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SubstantialFrivolity

I'm not even supposed to be here today

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joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
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SubstantialFrivolity


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
I'm not even supposed to be here today

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
				


				
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Why do you consistently assume that people who don't share your views of LLM capabilities just haven't seen what they can do/what humans can do? For example:




They can't code? Have you seen the average code monkey?




Yes I have (and of course, I've used LLMs as well). That's why I say LLMs suck at code. I'm not some ignorant caricature like you seem to think, who is judging things without having proper frame of reference for them. I actually know what I'm talking about. I don't gainsay you when you say that an LLM is good at medical diagnoses, because that's not my field of expertise. But programming is, and they simply are not good at programming in my opinion. Obviously reasonable people can disagree on that evaluation, but it really irks me that you are writing like anyone who disagrees with your take is too inexperienced to give a proper evaluation.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 15, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I think this is bad advice. First, because that is not generally agreed upon (the fourth book is excellent in my view), but second because if you read three doorstopper fantasy novels you're not going to stop there. Pretty much anyone who enjoys them enough to get that far is going to keep going to see how they like the books they were advised against. Third, it would be extremely frustrating to get only 30% of a story. Better to not read the books at all if they really do go downhill to such an extent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
She's probably right but damn if that isn't the most autistic thing ever. It is not new that people will treat anything short of maximal condemnation of child porn as being pro-child abuse. I don't think that it should be that way, because it's better for said abused children if we can rationally discuss ways to better disincentivize what's happening to them. But for better or for worse that's how people are, they can handle zero rational discussion on this topic and I would say she should've known that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 4, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If they can stop the damn thing from hallucinating caselaw and statutes, it might already be there.




Sure, but hasn't that always been the challenge? This feels like it boils down to "if they can fix the problems, it'll be great", which is true but applies to everything.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for June 27, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
There are themes?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
My general impression is that women seek plausible deniability (sometimes to the point of sabotaging their communication to men), but they want men to be direct with them (insert Darth Plagueis meme here), at least within the bounds of decorum. i.e. women want you to ask them on a date directly, not to talk about how you want to have sex with them if it goes well.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 2, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Can't cut medicaid or social security because your voting base will revolt.




I don't see why Trump gives a shit. He can't be reelected anyway, so who cares if the voters hate him? His career in politics is over either way. He's in the ideal position to do necessary-but-unpopular things. Granted that he needs Congress to play ball (he can't just cut spending on welfare himself), but Trump himself doesn't need to worry.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Does she claim those weren't? If she's willing to bite the bullet and say "it was a problem when Obama and Biden did it too" then there's no problem. I certainly would agree with her in that case; the constitution is quite explicit that Congress is to be the one authorizing war.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


your only option is people who are incentivised to lie to you: priests, gamer girls, masculinity influencers, MeToo journalists, etc.




I'm confused, how do you figure priests are incentivized to lie to people about how to find dates? I wouldn't go to a priest for marriage advice (for obvious reasons), but plenty of priests dated (and yes, even had sex - priests are sinners too) before joining the clergy. For example, the pastor of my parish is a pretty young guy who was engaged before he decided he was being called to the priesthood, so he could probably give decent advice about attracting women (if you're in Brazil where he's from).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
    

  1. Yes
    2. 

  2. Yes, although at a stop sign it's acceptable to not fully stop only if visibility is good and there's nobody else. It's still illegal though and don't complain if you get a ticket from a well hidden police officer.
    3. 

  3. Largely followed but doesn't have to be to the letter. 5 mph over is fine, 10 is iffy, 15+ you shouldn't be on the road.
    4. 

  4. Yes the left lane is for passing only, no it's not ok if someone cuts you off and rides your bumper. I have no idea why you tied these two together because they are very different.
    5. 

  5. Absolutely not. Better to miss an exit or get forced into the wrong exit than to do shit liable to cause accidents. Again if someone does this they shouldn't be allowed to drive.
    6. 

  6. No
    7. 



				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Oh for heaven's sake, dude. When did I ever say I consider myself better than anyone else, that I would deserve such a litany of sarcasm directed at me? I don't think that and certainly haven't said it. I am just an ordinary programmer - I doubt very much that I'm better at programming than anyone here except the non-programmers, and I'm sure I'm worse than more than a few. Not only did I say "hey I'm not trying to litigate this right now" and that got ignored, now I get people dogpiling me saying I'm a troll or think I'm better than everyone else or whatever.


But fine, since you and @SnapDragon are insistent on pressing me on the topic (and since I apparently didn't say to him what my experience was, my bad on that, but I know I have posted this in a previous thread before), I will reiterate the things that I personally have seen LLMs fall flat on their face with. This is of course in addition to the various embarrassments that are public, like Microsoft's ill-conceived attempt to let Copilot loose on PRs.


    

  • Tried to get ChatGPT to help me generate a fluentd config file that would process logs in a way I needed to do for work. It gave me a config file that not only didn't do the thing, it didn't conform to the schema and caused the software to crash
    • 

  • Tried to get it to help me order CloudFormation resource delete-and-recreate in a different way than the default order. It first gave me options that didn't even exist, then it gave me options that did exist but didn't do what I asked for. I had a similar issue with the AWS-trained model they provide, which also suggested options that don't do what I asked for (and are documented as such).
    • 

  • A coworker used ChatGPT (a custom one trained on our API docs) to generate a script to run against our API. Again it hallucinated methods that simply do not exist.
    • 



These were all within the last year, though I couldn't tell you exactly when or what model or anything. And I've been honest that sometimes it has done good work for me, namely in generating short snippets of code in a language (or using an API) that I know well enough to recognize as correct when I see it, but not well enough to produce without laborious reading of docs. I've never claimed that LLMs work 0% of the time (if people have taken that away, I've done a poor job communicating), but the failure rate is much too high for them to be considered viable tools in my book. Most frustratingly, the things that I actually need help on, the ones where I don't know really anything about the topic and a workable AI assistant would actually save me a ton of time, are precisely the cases where it fails hard (as in my examples where stuff doesn't even work at all).


So those are again my experiences with LLMs that have caused me to conclude that they are hype without substance. Disagree if you like, I don't mind if you find it useful and like I have tried to say I'm not actually trying to convince people of my views on this topic any more. Like I tried to say earlier, the only reason I posted in this thread was to push back on the idea that one simply must be ignorant if they don't think LLMs are good at coding (and other things). That idea is neither true, necessary, or kind (as the rules allude to) and I felt that it deserved some sort of rebuttal. Though heaven knows I wish I had just left it alone and had peace and quiet rather than multiple people jumping down my throat.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The average person who writes code. Not an UMC programmer who works for FAANG.




Yes, that is indeed what I meant as well.




The proof of the pudding is in the eating; and for code, if it compiles and has the desired functionality.




I agree. And it doesn't. Code generated by LLMs routinely hallucinates APIs that simply don't exist, has grievous security flaws, or doesn't achieve the desired objective. Which is not to say humans never make such mistakes (well, they never make up non-existent APIs in my experience but the other two happen), but they can learn and improve. LLMs can't do that, at least not yet, so they are doing worse than humans.




Why should I privilege your claims over [famous programmers]?




I'm not saying you should! I'm not telling you that mine is the only valid opinion; I did after all say that reasonable people can disagree on this. My issue is solely that your comment comes off as dismissing anyone who disagrees with you as too inexperienced to have an informed opinion. When you say "They can't code? Have you seen the average code monkey?", it implies "because if you had, you wouldn't say that LLMs are worse". That is what I object to, not your choice to listen to other programmers who have different opinions than mine.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 23, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's crazy on multiple levels. His age, like you said, but also that it's blatantly illegal. I guess in theory the constitution could be amended, but does anyone seriously think that's likely? I certainly don't, at least. And without an amendment, a lot of Trump's supporters are going to refuse to support him any more (because they don't like flouting the law), at which point he can't win an election anyways.


To me, the whole idea of a third Trump term is just another in the long line of people freaking out about how he's the worst thing to ever happen to America. As the saying goes, the demand for authoritarianism from Trump outstrips supply.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I have to say I find it hard to understand why you care so much. Even if she does smell bad (which neither of us can know one way or the other, as we will never see her in person), what's it to you (as you will never experience the bad smell)? If her hygiene practices don't inflict any actual cost upon you, I don't see why it matters one way or the other to you.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 30, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I’m not even sure it’s possible to do so




Of course it's possible. I support principled application of laws (and general principles) all the time. Just because lots of people are hypocrites doesn't mean that it's impossible to escape that, it means that they are choosing to be hypocrites.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 30, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Fantastic story, had me grinning from ear to ear as I read it. Thanks for sharing! I do think your link is mistaken, though.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I agree it's not the best usage of "ask", but I feel like it's not as unreasonable as you're implying either. One might also say "we ask people not to murder", even though that is also a crime punishable by life in prison.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Oh yes it is, when a lot of those people will be doing 65 or less. Nobody has any business going 15 mph over the speed limit.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Walmart Labs, for data science and engineering, is as prestigious and as lucrative as a FAANG job currently.




Lucrative perhaps, but I dispute the claim about prestige. I've never even heard of Walmart Labs, whereas everyone in the industry knows of the FAANG companies and the high status that comes from working for one.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I've tried to have this debate with you in the past and I'm not doing it again, as nothing has changed. I'm not even trying to debate it with self_made_human really - I certainly wouldn't believe me over Carmack if I was in his shoes. My point here is that one should not attribute "this person disagrees with my take" to "they don't know what they're talking about".


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 30, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Literally anything would've been cleaner. Wickard v Filburn is one of the most bad faith interpretations of the law in our country's entire history. There might be worse, but there aren't a lot of them.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 29, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I would really want to have rooms wired, with conduit and pull strings in the event that I needed to pull something which wasn't already there. It's a complete pain in the dick to wire things after the fact, and I have often wished that I had wires for networking, for speaker connections, etc.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 22, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Man... now I kind of want to not visit Japan, because I feel guilty about the prospect of making life suck for the residents there.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 15, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


That is not quite true. if I tell you to read the wheel of time up to book six (if we are generous) and then jump directly to the gathering storm will I be giving bad advice?




Yes, because the entire series is great. Books nine and ten are some of the best material in the series in fact.




Fourth was total slog to read - you could remove 3/4ths of the book and improve it.




No way man. The fourth book was one of the best in the series. The Navani scenes alone made that book riveting and well worth reading, let alone the other good stuff on top of that.




And the fifth was both weird and the big secrets revealed and payoffs of mysteries were ... meh at best. And let's not start at the ending. The fifth was cringe in everything but the adolin parts. And even there was substantially weaker than similarly themed Coltaine's chain of dogs.




The fifth book has issues (I've touched on them before), but it still was decent. If Sanderson keeps putting out books that have the same issues as the fifth has, then I'll be more concerned. But for right now it's one single aberration in a series which has otherwise been uniformly excellent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for June 13, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I have had two whole cars. A 1997 Dodge Intrepid, which I owned from 2003-2011, and a 2001 Ford Mustang, which I got in 2011 and have to this day. To be honest I would like to have a new car (or even a decent used car), but my wife's cars keep dying and so we keep having to put our car money into her vehicle.