The way I use AI now feels more exhausting than the programming I did for the last 20 years. I pose a problem, then evaluate proposals, then pick the one I think is the "right one"(tm), then see the AI propose a bunch of weird shit, then call it out, refine the proposal until it feels just about right (this is the exhausting part), then let it code the proposal. The coding will then run for 1-5 hours and produce something that would have taken me at least 2 or 3 weeks (in that quality).

After 5 hours or so of doing this planning, I'm EXHAUSTED. I never was exhausted in this manner from programming alone. Am I learning something new? Feels like management. :)

I feel this as well. I think it’s something to do with having to be more “on” as you slowly work with the LLM to define the problem and find a reasonable solution. There’s not much of a flow-state. You have to process mountains of output and identify the critical points, over and over, endlessly. And it will always be an off in this unsettling little way, even when it’s mostly quite good. It’s jarring.

The strange sorts of errors and reasoning issues LLMs have also require a vigilance that is very draining to maintain. Likewise with parsing the inhuman communication styles of these things…

I think one of the benefits of AI is that it will get started, and keep going.

But maybe pacing/procrastination might be relief valves?

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