undefined

points

[-]

This is why executives think LLMs can replace everyone. They can see it can replace them, and project that onto everyone else. And they don't see the gaps in knowledge because they don't care about the facts, only the presentation.

by simpaticoder4 hours ago|

parent|

[-]

I have a theory that most people at most levels of work deal with the same amount of mental complexity. The difference is that as you move up the unit of abstraction gets larger, so your decisions and knowledge cover more scale. E.g. the engineer thinks about functions; the business owner thinks about products; the investor thinks about companies; the president thinks about nations; etc.

But people at the higher abstraction levels have a problem because they often never had (or lose) the ability to zoom in anywhere. And even the ones that can don't have time to learn to zoom in everywhere so they have to learn how to trust others, aka recognizing shibboleths. AI is great at sounding trustworthy and making reasonable looking output. In so doing, however, it's undermining the utility of shibboleths for large scale thinkers! That is the powerful are now deluding themselves that they have access to infinite reliable experts, and have gained the ability to zoom in everywhere, for only the cost of a data center. In a sense programmer experts like us are lucky because we have objective verification as a feedback loop to temper the exuberance. They do not.

If this is true, the kinds of error modes we'll see will be novel and catastrophic to a large fraction of businesses. If the feedback loops for correction are damaged or destroyed, we'll see firms gleefully, optimistically and energetically committing obvious mistakes until they die.

by cm111 hours ago|

parent|

[-]

I think agree with the broad, but disagree with the specifics. I really don't think a lot of people at the product level think about products. I really don't think the investors think that much about companies. I think as you move up, the things that separate are (in no order): ability to solve OR mask problems (one of these requires more skill/effort, but to people above they can look a lot closer), ability to naturally or adaptively (this is a fair, but somewhat positive word for this) socialize with the people in that next level, nepotism or blurrier forms of getting your foot in the door, willingness to look the other way (or just be obtuse), willingness to lie (or just be obtuse).

After the IC-level, each level filters less for the duties of the higher role. Even PMs seem surprisingly par at product ideation, vision, insight amongst their cross functional project team members. So many products fail, so many startups fail, so many projects are late, but those things don't seem to be what dictate promotions or investment even when they are specifically that role's role.

by Balgair3 hours ago|

parent|

prev|

[-]

https://thebullshitmachines.com/

This is a bit dated, but I think the message out of UW is right.

To your point on bosses: Turns out, you can very much bullshit a bullshitter.

by alexanderh5 hours ago|

parent|

prev|

[-]

damn, this is a real zinger lol. Definitely seems this way.

by theturtlemoves4 hours ago|

prev|

[-]

Maybe unrelated but this memory pops up: I once worked with a mechanical engineer who could not visualize anything in his mind and had quite some trouble with word finding and explaining his ideas. He just couldn't say what needed to be built, he could only evaluate after it was built (often "argh, no not that").

It's as if his training had centered so much on 3d modeling and tangible tweaking as you go, that he hadn't learned to simulate anything with his thoughts before starting. He had to start building it to figure out what he meant. Incredibly creative person, out of the box thinker and big picture visionary, but with difficulty translating his ideas to verbal concrete steps. But nobody realized this, which resulted in a lot of frustration both ways:

"Why didn't you build what I said?" "I did. This is exactly what you said." "No it's not! I said x y z" "Yes you said x y z, this IS x y z" Silence. "Then that's not what I meant"

by alnwlsn2 hours ago|

parent|

[-]

Now you know why AI text to CAD works so poorly.

by gedy3 hours ago|

parent|

prev|

[-]

Same, but not sure it's his training and just the way his head works. Have met a lot of people in software who can't draw or understand (very) simple block diagrams of systems. Some people don't have an inner eye.

by ai_fry_ur_brain4 hours ago|

prev|

[-]

Its so much worse now.

I deal with this all the time these days. If I ask for some clarification on scope, I usually get these ambiguous answers with fantastical ideas usually concerning some dreamed up impossible to implement tool that people assume is now possible because of AI, because everything is possible to them now!