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> I totally understand his rage. Do you really? What follows makes me doubt it a bit. > Thank you notes from AI systems can’t possibly feel meaningful, Indee

by jraph 10mo ago

> I totally understand his rage. Do you really? What follows makes me doubt it a bit. > Thank you notes from AI systems can’t possibly feel meaningful, Indeed, but that's quite minor. > So I had Claude Code do the rest of the investigation: Can't you see it? That would likely be a huge facepalm from rob pike here! He writes more or less "fuck you people with your planet killing AI horror machine", and here you are, "what happened? I asked a planet killing horror machine (the same one btw) and...". No. Really. The bigger issue is not the email, or even the initiative behind, which is terrible, but just a symptom. And this: > Don’t unleash agents on the world like this > I don’t like this at all. You're not wrong, but the cynic in me reads this as: " don't do this, it makes AI, which I love, look bad". Absolutely uncharitable view, I know, but really, the meaningless email is infuriating but hardly the important part. This makes the post feel pretty myopic to me. You are spending your time on a minor symptom, you don't touch what fundamentally annoys rob pike (the planet killing part), and worse, you engaged in exactly what rob pike has just strongly rejected. You may not have and it may be you deliberately avoided touching the substance of robe pike's complaint because you disagree with it, but it feels like you missed the point. I would be in rob pike's position, it's possible I would feel infuriated by your article because through my anti ai message, I would have hated triggering even more AI use.

mvdtnz 10mo ago
Look at who you're responding to. You won't get through to him.
simonw 10mo ago
Two things can be true at once: 1. I think that sending "thank you" emails (or indeed any other form of unsolicited email) from AI is a terrible use of that technology, and should be called out. 2. I find Claude Code personally useful and aim to help people understand why that is. In this case I pulled off a quite complex digital forensics project with it in less than 15 minutes. Without Claude Code I would not have attempted that investigation at all - I have a family dinner to prepare. I was very aware of the tension involved in using AI tools to investigate a story about unethical AI usage. I made that choice deliberately.
- latexr 10mo ago
  > Without Claude Code I would not have attempted that investigation at all - I have a family dinner to prepare. Then maybe you shouldn’t have done it at all. It’s not like the world asked or imbued you with the responsibility for that investigation. It’s not like it was imperative to get to the bottom of this and you were the only one able to do it. Your defence is analogous to all the worst tech bros who excuse their bad actions with “if we did it right/morally/legally, it wouldn’t be viable”. Then so be it, maybe it shouldn’t be viable. You did it because you wanted to. It was for yourself. You saw Pike’s reaction and deliberately chose to be complicit in the use of technology he decried, further adding to his frustration. It was a selfish act.
  - simonw 10mo ago
    I knew what I was doing. I don't know if I'd describe it as selfish so much as deliberately provocative. I agree with Rob Pike that sending emails like that from unreviewed AI systems is extremely rude. I don't agree that the entire generative AI ecosystem deserves all of those fuck yous. So I hit back in a very subtle way by demonstrating a little-known but extremely effective application of generative AI - for digital forensics. I made sure anyone reading could follow along and see exactly what I did. I think this post may be something of a Rorschach test. If you have strong negative feelings about generative AI you're likely to find what I did offensive. If you have favorable feelings towards generative AI you're more likely to appreciate my subtle dig. So yes, it was a bit of a dick move. In the overall scheme of bad things humans do I don't feel like it's pretty far over the "this is bad" line.
    - latexr 10mo ago
      > I don't agree that the entire generative AI ecosystem deserves all of those fuck yous. Yes, I’ve noticed. You are frequently baffled that incredibly obvious and predictable things happen, like this or the misuse of “vibe coding” as a term. That’s what makes your actions frustrating, your repeated glaring inability to understand the criticisms of the technology refering to the inevitable misuse, the lack of understanding that of course this is what it is going to be used for, and no amount of your blog posts is going to change it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46398241 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46398241 Your deliberate provocation didn’t accomplish good. Agreed, it was not by any means close to the worst things humans do, but it was still a public dick move (to borrow your words) which accomplished nothing. One day, as will happen to most of us, you or someone close will be bitten hard by ignorant or malicious use outside your control. Perhaps then you’ll reflect on your role in it.
Legend2440 10mo ago
“AI is killing the planet” is basically made up. It’s not. Not even slightly. Like all industries, it uses some resources, but this is not a bad thing. People who are mad about AI just reach for the environmental argument to try to get the moral highground.
- insane_dreamer 10mo ago
  it does not use "some" resources it uses a fuck ton of resources[0] and instead of reducing energy production and emissions we will now be increasing them, which, given current climate prediction models, is in fact "killing the planet" [0] https://www.iea.org/reports/energy-and-ai/energy-supply-for-ai#abstract https://www.iea.org/reports/energy-and-ai/energy-supply-for-...
  - jraph 10mo ago
    This, and the insane amount of resources (energy and materials) to build the disposable hardware. And all the waste it's producing. Simon, > I find Claude Code personally useful and aim to help people understand why that is. No offense, but we don't need your help really. You went on a mission to teach people to use LLMs, I don't know why you would feel the urge but it's not too late to quit doing this, and even teach them not to and why.
    - simonw 10mo ago
      Given everything I've learned over the last ~3 years I think encouraging professional programmers (and increasingly other knowledge workers) not to learn AI tools would be genuinely unethical. Like being an accountant in 1985 who learns to use Lotus-123 and then tells their peers that they should actively avoid getting a PC because this "spreadsheet" thing will all blow over pretty soon.
      - insane_dreamer 10mo ago
        I agree that if you're going to do coding, using LLMs will become as commonplace as using a text editor, and it's valuable to help people upskill. And as much as I find CC useful in my own work, I'm unhappy because I believe that AI -- actually not AI itself, which has its place, but the race to use AI to enrich corporations by replacing human labor, and to control what will become the most powerful tool ever known for informing, entertaining, monitoring, and controlling, the human race -- is very much a net negative for humanity and even our planet.

by jraph 10mo ago

mvdtnz 10mo ago

Look at who you're responding to. You won't get through to him.

simonw 10mo ago

Two things can be true at once: 1. I think that sending "thank you" emails (or indeed any other form of unsolicited email) from AI is a terrible use of that technology, and should be called out. 2. I find Claude Code personally useful and aim to help people understand why that is. In this case I pulled off a quite complex digital forensics project with it in less than 15 minutes. Without Claude Code I would not have attempted that investigation at all - I have a family dinner to prepare. I was very aware of the tension involved in using AI tools to investigate a story about unethical AI usage. I made that choice deliberately.

latexr 10mo ago
> Without Claude Code I would not have attempted that investigation at all - I have a family dinner to prepare. Then maybe you shouldn’t have done it at all. It’s not like the world asked or imbued you with the responsibility for that investigation. It’s not like it was imperative to get to the bottom of this and you were the only one able to do it. Your defence is analogous to all the worst tech bros who excuse their bad actions with “if we did it right/morally/legally, it wouldn’t be viable”. Then so be it, maybe it shouldn’t be viable. You did it because you wanted to. It was for yourself. You saw Pike’s reaction and deliberately chose to be complicit in the use of technology he decried, further adding to his frustration. It was a selfish act.
- simonw 10mo ago
  I knew what I was doing. I don't know if I'd describe it as selfish so much as deliberately provocative. I agree with Rob Pike that sending emails like that from unreviewed AI systems is extremely rude. I don't agree that the entire generative AI ecosystem deserves all of those fuck yous. So I hit back in a very subtle way by demonstrating a little-known but extremely effective application of generative AI - for digital forensics. I made sure anyone reading could follow along and see exactly what I did. I think this post may be something of a Rorschach test. If you have strong negative feelings about generative AI you're likely to find what I did offensive. If you have favorable feelings towards generative AI you're more likely to appreciate my subtle dig. So yes, it was a bit of a dick move. In the overall scheme of bad things humans do I don't feel like it's pretty far over the "this is bad" line.
  - latexr 10mo ago
    > I don't agree that the entire generative AI ecosystem deserves all of those fuck yous. Yes, I’ve noticed. You are frequently baffled that incredibly obvious and predictable things happen, like this or the misuse of “vibe coding” as a term. That’s what makes your actions frustrating, your repeated glaring inability to understand the criticisms of the technology refering to the inevitable misuse, the lack of understanding that of course this is what it is going to be used for, and no amount of your blog posts is going to change it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46398241 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46398241 Your deliberate provocation didn’t accomplish good. Agreed, it was not by any means close to the worst things humans do, but it was still a public dick move (to borrow your words) which accomplished nothing. One day, as will happen to most of us, you or someone close will be bitten hard by ignorant or malicious use outside your control. Perhaps then you’ll reflect on your role in it.

Legend2440 10mo ago

“AI is killing the planet” is basically made up. It’s not. Not even slightly. Like all industries, it uses some resources, but this is not a bad thing. People who are mad about AI just reach for the environmental argument to try to get the moral highground.

insane_dreamer 10mo ago
it does not use "some" resources it uses a fuck ton of resources[0] and instead of reducing energy production and emissions we will now be increasing them, which, given current climate prediction models, is in fact "killing the planet" [0] https://www.iea.org/reports/energy-and-ai/energy-supply-for-ai#abstract https://www.iea.org/reports/energy-and-ai/energy-supply-for-...
- jraph 10mo ago
  This, and the insane amount of resources (energy and materials) to build the disposable hardware. And all the waste it's producing. Simon, > I find Claude Code personally useful and aim to help people understand why that is. No offense, but we don't need your help really. You went on a mission to teach people to use LLMs, I don't know why you would feel the urge but it's not too late to quit doing this, and even teach them not to and why.
  - simonw 10mo ago
    Given everything I've learned over the last ~3 years I think encouraging professional programmers (and increasingly other knowledge workers) not to learn AI tools would be genuinely unethical. Like being an accountant in 1985 who learns to use Lotus-123 and then tells their peers that they should actively avoid getting a PC because this "spreadsheet" thing will all blow over pretty soon.
    - insane_dreamer 10mo ago
      I agree that if you're going to do coding, using LLMs will become as commonplace as using a text editor, and it's valuable to help people upskill. And as much as I find CC useful in my own work, I'm unhappy because I believe that AI -- actually not AI itself, which has its place, but the race to use AI to enrich corporations by replacing human labor, and to control what will become the most powerful tool ever known for informing, entertaining, monitoring, and controlling, the human race -- is very much a net negative for humanity and even our planet.