You can just ask Claude why it did something in the code and it will tell you

Programmers just moved up a level , not dumber, we are now managers of a team of 'agent' programmers. The deliverable is now a functionality instead of a specific block of code

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fortzi a day ago | parent | next [-]

Claude won’t tell you why it did something. Instead, it will generate a probable explanation. The two are very different

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Zambyte a day ago | parent [-]

I'm not sure how context is managed between reasoning traces and actual output in Claude / claude code, but if the reasoning trace is in the context of the question for "why did you do that", it can actually answer why it did that.

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fortzi a day ago | parent | next [-]

I may be mistaking, but I doubt it digs through thinking tokens of previous runs, not to mention previous sessions

	▲	Zambyte a day ago \| parent [-]
		It would be a harness specific detail, but yeah, I think most / all harnesses drop the thinking from the context after the next turn.

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inigyou a day ago | parent | prev [-]

Reasoning traces are also probable explanations.

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Dylan16807 a day ago | parent | next [-]

Yeah but at that point it's probably close enough. Humans can get their own reasoning wrong too so some inaccuracy is acceptable.

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inigyou a day ago | parent [-]

It's exactly as close as asking for it after the fact. Reasoning traces have no relation to the reasons LLMs actually do things, except that they may do things because the reasoning trace says they should.

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Dylan16807 a day ago | parent [-]

It's exactly as close except when it isn't?

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inigyou a day ago | parent [-]

Yes, and when it isn't is a very specific very limited case that has no relation to the one being discussed.

The fact that some course of action was previously mentioned in a reasoning trace, or any other context, makes it more likely to be performed. It has nothing to do with the reason that it was mentioned in the reasoning trace.

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Dylan16807 a day ago | parent [-]

I don't think it's that limited of a case.

And it's not "no relation", it was brought up as an attempt to fix/subset the original claim.

	▲	inigyou a day ago \| parent [-]
		No, it's just warding off pedantry. There is one way that reasoning traces might "be the reason" something happens, but that's different from the reasoning trace saying why something happens, which was the question.

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Zambyte a day ago | parent | prev [-]

Not if the reasoning trace happened before they actually did the change.

	▲	inigyou a day ago \| parent [-]
		Incorrect, they still are.

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brookst a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yep. I do so much work with Claude on product requirements and architecture before a single line of code is written, and test coverage is extreme.

If I need to understand a specific line of code it means I did something wrong in planning or in requirements for testing.

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fortzi a day ago | parent [-]

In my experience it’s impossible to foresee all the micro decisions that reality will demand. IMO it’s one reason to not use waterfall, which is very similar to what you described

	▲	brookst 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		No, waterfall is an engineering process. What I’m describing is thorough documentation of requirements (acceptance criteria, if you like), and then encouraging Claude to be agile in execution. As long as the outcome is well-defined, it is expected and normal to iterate on implementation.

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ButlerianJihad a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> You can just ask Claude why it did something

But will Claude give you an authentic rationale and a traceable, verifiable "line of reasoning" for those things? Or will it just construct the next plausible Markov chain built on whatever Reddit thread it ingested at random?

You can ask Claude or any LLM for citations, and it will RAG them out ex post facto. Those actually aren't citations, they're just web searches for related articles, and they don't necessarily support the assertions that you're asking to cite.

I am sure that Claude and the others can produce intermediate logs of their inference and "reasoning" process while they are processing stuff, but can they really go back within the context window and construct an authentic apologia for a specific thing when you ask for it?

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moring a day ago | parent | next [-]

Now replace "Claude" by "human" and see how your comment goes.

Specifically, humans are known to decide subconsciously, then invent some "reasoning" out of thin air to justify it.

This matches my experience with decision-making in software projects.

	▲	fortzi a day ago \| parent [-]
		People, sometimes weirdly called by their animal name, humans, do have memories of their thought process. We can reach back to those memories to explain why we made a decision. Sometimes we don’t remember and speculate instead. Most of the time we can tell the difference

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fluidcruft a day ago | parent | prev [-]

You certainly can ask it to produce a verifiable report that tells you how to verify its claims. Yes, you do need to verify the results and confirm you agree with it. I do this sort of thing a lot to discover misunderstandings Claude has about things and iterating on them. There's a difference between reading everything yourself vs having a discussion where one of you (Claude) will happily dig through everything and create detailed memos for review. If you want line numbers as evidence, just ask then verify, etc.

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eudamoniac a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> and it will tell you [why it did something]

No, it will invent retroactively a plausible sounding reason why someone might have done it that way. These are very different things.

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pessimizer a day ago | parent | prev [-]

An LLM has no special insight into itself and has no reasons. It will come up with something that is convincing, and it will change based on the word choices you used in the request. You can observe this by asking it why it did something that it didn't actually do.

Dementia patients also do this.