I'd go as far as to say I think harder now – or at least quicker. I'm not wasting cycles on chores; I can focus on the bigger picture.

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9rx 10 hours ago | parent [-]

I've never felt more mental exhaustion than after a LLM coding session. I assume that is a result of it requiring me to think harder too.

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josephg 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I feel this too. I suspect its a byproduct of all the context switching I find myself doing when I'm using an LLM to help write software. Within a 10 minute window, I'll read code, debug a problem, prompt, discuss the design, test something, do some design work myself and so on.

When I'm just programming, I spend a lot more time working through a single idea, or a single function. Its much less tiring.

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Gigachad 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

In my experience it's because you switch from writing code to reviewing code someone else wrote. Which is massively more difficult than writing code yourself.

	▲	an hour ago \| parent [-]
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AlotOfReading 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It wasn't until I read your comment that I was able to pinpoint why the mental exhaustion feels familiar. It's the same kind (though not degree) of exhaustion as formal methods / proofs.

Except without the reward of an intellectual high afterwards.

	▲	samusiam 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Personally I do get the intellectual high after a long LLM coding session.