are used to being expected to "wing it" on whatever technical subject comes up. On the other hand you can always find informed comments by users who have specialist knowledge. And there's plenty of pushback…

It's not been my personal experience on this website in the last 2-3 years atleast, pre-covid perhaps. But despite that you aren't wrong and the only reason I even visit this website is because people sometimes did/do take time to reflect on things based on their experience and knowledge. And in hindsight pointing out that hn has issues wasn't even the point but I feel frustrated when everyone is readily agreeing to…

>> I possibly should just drop reading this place until we have most noisy people go away.

Not to disappoint you but I don't think they ever will. HN is free to join and use so people will join and use it and say whatever they want to say whether it makes sense or not. Filtering out noise is a useful skill to have especially since one can't block users or mute conversations and so on.

>> In the moment I probably thought if they are GM level and I can beat them, is this some interesting find, my disappointment honestly led me to making a rather incorrect call on this one.

Sorry, I didn't get this? What was the incorrect call you made?

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#653

Post by moomoo11 » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 12:12 PM UTC

lolakutty wrote: post #641

moomoo11 wrote: post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i think you miss the part about the loop. you're still building software for the past/current world. when you have chains of agents working seamlessly, where agents are managed by themselves (like spawning a new chain to do some scope of work), and it just sort of works on a infinite game loop, your system continually keeps improving as it works. at least, that is the goal with the systems i like to build. you have t…

Your use case totally makes sense. The non-sense is the part where you think putting agents in a loop is going to yield better results indefinitely...

i guess me and my customers are morons then and you’re a genius when you’ve not achieved anything

life of a w2

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#654

Post by desterothx » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 12:13 PM UTC

zug_zug wrote: post #143

slibhb wrote: post #115

> the frontier labs are priced according to the narrative that they have produced or will in the very near future produce a fully automated drop-in replacement for most knowledge workers That's a reason to be bearish about AI companies, not LLMs. But is it even true? OpenAI and Anthropic have each reported ~50 billion in revenue with ~900 billion valuations. That's a high ratio but I'm not sure if follows that the on…

I looked at the math and I think it's true. Remember revenue is just sales, not profit. These labs are shooting for > $1T valuations, which traditionally means your PROFIT is at least 1/20th or 1/30th of that (so let's say minimum 30B$/year PROFIT). These companies however are LOSING money (anthropic tries to make it sound like it's profit by deviating from accepted accounting principles) and subsidizing these models…

Yeah, just take the EBITDA and suddenly the valuations make sense. Paying money for a vending machine that currently loses money hand over fist is generally not a sound investment strategy

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#655

Post by moomoo11 » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 12:16 PM UTC

lolakutty wrote: post #642

Capricorn2481 wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 98% of people think AI means what gemini tells them when they do a google search. > of that 2% who go beyond... maybe 20% of those are using AI to code. > so of that 20%, maybe 5% have... maybe 1-5% of that 5% actually went deeper How can you write any of this when you said you just started liking LLMs with Astra, a model that released two weeks ago. You're whipping out a bunch of made up stats trying to describe l…

I think he is someone who got burned by some bad software contractors in the past...

no i’m just a startup founder who enjoys solving problems.

already been through one IPO where i was an early employee so i’ve never really had to work with morons.

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#656

Post by fragmede » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 12:17 PM UTC

moomoo11 wrote: post #653

lolakutty wrote: post #641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your use case totally makes sense. The non-sense is the part where you think putting agents in a loop is going to yield better results indefinitely...

i guess me and my customers are morons then and you’re a genius when you’ve not achieved anything life of a w2

Don't nobody tell them about K1

Re: Why I'm still bearish on LLMs after Navier-Stokes

#657

Post by marcus_cc » Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 12:38 PM UTC

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