[ofjcihen]

I don’t think the snark is warranted here. The person you’re responding to is linking an article dealing with that issue and the title is what they mentioned.

Edit: SimonW? Really? I didn’t see the name but I didn’t expect you to be like that.

[simonw]

I stand by what I said.

I don't think the response from troupo that nayshins's personal experience is invalidated by a "randomised controlled trial" was well argued, so I imitated what I saw as their snarky wording with my own reworded version of it.

I do take the "AI isn't actually a productivity boost" thing a little bit personally these days, because the logical conclusion for that is that I've been deluding myself for the past two years and I'm effectively a victim of "magical thinking".

(That said, I did actually go to delete my comment shortly after posting it because I didn't think it added anything to the conversation, but it had already drawn a reply so I left it there.)

[ofjcihen]

That’s totally fair and I get it.

Working in security I often feel the same way and let’s be fair in the grand scheme of things it’s not that big of a deal.

[troupo]

> because the logical conclusion for that is that I've been deluding myself for the past two years and I'm effectively a victim of "magical thinking".

You may just as well have. I, for one, am absolutely ready to re-evaluate any and all approaches I have with AI to see if I am actually more productive or not.

But moreover, your own singular experience with your own code and projects may make you more productive. We don't know if it does because we don't have a baseline against which to measure.

But even moreover over that moreover is that we don't even have a question "does a single senior engineer's experience with his own code and approaches can be generalised over the entire population of programmers?" Skeptics say: no (and now have some proof of that). Optimists loudly say: yes, of course, and dismiss everyone who dares contradict out of hand.

[refulgentis]

Not OP, not sure what you mean but curious.

- Snark?

- Is "the issue" that anyone who claims any productivity gain is using magical thinking?

- How does the linked article "deal with" "the issue"?

- What title did they mention?

- What did they link to that has that title?

> Edit: SimonW? Really? I didn’t see the name but I didn’t expect you to be like that.

Like what? I think you're getting a bit emotional & personal here, I don't read anything remotely inappropriate into Simon's comment. Been here 15 years. OP's was odd for HN in that it admits 0 argument: if you think you have productivity gains, it's magical thinking.

[ofjcihen]

So I understand how people can get emotional about this topic but really quick let’s calm down and reevaluate what I said.

My comment was in response to Simon’s reply to a user who posted an article. The title of the article they posted addresses magical thinking in AI.

Now whether that’s an opinion you share or not is not the point. Simon responded as if the user was only calling any perceived gains from AI as magical thinking which is not the case.

I’ll let you come back to that when you feel like it. Altogether, though it’s just disappointing to see someone who’s work I read often jumping to an emotional response when it’s not warranted.

[fragmede]

Never meet your heros. Then again, if the worst is a bit of emotionally charged snark, of which we are all guilty of at some point, I think I'll live.

[ofjcihen]

Very true and to be fair Simon’s response with his perspective is valid and understandable.