[array_key_first]

Mechanics, and humans, are non-deterministic. Every mechanic works differently, because they have different bodies and minds.

LLMs are, of course, bad. Or not good enough, at least. But suppose they are. Suppose they're perfect.

Would I rather use an app or just directly interface with an LLM? The LLM might be quicker and easier. I know, for example, ordering takeout is much faster if I just call and speak to a person.

[theendisney]

Old people sometimes call rather than order on the website. They never fail to come up with a query that no amount of hardcoded logic could begin to attack.

[sarchertech]

> Every mechanic works differently, because they have different bodies and minds.

Yes but the same LLM works very differently on each request. Even ignoring non-determinism, extremely minor differences in wording that a human mechanic wouldn’t even notice will lead to wildly different answers.

> LLMs are, of course, bad. Or not good enough, at least. But suppose they are. Suppose they're perfect.

You’re just talking about magic at that point.

But suppose the do become “perfect”, I’m skeptical we’ll ever have the compute resources to replace a significant fraction of computation with LLMs.