3 ms·

Honest question. Does asking "make no mistakes" actually change the output? Does it make mistakes if you don't bother to ask for no mistakes? Is it just to m

Honest question. Does asking "make no mistakes" actually change the output? Does it make mistakes if you don't bother to ask for no mistakes? Is it just to make the human feel more secure?

hyperhello 3mo ago
It will make mistakes if you tell it to, so I assume it will make no mistakes if you tell it not to.
- none_to_remain 3mo ago
  When this news came out I amused myself by asking Claude to prove that 0.999... != 1. First it did so for the hyperreals. To do it for the reals I had to tell it it was allowed to make mistakes, although it didn't end up interestingly wrong - just very fuzzy and vague.
  - greenavocado 3mo ago
    Fable, prove that for every positive integer n, repeatedly dividing by 2 if even or multiplying by 3 and adding 1 if odd will always eventually reduce the sequence to 1.
  - raphlinus 3mo ago
    Actually it's not true for the hyperreals either, though this is a common misconception. It's extremely easy for me to believe that an llm would produce a "proof" and that people would fall for it.
    - none_to_remain 3mo ago
      I don't know if I fell for it - my response was "LOL, I sure can't tell you if this one is right or wrong". I guess that makes it more convincing than the proof for the reals.
minimaxir 3mo ago
It's a meme. Telling it to "make no mistakes" doesn't do anything because LLMs don't have an inherent concept of a mistake and they are already RLHFed to code correctly. However, if you tell it to not do particular behaviors explicitly—some of which would be considered mistakes—it will not do said behaviors and with enough checks and balances, you'll get output without "mistakes". One example of this from the OpenAI Unit Distance prompt: https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/04d1d1e4-bc75-476a-97cf-49055cd98d31/cdc_prompt.pdf https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/04d1d1e4-bc75-476a-97cf-49055cd98... > Do not return merely because current approaches fail or agents report theorem-strength gaps. Continue launching new rounds, reopening blocked approaches only when there is a genuinely new mechanism, and searching for fresh formulations. Return only when a complete affirmative proof has been found and survives adversarial audit. > Do not return a reduction, partial result, isolated missing lemma, “best effort” summary, or explanation of why the problem is difficult.
- dcrazy 3mo ago
  There really was a time when “make no mistakes” was thought to increase response quality. Maybe it steered the content of the thought channel?
- wren6991 3mo ago
  I like the explicit and imperative style of this prompt. Makes me feel like LLMs are just weird Turing machines and CoT is their tape.
jewel 3mo ago
I believe it's a reference to a joke meme that goes something like "Write Windows 12 from scratch. Make no mistakes." At least that's the first context I heard it in.
- greenavocado 3mo ago
  Precisely
  - rvz 3mo ago
    You are "not allowed" to make that joke here. [0] and you probably upset a bunch of grumpy meanies. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48838228 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48838228
    - deleted 3mo ago
      [deleted]
saganus 3mo ago
It's just a meme at this point.
greenavocado 3mo ago
> Does asking "make no mistakes" actually change the output? Why Teams Add "Make No Mistakes" to AI Prompts (And Why It Never Works) https://jakemcmahon.github.io/medium-articles/make-no-mistakes-ai-prompts.html https://jakemcmahon.github.io/medium-articles/make-no-mistak...

Honest question. Does asking "make no mistakes" actually change the output? Does it make mistakes if you don't bother to ask for no mistakes? Is it just to make the human feel more secure?

hyperhello 3mo ago

It will make mistakes if you tell it to, so I assume it will make no mistakes if you tell it not to.

none_to_remain 3mo ago
When this news came out I amused myself by asking Claude to prove that 0.999... != 1. First it did so for the hyperreals. To do it for the reals I had to tell it it was allowed to make mistakes, although it didn't end up interestingly wrong - just very fuzzy and vague.
- greenavocado 3mo ago
  Fable, prove that for every positive integer n, repeatedly dividing by 2 if even or multiplying by 3 and adding 1 if odd will always eventually reduce the sequence to 1.
- raphlinus 3mo ago
  Actually it's not true for the hyperreals either, though this is a common misconception. It's extremely easy for me to believe that an llm would produce a "proof" and that people would fall for it.
  - none_to_remain 3mo ago
    I don't know if I fell for it - my response was "LOL, I sure can't tell you if this one is right or wrong". I guess that makes it more convincing than the proof for the reals.

minimaxir 3mo ago

It's a meme. Telling it to "make no mistakes" doesn't do anything because LLMs don't have an inherent concept of a mistake and they are already RLHFed to code correctly. However, if you tell it to not do particular behaviors explicitly—some of which would be considered mistakes—it will not do said behaviors and with enough checks and balances, you'll get output without "mistakes". One example of this from the OpenAI Unit Distance prompt: https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/04d1d1e4-bc75-476a-97cf-49055cd98d31/cdc_prompt.pdf https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/04d1d1e4-bc75-476a-97cf-49055cd98... > Do not return merely because current approaches fail or agents report theorem-strength gaps. Continue launching new rounds, reopening blocked approaches only when there is a genuinely new mechanism, and searching for fresh formulations. Return only when a complete affirmative proof has been found and survives adversarial audit. > Do not return a reduction, partial result, isolated missing lemma, “best effort” summary, or explanation of why the problem is difficult.

dcrazy 3mo ago
There really was a time when “make no mistakes” was thought to increase response quality. Maybe it steered the content of the thought channel?
wren6991 3mo ago
I like the explicit and imperative style of this prompt. Makes me feel like LLMs are just weird Turing machines and CoT is their tape.

jewel 3mo ago

I believe it's a reference to a joke meme that goes something like "Write Windows 12 from scratch. Make no mistakes." At least that's the first context I heard it in.

greenavocado 3mo ago
Precisely
- rvz 3mo ago
  You are "not allowed" to make that joke here. [0] and you probably upset a bunch of grumpy meanies. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48838228 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48838228
  - deleted 3mo ago
    [deleted]

saganus 3mo ago

It's just a meme at this point.

greenavocado 3mo ago

> Does asking "make no mistakes" actually change the output? Why Teams Add "Make No Mistakes" to AI Prompts (And Why It Never Works) https://jakemcmahon.github.io/medium-articles/make-no-mistakes-ai-prompts.html https://jakemcmahon.github.io/medium-articles/make-no-mistak...