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> I don't find anything wrong with this It’s not about being wrong, it’s about being ironic. We have LLMs shoved down our throats as this new way to communicat

by latexr 2y ago

> I don't find anything wrong with this It’s not about being wrong, it’s about being ironic. We have LLMs shoved down our throats as this new way to communicate—we are encouraged to ask them to make our writing “friendlier” or “more professional”—and then one of the companies creating such a tool asks the very people most interested in it to not use it for the exact purpose we’ve been told it’s good at. They are asking you pretty please to not do the bad thing they allow and encourage everyone to do. They have no issue if you do it to others, but they don’t like it when it’s done to them. It is funny and hypocritical and pulls back the curtain a bit on these companies. It reminded me of the time Roy Wood Jr visited a pro-gun rally where they argued guns make people safe, while simultaneously asking people to not carry guns because they were worried about safety. The cognitive dissonance is worth pointing out. https://youtube.com/watch?v=m2v9z2S5XzQ&t=190 https://youtube.com/watch?v=m2v9z2S5XzQ&t=190

jack_pp 2y ago
Making your comms friendlier or whatever is one of the myriad ways to use LLMs. Maybe you personally have "LLMs shoved down your throat" by your corporate overlords. No one in their right mind can say that LLMs were created for such a purpose, it just so happens you can use it in this way.
- fmbb 2y ago
  LLMs are sold by corporate overlords to corporate overlords. They all know this is what it will be used for. The writing was on the wall that the main use will be spam and phishing. You can say the creators did not intend on this purpose, but it was created with knowledge that this would be the main use case.
- YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
  LLMs aren’t making your comms friendlier; they’re just making them more vapid. When I see the language that ChatGPT spits out when you tell it to be friendly, I immediately think ‘okay, what is this person trying to sell me?’
  - gosub100 2y ago
    Now imagine a world where most kids were raised with this bullshit and it's normal to them.
    - ThrowawayR2 2y ago
      Most kids were raised while inundated with advertising but don't talk like a TV commercial.
      - kelseyfrog 2y ago
        Respectfully, I disagree. Like and subscribe.
  - lupire 2y ago
    You are you, here. Think of the statistically average person and what they consider friendly.
muzani 2y ago
The LLM companies have always been against this kind of thing. Sam Altman (2023): "something very strange about people writing bullet points, having ChatGPT expand it to a polite email, sending it, and the sender using ChatGPT to condense it into the key bullet points" 3 years ago people were poking fun about how restrictive the terms were - you could get your API key blocked if you used it to pretend to be a human. Eventually people just used other AIs for things like that, so they got rid of these restrictions that they couldn't enforce anyway.
- myfonj 2y ago
  Interesting that this quote really contains "sender" where "recipient" was intended, but it had absolutely no impact on any reader. (I even asked Claude and ChatGPT if they noticed anything strange in the sentence, and both needed additional prompting to spot that mistake.) https://x.com/sama/status/1631394688384270336 https://x.com/sama/status/1631394688384270336 Thanks for this heads-up, by the way, I've missed this particular tweet, but eventually got into exact same observation.
  - einsteinx2 2y ago
    Wow I completely didn’t notice that until I read your comment. My brain must have automatically filled in the correct word. I had to go back and re-read it to confirm.
    - myfonj 2y ago
      Well English is not my first language, so I probably tend to go through text more slowly and/or scan the text differently, so I have higher chance stumbling upon these oddities. (I can confirm that sometimes I see unexpected amount of misspelt homophones or usage of strangely related words.) Seeing two distinct LLM chats gloss over this particular nuance in almost identical way was really interesting. Grok, on the other hand, has absolutely no problem with concept of sender both expanding and compressing the message, and with absence of recipient. Even after super-painstaking discussion, where Grok identified the strange absence of the "recipient", when I asked him to correct the sentence, he simply changed the word "sender" to the word "themselves": > something very strange about people writing bullet points, having ChatGPT expand it to a polite email, sending it, and *themselves* using ChatGPT to condense it into the key bullet points https://x.com/i/grok/share/mwFR2jQ9MS6uVemgiHokJKiBd https://x.com/i/grok/share/mwFR2jQ9MS6uVemgiHokJKiBd (cringe/pain warning)
blagie 2y ago
> It reminded me of the time Roy Wood Jr visited a pro-gun rally where they argued guns make people safe, while simultaneously asking people to not carry guns because they were worried about safety. The cognitive dissonance is worth pointing out. Well, no. It's irony, but it's only cognitive dissonance in a comedy show which misses the nuance. Most pro-gun organizations are heavily into gun safety. The message is that guns aren't unsafe if they're being used correctly. Most of the time, this means that most guns should be locked up in a safe, with ammo in a separate safe, except when being transported to a gun range, for hunting, or similar. When being used there, one should follow a specific set of procedures for keeping those activities safe as well. It's a perfect analogy for the LLM here too. Anthropic encourages it for many uses, but not for the one textbox. Irony? Yes. Wrong? Probably not.
- numbsafari 2y ago
  These are the same people that insist we arm elementary school teachers and expect those teachers to someday pull the trigger on a child instead of having proper gun laws. There is no irony.
  - ThunderSizzle 2y ago
    I don't expect that, so I won't be using public schools. I have no illusion that safety or education is an actual concern in public schools in general.
    - DiscourseFan 2y ago
      They do, but safety and social control go hand in hand. In any case, its not as if your kid is safer at a private school. Kids are violent, no matter where they are; maybe you remember going through school yourself?
  - imchillyb 2y ago
    When have gun laws ever stopped a shooting? When have criminals EVER followed law, code, rules, or even a suggestion from their fellow citizens? Believing laws deter criminals is almost criminally insane and beggars all logic. After all of the accumulated evidence against your belief, you still believe laws deter criminality. The death penalty doesn’t deter criminals. How could words possibly have an effect?
amelius 2y ago
Yes, and they should state that they also don't use AI in the selection process.
- xylifyx 2y ago
  They don't because they do. However maybe the Anthropic AI isn't performing well on AI generated applications. I think they will get better results by having applicants talk to an AI during the application process.
ecocentrik 2y ago
I don't see the cognitive dissonance here. If a model was applying for a position with a cosmetics company, they might want to see what the blank canvas looks like. Being able to gauge a candidate's natural communication skills is highly useful. If you're an ineffective communicator, there's a good chance your comprehension skills are also deficient.
- nertirs1 2y ago
  The same could be said about a lot of things, like being able to write a functional solution to a leet code puzzle on a black board in front of an audience. IMHO, an effective interview process should attempt to mimic the position for which a person is applying. Making a candidate jump through hoops is a bit disrespectful.
  - ecocentrik 2y ago
    IMO the interview process should help the employer correctly identify qualified candidates. Respect for the candidates is important but some candidates should absolutely be prepared to jump through hoops.
    - lupire 2y ago
      Jumping through hoops isn't the only way to demonstrate professional skill. I am the lion tamer, not the lion.
- mathgeek 2y ago
  > If you're an ineffective communicator, there's a good chance your comprehension skills are also deficient. We are quickly moving into a world where most communications are at best assisted by AI and more often have little human input at all. There’s nothing inherently “wrong” about that (we all have opinions there), but “natural” (quotes to emphasize that they’re taught and not natural anyway) communication skills are going to be less and less common as time marches on, much like handwriting, typewriting, calligraphy, etc.
fnqi8ckfek 2y ago
[dead]
FilosofumRex 2y ago
It's sardonic rather than ironic - irony is sarcastic humor devised to highlight a contradiction or hypocrisy; while sardonic is disdainful, bitter and scornful. It'd have been ironic if Anthropic had asked the applicant not to use AI for the sake of originality and authenticity; but if the applicant felt compelled to do so, then it better rock and wow them to hire the applicant sight unseen. It's sardonic because Anthropic is implying use of AI on them is an indication of fraud, deceit, or incompetence; but it's a form of efficiency, productivity or cleverness when used by them on the job!
- latexr 2y ago
  > It's sardonic rather than ironic Doesn’t seem like that to me, after reading the dictionary definitions. Sardonic: grimly mocking or cynical. Ironic: happening in a way contrary to what is expected, and typically causing wry amusement because of this. Pretty sure I meant the second one.
robertlagrant 2y ago
> We have LLMs shoved down our throats as this new way to communicate I don't think that's true at all.
lolinder 2y ago
You're wrapping all the AI companies up in a single box, but: * Most of the AI you get shoved down your throat is by the providers of services you use, not the AI companies. * Among the AI companies, Anthropic in particular has had a very balanced voice that doesn't push for using AI where it doesn't belong. Their marketing page can barely be called that [0]. Their Claude-specific page doesn't mention using it for writing at all [1]. You seem to be committing the common fallacy of treating a large and disparate group of people and organizations as a monolith and ascribing cognitive dissonance where what you're actually seeing is diversity of opinion. [0] https://www.anthropic.com/ https://www.anthropic.com/ [1] https://www.anthropic.com/claude https://www.anthropic.com/claude
belter 2y ago
Either than glorified template generators, real professional software developers are only using coding assistants because it's being shoved down their throats: https://youtu.be/H_DBqWI8hJw?t=2072 https://youtu.be/H_DBqWI8hJw?t=2072

by latexr 2y ago

jack_pp 2y ago

Making your comms friendlier or whatever is one of the myriad ways to use LLMs. Maybe you personally have "LLMs shoved down your throat" by your corporate overlords. No one in their right mind can say that LLMs were created for such a purpose, it just so happens you can use it in this way.

fmbb 2y ago
LLMs are sold by corporate overlords to corporate overlords. They all know this is what it will be used for. The writing was on the wall that the main use will be spam and phishing. You can say the creators did not intend on this purpose, but it was created with knowledge that this would be the main use case.
YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
LLMs aren’t making your comms friendlier; they’re just making them more vapid. When I see the language that ChatGPT spits out when you tell it to be friendly, I immediately think ‘okay, what is this person trying to sell me?’
- gosub100 2y ago
  Now imagine a world where most kids were raised with this bullshit and it's normal to them.
  - ThrowawayR2 2y ago
    Most kids were raised while inundated with advertising but don't talk like a TV commercial.
    - kelseyfrog 2y ago
      Respectfully, I disagree. Like and subscribe.
- lupire 2y ago
  You are you, here. Think of the statistically average person and what they consider friendly.

muzani 2y ago

The LLM companies have always been against this kind of thing. Sam Altman (2023): "something very strange about people writing bullet points, having ChatGPT expand it to a polite email, sending it, and the sender using ChatGPT to condense it into the key bullet points" 3 years ago people were poking fun about how restrictive the terms were - you could get your API key blocked if you used it to pretend to be a human. Eventually people just used other AIs for things like that, so they got rid of these restrictions that they couldn't enforce anyway.

myfonj 2y ago
Interesting that this quote really contains "sender" where "recipient" was intended, but it had absolutely no impact on any reader. (I even asked Claude and ChatGPT if they noticed anything strange in the sentence, and both needed additional prompting to spot that mistake.) https://x.com/sama/status/1631394688384270336 https://x.com/sama/status/1631394688384270336 Thanks for this heads-up, by the way, I've missed this particular tweet, but eventually got into exact same observation.
- einsteinx2 2y ago
  Wow I completely didn’t notice that until I read your comment. My brain must have automatically filled in the correct word. I had to go back and re-read it to confirm.
  - myfonj 2y ago
    Well English is not my first language, so I probably tend to go through text more slowly and/or scan the text differently, so I have higher chance stumbling upon these oddities. (I can confirm that sometimes I see unexpected amount of misspelt homophones or usage of strangely related words.) Seeing two distinct LLM chats gloss over this particular nuance in almost identical way was really interesting. Grok, on the other hand, has absolutely no problem with concept of sender both expanding and compressing the message, and with absence of recipient. Even after super-painstaking discussion, where Grok identified the strange absence of the "recipient", when I asked him to correct the sentence, he simply changed the word "sender" to the word "themselves": > something very strange about people writing bullet points, having ChatGPT expand it to a polite email, sending it, and *themselves* using ChatGPT to condense it into the key bullet points https://x.com/i/grok/share/mwFR2jQ9MS6uVemgiHokJKiBd https://x.com/i/grok/share/mwFR2jQ9MS6uVemgiHokJKiBd (cringe/pain warning)

blagie 2y ago

> It reminded me of the time Roy Wood Jr visited a pro-gun rally where they argued guns make people safe, while simultaneously asking people to not carry guns because they were worried about safety. The cognitive dissonance is worth pointing out. Well, no. It's irony, but it's only cognitive dissonance in a comedy show which misses the nuance. Most pro-gun organizations are heavily into gun safety. The message is that guns aren't unsafe if they're being used correctly. Most of the time, this means that most guns should be locked up in a safe, with ammo in a separate safe, except when being transported to a gun range, for hunting, or similar. When being used there, one should follow a specific set of procedures for keeping those activities safe as well. It's a perfect analogy for the LLM here too. Anthropic encourages it for many uses, but not for the one textbox. Irony? Yes. Wrong? Probably not.

numbsafari 2y ago
These are the same people that insist we arm elementary school teachers and expect those teachers to someday pull the trigger on a child instead of having proper gun laws. There is no irony.
- ThunderSizzle 2y ago
  I don't expect that, so I won't be using public schools. I have no illusion that safety or education is an actual concern in public schools in general.
  - DiscourseFan 2y ago
    They do, but safety and social control go hand in hand. In any case, its not as if your kid is safer at a private school. Kids are violent, no matter where they are; maybe you remember going through school yourself?
- imchillyb 2y ago
  When have gun laws ever stopped a shooting? When have criminals EVER followed law, code, rules, or even a suggestion from their fellow citizens? Believing laws deter criminals is almost criminally insane and beggars all logic. After all of the accumulated evidence against your belief, you still believe laws deter criminality. The death penalty doesn’t deter criminals. How could words possibly have an effect?

amelius 2y ago

Yes, and they should state that they also don't use AI in the selection process.

xylifyx 2y ago
They don't because they do. However maybe the Anthropic AI isn't performing well on AI generated applications. I think they will get better results by having applicants talk to an AI during the application process.

ecocentrik 2y ago

I don't see the cognitive dissonance here. If a model was applying for a position with a cosmetics company, they might want to see what the blank canvas looks like. Being able to gauge a candidate's natural communication skills is highly useful. If you're an ineffective communicator, there's a good chance your comprehension skills are also deficient.

nertirs1 2y ago
The same could be said about a lot of things, like being able to write a functional solution to a leet code puzzle on a black board in front of an audience. IMHO, an effective interview process should attempt to mimic the position for which a person is applying. Making a candidate jump through hoops is a bit disrespectful.
- ecocentrik 2y ago
  IMO the interview process should help the employer correctly identify qualified candidates. Respect for the candidates is important but some candidates should absolutely be prepared to jump through hoops.
  - lupire 2y ago
    Jumping through hoops isn't the only way to demonstrate professional skill. I am the lion tamer, not the lion.
mathgeek 2y ago
> If you're an ineffective communicator, there's a good chance your comprehension skills are also deficient. We are quickly moving into a world where most communications are at best assisted by AI and more often have little human input at all. There’s nothing inherently “wrong” about that (we all have opinions there), but “natural” (quotes to emphasize that they’re taught and not natural anyway) communication skills are going to be less and less common as time marches on, much like handwriting, typewriting, calligraphy, etc.

fnqi8ckfek 2y ago

[dead]

FilosofumRex 2y ago

It's sardonic rather than ironic - irony is sarcastic humor devised to highlight a contradiction or hypocrisy; while sardonic is disdainful, bitter and scornful. It'd have been ironic if Anthropic had asked the applicant not to use AI for the sake of originality and authenticity; but if the applicant felt compelled to do so, then it better rock and wow them to hire the applicant sight unseen. It's sardonic because Anthropic is implying use of AI on them is an indication of fraud, deceit, or incompetence; but it's a form of efficiency, productivity or cleverness when used by them on the job!

latexr 2y ago
> It's sardonic rather than ironic Doesn’t seem like that to me, after reading the dictionary definitions. Sardonic: grimly mocking or cynical. Ironic: happening in a way contrary to what is expected, and typically causing wry amusement because of this. Pretty sure I meant the second one.

robertlagrant 2y ago

> We have LLMs shoved down our throats as this new way to communicate I don't think that's true at all.

lolinder 2y ago

You're wrapping all the AI companies up in a single box, but: * Most of the AI you get shoved down your throat is by the providers of services you use, not the AI companies. * Among the AI companies, Anthropic in particular has had a very balanced voice that doesn't push for using AI where it doesn't belong. Their marketing page can barely be called that [0]. Their Claude-specific page doesn't mention using it for writing at all [1]. You seem to be committing the common fallacy of treating a large and disparate group of people and organizations as a monolith and ascribing cognitive dissonance where what you're actually seeing is diversity of opinion. [0] https://www.anthropic.com/ https://www.anthropic.com/ [1] https://www.anthropic.com/claude https://www.anthropic.com/claude

belter 2y ago

Either than glorified template generators, real professional software developers are only using coding assistants because it's being shoved down their throats: https://youtu.be/H_DBqWI8hJw?t=2072 https://youtu.be/H_DBqWI8hJw?t=2072