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What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

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Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#71

Post by comeondude »

alganet wrote: post #44
comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

Nice! That's what we all want, but without the content reapropriation, surveillance and public discourse meddling. Think of a version that is even more fun, won't teach your kids wrong stuff, won't need a datacenter full of expensive chips and won't hit the news with sensacionalist headlines.

That’s the dream eh?!

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#72

Post by tines »

dmix wrote: post #70
thousand_nights wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because the preachers preach how amazing it is on their greenfield 'i built a todo list app in 5 minutes from scratch' and then you use it on an established codebase with a bigger context than the llm could ever possibly consume and spend 5x more time debugging the slop than it would've taken you to do the task yourself, and you become jaded stop underestimating the amount of internalized knowledge people can have ab…

A completely non-technical saleslady on our team prototyped a whole JS web app that generated some data based on some user inputs (and even generated PDFs), which solved a problem our customers were having and our devs didnt have the time to develop yet. This obviously was a temporary tool we'd never let touch our github repo but it still very much worked and solved a niche problem. It even looked like our app becaus…

Do people actually learn when using these tools though? I mean, I’m sure they can be used to learn, just like TikTok could be used to read John Stuart Mill. But I doubt that’s what it’s going to be used for in real life.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#73

Post by llmthrow103 »

comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

This post is about a specific, complex system that stretches from operating system to the physical world, as well as some philosophical problems.

What you're describing is a dead simple hobby project that could be completed by a complete novice in less than a week before the advent of LLMs.

It's like saying "I'm absolutely blown away by microwaves, I can have a meal hot and ready in just a few minutes with no effort or understanding. I think all culinary schools should have a curriculum that teaches people how to use microwaves effectively."

Maybe the goal of education should be giving people a foundation that they can build on, not make them an expert in something that a low skill ceiling and diminishing returns.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#74

Post by RangerScience »

llmthrow103 wrote: post #73
comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

This post is about a specific, complex system that stretches from operating system to the physical world, as well as some philosophical problems. What you're describing is a dead simple hobby project that could be completed by a complete novice in less than a week before the advent of LLMs. It's like saying "I'm absolutely blown away by microwaves, I can have a meal hot and ready in just a few minutes with no effort…

I mean - going from “doable in a week with the right mindset” to “doable in a day when I’ve struggled before” is uhhh kinda worth being blown away by

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#75

Post by alganet »

comeondude wrote: post #71
alganet wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice! That's what we all want, but without the content reapropriation, surveillance and public discourse meddling. Think of a version that is even more fun, won't teach your kids wrong stuff, won't need a datacenter full of expensive chips and won't hit the news with sensacionalist headlines.

That’s the dream eh?!

It's a tradition, a way of building things.

You're an artist, I'm sure you understand what art that comes from tradition tries to accomplish.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#76

Post by steveBK123 »

alfalfasprout wrote: post #62
atleastoptimal wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think much of HN has a blind spot that prevents them from engaging with the facts. Yes, AI currently has limitations and isn't a panacea for cognitive tasks. But in many specific use cases it is enormously useful, and the rapid growth of ChatGPT, AI startups, etc. is evidence of that. Many will argue that it's all fake, that it's all artificial hype to prop of VC evaluations, etc. They literally will see the billio…

I'm not sure if this post is ragebait or not but I'll bite... If anything, HN is in general very much on the LLM hype train. The contrarian takes tend to be from more experienced folks working on difficult problems that very much see the fundamental flaws in how we're talking about AI. > Many will argue that it's all fake, that it's all artificial hype to prop of VC evaluations, etc. They literally will see the billi…

I was talking to a friend today about where AI would actually be useful in my personal life, but it would require much higher reliability.

This is very basic stuff, not rewriting a codebase, creating a video game from text prompt or generating imagery.

Simply - I would like to be able to verbally prompt my phone something like "make sure the lights and AC are set to I will be comfortable when I get home, follow up with that plumber if they haven't gotten back to us, place my usual grocery order plus add some berries plus anything my wife put on our shared grocery list, and schedule a haircut for the end of next week some time after 5pm".

Basically 15-30min of daily stupid personal time sucks that can all be accomplished via smartphone.

Given the promise of IoT, smart home, LLMs, voice assistants, etc.. this should be possible.

This would require it having access to my calendar, location, ability to navigate apps on my phone, read/send email/text, and spend money. Given the current state of the tools, even if there is a 0.1% chance it changes my contact card photo to Hitler, replies to an email from my boss with an insult, purchases $100,000 in bananas, or sets the thermostats to 99F.. then I couldn't imagine giving an LLM access to all those things.

Are we 3 months, 5 years, or never away from that being achievable? These feel like the kind of things previous voice assistants promised 10 years ago.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#77

Post by llmthrow103 »

RangerScience wrote: post #74
llmthrow103 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This post is about a specific, complex system that stretches from operating system to the physical world, as well as some philosophical problems. What you're describing is a dead simple hobby project that could be completed by a complete novice in less than a week before the advent of LLMs. It's like saying "I'm absolutely blown away by microwaves, I can have a meal hot and ready in just a few minutes with no effort…

I mean - going from “doable in a week with the right mindset” to “doable in a day when I’ve struggled before” is uhhh kinda worth being blown away by

Yeah, great, but also completely irrelevant. Is every post on Hacker News related to AI in any way a place to post anecdotes about AI?

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#78

Post by ryandv »

nomel wrote: post #61
comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

> "I'm an artist" This is actually what I'm most excited about: in the reasonably near future, productivity will be related to who is most creative and who has the most interesting problems rather than who's spent the most hours behind a specific toolchain/compiler/language. Solutions to practical problems won't be required to go through a layer of software engineer. It's going to be amazing, and I'm going to be with…

> productivity will be related to who is most creative and who has the most interesting problems rather than who's spent the most hours behind a specific toolchain/compiler/language.

Why stop at software? AI will do this to pretty much every discipline and artform, from music and painting, to law and medicine. Learning, mastery, expertise, and craftsmanship are obsolete; there's no need to expend 10,000 hours developing a skill when the AI has already spent billions of hours in the cloud training in its hyperbolic time chamber. Academia and advanced degrees are worthless; you can compress four years of study into a prompt the size of a tweet.

The idea guy will become the most important role in the coming aeon of AI.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#79

Post by ants_everywhere »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #50
comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

I think much of HN has a blind spot that prevents them from engaging with the facts. Yes, AI currently has limitations and isn't a panacea for cognitive tasks. But in many specific use cases it is enormously useful, and the rapid growth of ChatGPT, AI startups, etc. is evidence of that. Many will argue that it's all fake, that it's all artificial hype to prop of VC evaluations, etc. They literally will see the billio…

Some people see it as a political identity issue.

One person told me the other day that for the rest of time people will see using an AI as equivalent to crossing a picket line.

Re: What is Realtalk’s relationship to AI? (2024)

#80

Post by vlovich123 »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #50
comeondude wrote: post #39

Im genuinely blown away by llms. I’m an artist who’ve always struggled to learn how to code. I can pick up on computer science concepts, but when I try to sit down and write actual code my brain just pretends it doesn’t exist. Over like 20 years, despite numerous attempts I could never get past few beginner exercises. I viscerally can’t stand the headspace that coding puts me in. Last night I managed to build a custo…

I think much of HN has a blind spot that prevents them from engaging with the facts. Yes, AI currently has limitations and isn't a panacea for cognitive tasks. But in many specific use cases it is enormously useful, and the rapid growth of ChatGPT, AI startups, etc. is evidence of that. Many will argue that it's all fake, that it's all artificial hype to prop of VC evaluations, etc. They literally will see the billio…

To me the progress achieved so far has been overhyped in many respects. The numbers out of Google that 25% of the code being generated is AI or some high number like that? BS. It’s gamified statistics that look at the command completion (not AI trying to solve a problem) vs what’s accepted and it’s likely hyper inflated even then.

It works better than you for UI prototypes when you don’t know how to do UI (and maybe even faster even if you do). It doesn’t work at all on problems it hasn’t seen. I literally just saw a coworker staring at code for hours and getting completely off track trying to correct AI output vs stepping through the problem step by step using how we thought the algorithm should work.

There’s a very real difference between where it could be in the future to be useful vs what you can do with it today in a useful way and you have to be very careful about utilizing it correctly. If you don’t know what you’re doing and AI helps you get it done cool, but also keep in mind that you also won’t know if it has catastrophic bugs because you don’t understand the problem and the conceptual idea of the solution well enough to know if what it did is correct. For most people there’s not much difference but for those of us who care it’s a huge problem.

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