4 ms·

As a counterpoint, I've been using my own PC since I was 6 and know reasonably well about the innards of LLMs and agentic AI, and absolutely love this ability t

As a counterpoint, I've been using my own PC since I was 6 and know reasonably well about the innards of LLMs and agentic AI, and absolutely love this ability to hold a conversation with an AI. Earlier today, procrastinating from work, I spent an hour and a half talking with it about the philosophy of religion and had a great time, learning a ton. Sometimes I do just want a quick response to get things done, but I find living in a world where I'm able to just dive into a deep conversation with a machine that has read the entirety of the internet is incredible.

typpilol 1y ago
Couldn't you learn way more without the fluff? Would you really ask an AI how's it's doing?
- falcor84 1y ago
  I'm probably neurodiverse, so ymmv, but I really couldn't care much less about how people are doing; it's a very small part of my idea of a good conversation. What I want is to bounce ideas off of each other, and so the answer is no: I can't get the same experience or learning from just reading a book or being in a lecture - I want that back-and-forth where I'm the one talking about 50% of the time.
saaaaaam 1y ago
I think chatting discursively is fine! For some people that’s a good way to learn (so long as you fact check). I’m talking about just mindless chatter “how’s your day?” and asking what can best be described as “meme questions”.
mark_l_watson 1y ago
I enjoy doing the same thing: if I am reading and something in the text triggers a memory (could be a historic person, a philosophy, some technology, place, etc.) then I like to have a back and forth for a minute or two to fill in my memory or get more background. A fortune has been spent developing AI coding agents and they are useful, but I think that if used properly LLM based AI can be most useful in short educational or spitballing sessions. I probably only directly use LLM based AI for about two hours a week (including coding agents), but that is well used time for me.

typpilol 1y ago

Couldn't you learn way more without the fluff? Would you really ask an AI how's it's doing?

falcor84 1y ago
I'm probably neurodiverse, so ymmv, but I really couldn't care much less about how people are doing; it's a very small part of my idea of a good conversation. What I want is to bounce ideas off of each other, and so the answer is no: I can't get the same experience or learning from just reading a book or being in a lecture - I want that back-and-forth where I'm the one talking about 50% of the time.

saaaaaam 1y ago

I think chatting discursively is fine! For some people that’s a good way to learn (so long as you fact check). I’m talking about just mindless chatter “how’s your day?” and asking what can best be described as “meme questions”.

mark_l_watson 1y ago

I enjoy doing the same thing: if I am reading and something in the text triggers a memory (could be a historic person, a philosophy, some technology, place, etc.) then I like to have a back and forth for a minute or two to fill in my memory or get more background. A fortune has been spent developing AI coding agents and they are useful, but I think that if used properly LLM based AI can be most useful in short educational or spitballing sessions. I probably only directly use LLM based AI for about two hours a week (including coding agents), but that is well used time for me.