[elicksaur]

The AI is optimized for producing text that sounds like it makes sense and is helpful.

This is not a guarantee that the text it produces is a correct explanation of the thing you are asking about. It’s a mental trick like a psychic reading tea leaves.

[crazygringo]

I'm so tired of this caveat.

It's generally pretty obvious if the explanation makes sense. And you can locate the original paper(s) as well to verify.

And you know what? My PhD friends get things wrong all the time too. I need to verify what they say as well.

"This is not a guarantee"? You're right. Nothing is a guarantee, but a lot of things are awfully helpful.

[elicksaur]

I’m tired of “Well people get things wrong, too.” as a defense of these systems. They should stand or fall on their own merit.

And yes, reducing everything in the world - nothing matters. Everything is relative. What even is truth, amirite?

If that’s our slogan for the future then it is hella depressing.

[crazygringo]

> They should stand or fall on their own merit.

And they do. They stand on the fact that they save time, raise productivity, and assist in learning. That's the merit.

Demanding absolute perfection as the only measure of merit is bonkers. And if that's the standard you hold everything in your life too, you must be pretty disappointed with the world...

[elicksaur]

None of my comments say I’m demanding perfection. That’s a fallacy to reduce my position to absurdism, so it can be easily dismissed.

LLMs have not improved my productivity. When I have tried to use them, they have been a net negative. There are many other people who report a similar experience.

[crazygringo]

You said:

> This is not a guarantee that the text it produces is a correct explanation

A guarantee of correctness is perfection. I don't know else to take it.

Not all jobs or tasks are helped by LLM's. That's fine. But many are, and hugely.

You dismissed it for everyone as "a mental trick like a psychic reading tea leaves". Implying it has no value for anyone.

Your words.

That's just wrong.

Now you say it doesn't have value for you and for some other people. That's fine. But that's not what you were saying above. That's not what I was responding to.