| ▲ | palmotea 5 hours ago |
| > Why is everybody all the time in favour of AI on HN? Many reasons: 1. The people on HN tend to think they're very clever, but they're often not as clever as they think they are. That has a lot of wide-ranging implications, from classic "engineer's disease" thinking to stuff a lot dumber. 2. I wouldn't be surprised at some unexpectedly large amount of AstroTurfing, especially considering the sheer amount money is flowing into the AI space. My understanding is HN has some influential people reading it, and is influential on a certain fraction of the wider group of software developers. 3. I think there's a certain amount of defensiveness from AI enthusiasts. They've enthusiastically adopted AI to a certain degree, so critique/skepticism of their choice is felt as a personal criticism. 4. HN is a pedantic place (see 1), so "everybody all the time in favour of AI" will be interpreted literally as false, when it really should be interpreted as "why is there so much pro-AI activity." |
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| ▲ | combobyte 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| > I wouldn't be surprised at some unexpectedly large amount of AstroTurfing, especially considering the sheer amount money is flowing into the AI space. Including money from Y Combinator itself (which, may we never forget, was once helmed by Sam Altman). If you're looking for unbiased tech news and genuine user sentiment, you probably shouldn't be getting it from one of Silicon Valley's favorite VC firms. |
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| ▲ | RGS1811 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Name the alternative tech news / user sentiment sources. I want to widen my reading. | | |
| ▲ | Arodex 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | lobste.rs | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Sadly, it's succumbing to the "the mods are -justifiably- uncomfortable with cleaning house and the quality of discussion is regressing to the Internet Mean" disease that every pretty-much-open-access link aggregator that attaches a link discussion forum contracts. |
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| ▲ | simoncion 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > ...may we never forget, was once helmed by Sam Altman Didn't he get fired because enough of the other YC partners couldn't trust him? If so, it's a pity for him that -at that time- he didn't have the CEO of a software megacorp to call on to reverse the decision and shitcan the people who made it. |
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| ▲ | simoncion 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > 2. I wouldn't be surprised at some unexpectedly large amount of AstroTurfing, especially considering the sheer amount money is flowing into the AI space. Given the soul-crushingly large amounts of money sloshing around in this tiny slice of the industry, the amount of astroturfing, positive-sentiment manufacturing, & etc. is right about where I expect it to be... as is the amount of vehement denial that it exists. ;) |
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| ▲ | fn-mote 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | The other option: people are using AI successfully on the job and are writing based on their own experience. | | |
| ▲ | palmotea 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | >> Given the soul-crushingly large amounts of money sloshing around in this tiny slice of the industry, the amount of astroturfing, positive-sentiment manufacturing, & etc. is right about where I expect it to be... as is the amount of vehement denial that it exists. ;) > The other option: people are using AI successfully on the job and are writing based on their own experience. Those aren't mutually exclusive. And it's worth noting that people claiming to use "AI successfully on the job" often do not stop at "their own experience." They often make sweeping statements like "LLMs write better code than people," and attack any critiques or skepticism of LLMs. | |
| ▲ | simoncion 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | ...and here's the denial! A careful reader of my post notices that I neither said nor suggested that there were no honest success stories. ;) | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | But the majority of positive sentiment probably isn't turfed. HN is not that important, it's a small forum. Is some money being spent to boost the image of the industry. Probably. But if you read most comment sections, they are organic users which are posting positive things. | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | > HN is not that important, it's a small forum. cough It's at least as important as Slashdot was back in the day. I'm not "buying" what you're "selling", dude. | | |
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| ▲ | orangedog 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > 1. The people on HN tend to think they're very clever, but they're often not as clever as they think they are. That has a lot of wide-ranging implications, from classic "engineer's disease" thinking to stuff a lot dumber. I don't think suggesting that people are stupid is a very good argument. I think part of the reason people are for it is post like yours which are rude and not in good faith. I'd imagine why as many people are for it on HN is for many people, it just works. Now imagine this snark about not being as clever as you think you are just because you enjoy using a tool. What's that going to do? Cause you to dig your feet in because you're being told the real reason you like these tools is because you're not very clever or you take things as a personal criticism. Yes, being told you think you are clever but you aren't really is personal. I don't think you're posting in good faith. I certainly don't think you're going to get the real reasons people support this stuff when you act like they're stupid or suggest a lot of this is being turfed. People are using these tools because they work. Your post says more about you than it does supporters. |
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| ▲ | palmotea 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > I don't think suggesting that people are stupid is a very good argument. I think part of the reason people are for it is post like yours which are rude and not in good faith. You'll note I didn't say anyone was "stupid," if anything, I was actually saying those people were myopic and arrogant. I recommend you familiarize yourself with the concept of "engineer's disease," once you understand it, you'll see it all the time on HN. > I don't think you're posting in good faith. I certainly don't think you're going to get the real reasons people support this stuff when you act like they're stupid or suggest a lot of this is being turfed. People are using these tools because they work. > Your post says more about you than it does supporters. I don't think suggestion that people are posting in bad faith is a good argument. I also detect a fair bit of binary thinking from you. All I did was post a non-exhaustive list of different reasons for that kind of content to answer the comment I was replying to. | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The only "binary thinking" I'm using is not assuming that the reasons that people support these tools are all negative (myopic and arrogant, false sentiment, defensiveness, and pedantism). You didn't even try to suggest that a lot of people are using these tools for positive reasons. Who is being myopic and arrogant? Who is engaging in binary thinking? Consider that some people simplye find that these tools work for them. | |
| ▲ | cindyllm 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [dead] |
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| ▲ | simoncion 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > I don't think suggesting that people are stupid is a very good argument. I've worked with a lot of people. Many of them are that stupid. Suggesting that these stupid people do not exist, that -if they did exist- none of them are professional programmers, and -even if they were programmers- they do not have the means to voice support for something that they're smitten with is not a good argument. I'll also vaguely gesture at the various studies that find that the majority of conversation -by post volume- on Internet Forums is done by a small number of people. Never doubt the ability for a few loud folks [0] with lots of time on their hands to dominate a conversation. This goes like 10,000x when there's a huge amount of money sloshing around in said industry and said industry really needs to maintain a positive public reputation. [0] ...and -sometimes- their sockpuppets... | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I didn't say that dumb people don't exist, I think positing that the reason people like these tools is because actually they're stupid isn't very compelling. | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | > ...I think positing that the reason people like these tools is because actually they're stupid isn't very compelling. And I explained why I disagreed! One "subtle" thing to note is that the claim isn't "Everyone who uses LLM-based tools and writes about the success they had is stupid.". | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Then you aren't going to get to why people are using these tools because a lot of intelligent people are using them. | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Then you aren't going to get to why people are using these tools... I couldn't disagree more! If you haven't already, you should watch this topical presentation from Greg K-H that was posted to HN like a week ago. [0] It's about an hour long, but you can probably watch most of it at 120->150% speed. Notice how his praise for the tools differs from so much of the expressed positive sentiment for said tools here on HN. The "low-horsepower" people I've known tend to praise things in a way that smells very much like astroturfing. The "high-horsepower" people I've known both express very nuanced opinions and tend to know better than to burn a ton of time squabbling with Internet Randos in a place like this... they have much better things to do with their lives. [0] <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnV_cWeoo5Q> | | |
| ▲ | palmotea 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > The "low-horsepower" people I've known tend to praise things in a way that smells very much like astroturfing. The "high-horsepower" people I've known both express very nuanced opinions I think that's a good observation, but I wouldn't say those people are actually astroturfing (noting you only said they smell like that). But that "low-horsepower" vs "high-horsepower" distinction probably has a big bearing on people's attitudes towards LLMs. "Low-horsepower" people are simultaneously much more easily impressed and often lack the skill to properly evaluate the output they're getting. It's often been remarked that LLMs feel awesome for topics you know nothing about. It's kinda like Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect for people who were never knowledgeable about any topic. [1] "The phenomenon of a person trusting newspapers for topics which that person is not knowledgeable about, despite recognizing the newspaper as being extremely inaccurate on certain topics which that person is knowledgeable about." (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Gell-Mann_amnesia_effect#Engl...) | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | You're again reverting to the only reason people like these is because they're stupid. People are writing entire apps in days. You're just jaded if that isn't impressive to you. | | |
| ▲ | palmotea an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | > You're again reverting to the only reason people like these is because they're stupid. No, clearly I did not. FYI, it's tedious and annoying for me to respond to someone who consistently misunderstands my posts. And I'm seeing a pattern in your misunderstandings. They send a message that undermines the points you're trying to make. | | |
| ▲ | orangedog an hour ago | parent [-] | | > people are simultaneously much more easily impressed and often lack the skill to properly evaluate the output they're getting This is why people who praise these models do? You're saying they aren't capable of evaluating their own experiences. Once again, not giving any positive reason as to why people could feel the way they do about these models. The pattern is you are engaging in the binary thinking you are complaining about. Your sentiment is pretty clear. | | |
| ▲ | palmotea an hour ago | parent [-] | | > This is why people who praise these models do? You're saying they aren't capable of evaluating their own experiences. Once again, not giving any positive reason as to why people could feel the way they do about these models. The pattern is you are engaging in the binary thinking you are complaining about. > Your sentiment is pretty clear. See, this one of the frustrating things about your responses: I make some statement about some subset, and you generalize it to the universe (of AI fans) and object. The thing you're objecting to is your own misunderstanding. | | |
| ▲ | orangedog an hour ago | parent [-] | | Well, yeah, when you are asked why people talk about these models on HN and your answers are: myopia, funded support, taking things personally, and pedantry and then you double down on it suggesting that another reason is these people aren't capable of evaluating what they are seeing, then you are only painting those people with a negative brush. Do yo believe there are positive reasons people are adopting these models? Because there is nothing in your responses that suggest you do. I, as somebody who rarely uses these models but understands why people might, don't see any attempt at being unbiased. |
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| ▲ | simoncion 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Nope. You: You're again reverting to the only reason people like these is because they're stupid.
Me: If you haven't already, you should watch this topical presentation from Greg K-H that was posted to HN like a week ago. ... Notice how his praise for the tools differs from so much of the expressed positive sentiment for said tools here on HN. ... The "high-horsepower" people I've known both express very nuanced opinions ...
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| ▲ | orangedog 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | Thanks but I'm not going to watch it. > people are simultaneously much more easily impressed and often lack the skill to properly evaluate the output they're getting Yes, this is the exact sentiment expressed. That the praise you see is because of these people with low-horsepower who aren't capable of evaluating their own experiences. | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Thanks but I'm not going to watch it. You really should! It's positive sentiment about LLM-based tools that comes from a "high-horsepower" individual. Given your commentary here, it really seems like you've not encountered much of that sort of thing, so it'd really do you some good to load it into to your databanks for use in future discussions. | | |
| ▲ | orangedog 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | I've encountered plenty of it on HN and elsewhere, I just don't share your view of the space. |
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| ▲ | simoncion 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > I think that's a good observation, but I wouldn't say those people are actually astroturfing (noting you only said they smell like that). I agree with everything you've said here [0] as well as this bit I'm quoting specifically. I would strongly disagree with any claim that positive reports from "low-horsepower" people are likely to be astroturf. I'm just noting that a lot of astroturf reads like the way the "low-horsepower" people I've known tend to praise things. [0] ...at least with whatever the comment said when I wrote this one ;)... | | |
| ▲ | palmotea an hour ago | parent [-] | | > I agree with everything you've said here [0] as well as this bit I'm quoting specifically. I would strongly disagree with any claim that positive reports from "low-horsepower" people are likely to be astroturf. I think we're in agreement. > I'm just noting that a lot of astroturf reads like the way the "low-horsepower" people I've known tend to praise things. The "why" behind that would be interesting to know. It could just be that we assume astroturf would be low-effort, and that praise is low-effort (even if that's the most effort the "low-horsepower" person can muster), so they read the same. |
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| ▲ | orangedog 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I don't observe the same things on HN that you do. I see a variety of sentiment - positive, negative, low-effort and high-effort. | | |
| ▲ | simoncion 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > I see a variety of sentiment - positive, negative, low-effort and high-effort. Me too! |
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| ▲ | Pannoniae 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | As a less emotionally charged example (people get upset with being called stupid, justifiably) - the average size of an array or a list is less than 4. With that many elements you'd be better off storing the elements as a tuple or a struct, but people often reach for a generic array container regardless. |
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| ▲ | uv-depression 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| > 1. The people on HN tend to think they're very clever, but they're often not as clever as they think they are. That has a lot of wide-ranging implications, from classic "engineer's disease" thinking to stuff a lot dumber. Related: the Rationalists display this very well (though it's certainly not unique to them). The jump from "I think my beliefs through carefully, therefore I am reasonably rational" (likely already false, or at best true in a limited domain) to "I am rational, therefore my beliefs are well-thought through" is actually very small in the human mind, despite the latter being the opposite of rationality. Also, the existence of Gell-Mann amnesia should be taught to everyone! > 3. I think there's a certain amount of defensiveness from AI enthusiasts. I've encountered this as well. I think this is also a huge part of why you see so many people loudly exclaiming "every programmer uses LLMs now" despite that not being even close to true. If you criticize LLMs, it (socially, to them) counts as criticism of their users as well. As well, bosses are probably the most excited about LLMs because they hope to fire us all soon, so it can be pointlessly self-destructive to speak negatively about LLMs in a professional context right now. That, plus AI boosters tend to be incredibly annoying about it, bringing it up at every possible opportunity, changing every technical discussion to be about them, suggesting them for the stupidest use-cases, loudly proclaiming nonsensical productivity boosts (perhaps you feel 5x as productive because you're forcing other people to spend their time fixing your shitty slop code?) etc. So as someone who does not use LLMs I avoid talking to them. |
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| ▲ | orangedog 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | I just think this speaks more to people observing different things and taking that as ground truth. I notice the people who are critical of these tools because like the above post and yours, they are relentlessly critical without ceding basic things like people are excited about these tools because they are useful. I have 0 doubts some people are seeing 5x productivity boosts because of the stuff that is regularly posted on HN - stuff that used to take months taking days. I'm not a booster, I barely use these tools but what I notice is the two apparent "sides" that people have shifted into and really I don't think that' necessary because these are just tools that have adnvantages and disadvantages. | | |
| ▲ | uv-depression 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > I have 0 doubts some people are seeing 5x productivity boosts because of the stuff that is regularly posted on HN - stuff that used to take months taking days. I will cede this: it indeed seems like you can throw together a shitty half-working prototype very quickly using LLMs. There's been a deluge of half-working prototypes, but years in and where are all these projects now? No study has concluded anything near a 5x improvement. Besides, my actual opinion is that even if these actually gave a large productivity improvement, it's wouldn't be worth it. The negatives are simply too large: - the concentration of power they are pushing for; - the environmental effects of training; - the disinformation they spread at scale (which in practice is their primary use-case); - the adverse effect on a shared reality from the fact that they cannot reliably answer questions, yet are presented as doing so; - the adverse effect on a shared reality from their sycophancy (do the rich surrounded by yes-men seem in touch with reality?); - their anti-social nature, as they discourage engaging with other people in favour of solipsism masked by a poor simulacrum of personhood; - their weakening of labour power because of the managerial class' belief that they will soon replace workers (whether or not they actually can is not particularly relevant); - the large-scale plagiarism they enable; - lastly, their weakening of already incredibly lax standards of engineering from our field. The promise of more software does not even come close to outweighing all of that. | | |
| ▲ | orangedog an hour ago | parent [-] | | It's just from my personal experience when I rarely use Claude, I can get it to produce things in minutes that would take me hours. They're not shitty, I can review what's been generated and it's better than I would have done. Similarly with the UIs we build here, they would take days or weeks and we can put them together in a few hours. I can't speak to you other issues but these are here to stay and I think the only realistic way forward is to learn how to use them. | | |
| ▲ | uv-depression an hour ago | parent [-] | | > It's just from my personal experience I guess let's just ignore the evidence, then. > I can't speak to you other issues but these are here to stay and I think the only realistic way forward is to learn how to use them. People only say this about things that they want. Ignoring the consequences of one's actions is not a neutral position. Societies are perfectly capable of banning things (yeah, you can probably sneak a local model through a hypothetical law, but it would end the industrial scale problems). | | |
| ▲ | orangedog an hour ago | parent [-] | | > I guess let's just ignore the evidence, then. There isn't any evidence. It's pretty much all anecdotal. I can only speak from my experience. > People only say this about things that they want. Ignoring the consequences of one's actions is not a neutral position. Societies are perfectly capable of banning things (yeah, you can probably sneak a local model through a hypothetical law, but it would end the industrial scale problems). We're not going to ban these models, though. Which means we have to figure out how best to live with them. |
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