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Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

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Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#821

I work for Google, and I just got done with my work day. I was just writing I guess what you'd call "AI generated code." But the code completion engine is basically just good at finishing the lines I'm writing. If I'm writing "function getAc..." it's smart enough to complete to "function getActionHandler()", and maybe suggest the correct arguments and a decent jsdoc comment. So basically, it's a helpful productivity…

I'm confused, I've been doing similar tab completion for function names in eclipse since about 2003...

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#822
post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Humans are machines Even if we accept the premise (seeing humans as machines is literally dehumanising and a favourite argument of those who exploit them), not all machines are created equal. Would you use a bicycle to fill your taxes? > Somehow, we got to the moon Quite hand wavey. We didn’t get to the Moon by reading a bunch of text from the era then probabilistically joining word fragments, passing that around t…

Humans are obviously machines. If not, what are humans then? Fairies? Now once you've recognized that, you're better equiped for task at hand - which is augmenting and ultimately automating away every task that humans-as-machines perform by building equivalent or better machine that performs said tasks at fraction of the cost! People who want to exploit humans are the ones that oppose automation. There's still long w…

Profoundly spiritual take. Why is that the task at hand?

The conceit that humans are machines carries with it such powerful ideology: humans are for something, we are some kind of utility, not just things in themselves, like birds and rocks. How is it anything other than an affirmation of metaphysical/theological purpose to particularly humans? Why is it like that? This must be coming from a religious context, right?

I cannot at least see how you could believe this while sustaining a rational, scientific mind about nature, cosmology, etc. Which is fine! We can all believe things, just know you cant have your cake and eat it too. Namely, if anybody should believe in fairies around here, it should probably be you!

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#823

I work for Google, and I just got done with my work day. I was just writing I guess what you'd call "AI generated code." But the code completion engine is basically just good at finishing the lines I'm writing. If I'm writing "function getAc..." it's smart enough to complete to "function getActionHandler()", and maybe suggest the correct arguments and a decent jsdoc comment. So basically, it's a helpful productivity…

Thank you for this comment. So the code written in this manner isn't really "created by AI"; AI is just a nice additional feature of an editor.

I wonder if the enormous hype around AI is a good or bad thing; it's obviously both but will the good win out the bad, or will the disappointment eventually be so overwhelming as to extinguish any enthusiasm.

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#824
People still don't understand those who pay the bills are those who claim developers are less and less necessary. It doesn't matter how much we love our job and how much we care for quality, at the end those who pay take more care of reducing workforce for something potentially free or cheap. We are less needed, less cared and less seen as engineers. We are just a cost in a wrong column of Quickbooks. Get use to it.

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#825
post #704

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also work at Google and I agree with the general sentiment that AI completion is not doing engineering per se, simply because writing code is just a small part of engineering. However in my experience the system is much more powerful than you described. Maybe this is because I'm mostly writing C++ for which there is a much bigger training corpus than JavaScript. One thing the system is already pretty good at is wri…

This type of not having to think about the implementation, especially in a language that we've by now well-established can't be written safely by humans (including by Google's own research into Android vulnerabilities if I'm not mistaken), at least with the current level of LLM, worries me the most Time will tell whether it outputs worse, equal, or better quality than skilled humans, but I'd be very wary of anything…

> worries me the most

It isn't something I worry about at all. If it doesn't work and starts creating bugs and horrible code, the best places will adjust to that and it won't be used or will be used more judiciously.

I'll still review code like I always do and prevent bad code from making it into our repo. I don't see why it's my problem to worry about. Why is it yours?

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#826

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LLMs are a lot better at a lot of things than a lot of humans. We got to the moon using a large number of systems to a) avoid errors where possible and b) build in redundancies. Even an LLM knows this and knew what the statement meant: https://chatgpt.com/share/6722e04f-0230-8002-8345-5d2eba2e7d... Putting "corrected" in quotes and saying "death spiral" implies error compounding. https://chatgpt.com/share/6722e19c-7f…

> These LLMs seem so smart. Yes, they do *seem* smart. My experience with a wide variety of LLM-based tools is that they are the industrialization of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

It's more likely the opposite. Humans rationalize their errors out the wazoo. LLMs are showing us we really aren't very smart at all.

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#827
post #738

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google does not write much publicly available JavaScript. They wrote their own special flavor. (Same for any hugel legacy operation)

Can we get some more info on what you're reffering to ?

They're probably talking about Closure Compiler type annotations [0], which never really took off outside Google, but (imo) were pretty great in the days before TypeScript. (Disclosure: Googler)

0. https://github.com/google/closure-compiler/wiki/Annotating-J...

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#828
> "and we continue to be laser-focused on building great products."

NO! False. I can confirm they are not. I've known of several major obvious unfixed bugs/flaws in Google apps for years. and in the last year or so especially theres been an explosion in the number of head-scratching, jaw-dropping fails and UX anti-patterns in their code. GMail, Search, Maps and Android are now riddled with them.

on Sundar Pichai's watch he's been devolving Google to be yet another Microsoft type in terms of quality, care and taste.

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#829
post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So this is basically the google CEO saying "a quarter of our terminal inputs is written by a glorified tab completion"?

I'm sorry but I don't understand how people say LLMs are simply "tab completion". They allow me to do much more than that thanks to all the knowledge they contain. For instance, yesterday I wanted to write a tool that transfers any large file that is still being appended to to multiple remote hosts, with a fast throughput. By asking Claude for help I obtained exactly what I want in under two hours. I'm no C/C++ exper…

> thanks to all the knowledge they contain

This is what's problematic with modern "AI". Most people inexperienced with it, like the parent commenter will uncritically assume these LLMs poses "knowledge". This I find the most dangerous and prevalent assumption. Most people are oblivious to the fact how bad LLMs are.

Re: Google CEO says more than a quarter of the company's new code is created by AI

#830

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are obviously machines. If not, what are humans then? Fairies? Now once you've recognized that, you're better equiped for task at hand - which is augmenting and ultimately automating away every task that humans-as-machines perform by building equivalent or better machine that performs said tasks at fraction of the cost! People who want to exploit humans are the ones that oppose automation. There's still long w…

Profoundly spiritual take. Why is that the task at hand? The conceit that humans are machines carries with it such powerful ideology: humans are for something, we are some kind of utility, not just things in themselves, like birds and rocks. How is it anything other than an affirmation of metaphysical/theological purpose to particularly humans? Why is it like that? This must be coming from a religious context, right?…

> Why is that the task at hand?

Because it's boring stuff, and most of us would prefer to be playing golf/tennis/hanging out with friends/painting/etc. If you look at the history of humanity, we've been automating the boring stuff since the start. We don't automate the stuff we like.

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