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by rendleflag 1187 days ago
I recently asked an AI for help writing a python program with a mutex to prevent outdated information from being accessed. It presented me with a solution that I didn't fully understand, so I asked it to explain that part of the code. And then I asked it to explain part of the explanation. It just kept answering, never getting tired or irritated with me asking for clarification, and generating information that couldn't exist in a book or a blog post. It reminded me of the primer in "The Diamond Age". It catered the answers to my needs and deficiencies instead of making me adapt to it.
1 comments

> information that couldn't exist in a book or a blog post

I think that exists somewhere. Maybe not something that is specific to situation, but there is enough information out there that can lead you easily to the solution.

That’s why I prefer research instead of this AI assisted workflow. Instead of giving me the specific knowledge I need, it lets me know what I didn’t know and give me much more information to reason about.

I think your point about research is valid, but once that is done and you have a rough understanding of a solution, you just want things to work. You dont want a bunch of ways to do one thing, you want a single opinionated solution. Part of the information encoded in these models is from trainers deciding which answer is best, and that is information itself which isnt necessarily online.