[zerobees]

It cracks me up that you bring up the exoskeleton metaphor, because I'm pretty sure it originated from a 100% AI-generated essay that made it to the top of HN a while back. So I guess, AI is whispering things into our ears whether we notice or not.

[quietbritishjim]

Exoskeleton is such an obvious metaphor for AI (at least, one potential ways of using it) that surely no one, human or AI, could possibly claim credit for it.

[garciasn]

I had been explaining it to others as 'My Iron Man suit' before reading the exoskeleton essay, months later. So, you are definitely correct.

[dTal]

It feels more like a BMX bike to me. The quality of what I get out seems to be a direct function of what I put in. The threshold of what I can achieve is raised slightly, the speed with which I can achieve it is raised quite a lot - but it's not a magic rocket ship that whisks me to far off hostile environments and protects me while I'm there. I'm still "naked". The code is still mine, and I can get off the bike at any point and walk.

[kakacik]

Thats... not how most of the world is using llms. Students are getting measurably dumber (as in lacking actual topic understanding, since actually learning sonething properly is much harder than shallow knowledge), every other day I read about somebody losing their wealth due to listening to llms with finances.

Other recent articles - psychologists start seeing people losing their uniqueness and many people slowly veering towards same middle bland opinions.

I think top parent is correct - we are in the process of visibly losing a lot from our humanity, much more than we are gaining. We shouldnt be listening too much to loudest mouths here that praise efficiency gains, many of those are 'semi-autistic' folks with tunnel vision focused on 1 aspect and ignoring larger picture.

I dont see any change of course possible, the sweet nectar of efficiency and offloading decisions and work is too strong a drug to ignore. But everything has its set of benefits and drawbacks, and drawbacks here seem pretty brutal so far.

[nothingness456]

I think the first usage of this metaphor in its modern meaning belongs to Norbert Wiener

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

>So I guess, AI is whispering things into our ears whether we notice or not.

Humanity is a weak hive mind species. You can, with effort, keep it from whispering it into your ears, if you really want that. But it's impossible to keep it from whispering in another ear attached to your hivemind. And the only difference in those ears is the propagation delay before it's rattling around in your own skull.

[jvanderbot]

That's a pretty mid-tier metaphor on my part, along with Iron Man + Jarvis, that I don't think I'd even want to claim credit for :)

I will claim the CNC analogy though - I sometimes feel like a modern machinist just walking between machines and listening for screaming metal.

[chrisjj]

> I'm pretty sure it originated from a 100% AI-generated essay

There's no such thing. You're probably thinking of a 100% "AI"-/regurgitated/ essay.

[chrisjj]

> I'm pretty sure it originated from a 100% AI-generated essay

There's no such thing. You're probably thinking of "AI"-regurgitated essay.

[quadrifoliate]

If you think the AI generated that metaphor, you haven't been paying attention.

[zem]

the exoskeleton metaphor is way older than the current wave of LLMs