[addaon]

> But I, as a human, rarely have questions to ask.

Wow. This just does not match my personal experience. I do an hour or so walk around the reservoir near my house 4-5 times a week, letting my mind wander freely -- and I find that I stop on average at least five or ten times to take notes about questions to learn the answers to later, and occasionally decide that it's worth it to break pace to start learning the answer right then and there.

[agloe_dreams]

Thats super reasonable - I'm a person with ADHD so if I'm asking questions in a grocery store context - I might fully forget things or take way too long to get things done - Going for a walk in nature is absolutely a much better place for questions like that to me though. I think I would prefer to not have tech in the moment to take me out of the space.

[mrandish]

As a fellow ADHDer, can confirm. I must aggressively mono-task to ensure things get done. I have to consciously manage which mode I'm in, "Goal" or "Explore". A simple heuristic I sometimes share with others is: "I can either 'think deeply' or 'do/talk/listen'. Doing both modes at once is possible but at reduced throughput and quality of each. Switching modes is laggy." It's not precisely accurate and there are exceptions but it gets the general idea across.

[alistairSH]

But do you need AI for those answers? I sometimes do the same thing, but Google/DDG/whatever works fine for most, and a niche app works for others (IDing a bird = Merlin app, for example).

[com2kid]

Last year one of my berry bushes had browning leaves with some spots. Google search said infection, treatment plan, etc.

This year I snapped a pic and sent to chat gpt. Normal end of year die off, cut the brown branches away, here is a fertilizer schedule for end of year to support new growth for the next year.

ChatGPT makes gardening so much easier, and that is just one of many areas. Recipes are another, don't trust the math, but chat gpt can remix and elevate recipes so much better than Google recipe blog spam posts can.

[MisterTea]

> This year I snapped a pic and sent to chat gpt.

I used to be able to go to the local gardening center and ask the owner who could right away give you the right answer because that was his expertise that came from years of genuine experience. Then Home Depot put him put of business. Same with the local plumbing shop I could walk into with a leaky valve stem from a sink, have a guy glance at it and reply "that's an American Standard" spin around, open a drawer and hand me the part along with new washers.

Now I have to talk to a computer that may or may not be correct. I would rather talk to a real person.

[com2kid]

> I used to be able to go to the local gardening center and ask the owner who could right away give you the right answer because that was his expertise that came from years of genuine experience.

I can still do this, and I do on occasion. Hopefully I take the proper pictures and can remember enough about what is going on to convey the issue. ChatGPT will ask follow up questions and even ask for additional pictures if things aren't clear.

Also I can take action before my once every other month or so visit to the nursery, allowing me to take more immediate action.

[rogerkirkness]

Is the purpose of gardening to be arms and legs for ChatGPT to grow a garden?

[player1234]

Exactly brother! F the F-ing haters making gardening tips and recipes is a trillion dollar industry, maybe a trillion trillions even!

[poszlem]

Not the OP, but I ask way more questions now than I used to. Before, I’d sometimes wonder about things, but not enough to actually go and research them. Now, it’s as simple as asking the AI, and more often than not, I get a satisfying answer.

[throwanem]

What was the last thing you asked about? What was the answer?

[poszlem]

The origin of the word calf.

1. Calf (young cow, young of certain other mammals)

Old English: cealf (plural calfru or later calves)

Proto-Germanic: kalbaz or *kalbaz/kalbazō

Cognates: Old Norse kálfr, Old High German kalb, German Kalb, Dutch kalf.

Proto-Indo-European root: often linked to gel- (“to swell, be rounded”), possibly referring to the rounded shape of a young animal. Some etymologists, however, leave it as “origin uncertain” beyond Proto-Germanic.

2. Calf (back of the lower leg)

Old English: caf, cealf (“calf of the leg”) — likely related to the animal term, but the link is uncertain.

Possible origin: Could be from the same gel- “swell” root, referring to the bulging muscle at the back of the leg, or an independent development within Germanic.

Cognates: Old Norse kálfi (“calf of the leg”), Swedish kalv (leg calf), Icelandic kálfi.

[MisterTea]

Literally plugged the phrase "etymology word calf" into duckduckgo and the first result was this: https://etymologyworld.com/item/calf

This feels similar to a recent conversation with my friend when I was trying to recall the SoC used in the Nintendo Switch and he insisted on using his chatgpt app when I just went to the Wikipedia page for the Switch faster then he could open his app.

I don't want to sound negative, but - to me people who over rely on LLMs are lazy and low effort. I would not hire or work with them.

[red-iron-pine]

eventually they will grow dependent on the tool and will never be able to adapt

[throwanem]

Can you tell me about the one two before that, without looking it up?

[poszlem]

Yes, but I’m not going to. You seem to think I owe you a performance or an explanation. Stop circling around trying to trip me up and just make your point, if you have one.

[sceptic123]

Whether it's correct or not is another question

[jdhzzz]

I read that as I-Ding a bird. It was a second of wondering what I-Ding a bird was until I got to "Merlin" and realized it was ID-ing a bird (face-palm emoji here).

[infecto]

I am in the same boat. I am always thinking about things and recently often asking ChatGPT for an answer. Having a natural language interface for questions has opened the door for me to many more questions.

[GuB-42]

It happens to me all the time, however, I want to have real answers. And while a LLM is sometimes involved, I usually go deeper, with some cross referencing, fact checking and primary sources. LLMs are great at giving you a starting point, but the problem with them is that it is impossible to distinguish between fact or fiction, so I always have to verify. Really, I have seen my fair share of falsehoods popping up on LLMs, sometimes on simple and uncontroversial topics.

On hot topics like politics, illegal drugs, gender and racial differences, etc... it may be impossible to even get an answer passed the filters.

[reactordev]

I rarely have questions of others but I always question myself. :shrug:

There’s a difference between asking out loud or another being vs asking yourself internally.

[addaon]

> I rarely have questions of others but I always question myself.

There's only so many questions I have the ability to answer myself. Of those, there's only so many that I have the lifespan to answer myself. We stand on the shoulders of giants, and even on the shoulders of average people -- really it's shoulders all the way down. Unless the questioning itself is the source of joy (which it certainly sometimes is), I prefer to find out what others have learned when they asked the same questions. It's vanishingly rare that I believe I'm the first to think through something.

[reactordev]

Absolutely, they usually tend to write about it...

[svara]

I think not having those instant answers available is a big part of why your mind wanders in that setting.

[addaon]

I have the answers available (I have a phone and good connection), I just am tactical about when to pursue the answer in realtime and when not. If it feels like it's going to open up a wider field of questioning -- or if it feels like I'll learn that this vein is fully mined and goes nowhere -- I'll spend a few minutes searching; otherwise, defer.

[mikepurvis]

I was going to say the same. It's probably so much healthier to make note of questions for later research than to stop right then and there and either a) fall down a Wikipedia rabbit hole or b) have an AI strapped to your face perform an info-dump.

[throwanem]

Not everyone wants an imagination. This is good for those who don't.

[delusional]

I mirror that experience, except for the latter half. I enjoy just being outside and letting my mind wander, letting it wonder about odd questions in the moment. I never actually want or care about the answers, I just like the feeling of thinking.

I already have my phone, I could look up the answers immediately. The reason I don't isn't that I can't. It's that asking the question is the point, not answering it.

[starik36]

My walk is also around a reservoir, also 4-5 times a week and the length of the walk around it is also 1 hour.

Are you the guy that walks the poodle?

[addaon]

Negative, just myself. I suspect I've mentioned my physical location on HN previously -- southern Utah.

[starik36]

Ah, OK. Wrong state - similar reservoir. There is a guy who walks his poodle at the same time as I walk. We've exchanged head nods for years.

[dvfjsdhgfv]

When I walk around, I have many questions in my head. But I never stop to do something about it. If the question is important enough, it will stick and I'll do something about once I get back.

This is the modern curse: I know I can get an answer to nearly every question, and I can get it quickly, just taking my phone out of my pocket and dictating it, it takes zero effort. I feel it's worth to restrain oneself and just enjoy the walk. It just feels better.