Comment by s1artibartfast

12 hours ago

Immediate medical and childcare advice from LLM are pretty life changing.

Interpreting reports, avoiding drug interactions, or knowing when to seek medical care. And before people object- I can literally use the same LLM my doctor does to check these things, without waiting 2 weeks for an appointment.

I helped my parents work through bacterial culture results when my dad was hospitalized with sepsis, and had them ask their doctor for specific follow up tests.

I rebuilt my gas furnace and fixed my dishwasher with AI as an assistant.

Those aren't the fun parts tho. My favorite is touring art museums ancient historical sites with an LLM guide. It can give me a short academic essay about every artist, painting, or artifact. It can pull out details quirky stories about the history that I specifically would find interesting.

I cant recommend this enough. Its like visiting with a 10 PhD docents in art history.

4 comments

s1artibartfast

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dh2022  10 hours ago

How do you know it is not hallucinating those quirky stories :)?

  • s1artibartfast  10 hours ago

    How do you trust a book, blog, tour guide, or art history teacher?

    How do you trust the placards under a piece of art?

    The short answer is you accept that it isn't perfect and move on with life. I have found multiple errors in all of those things. Human tour guides are especially the worst at making things up.

    Part of navigating life is dealing with imperfect information and uncertainty.

    Just like with a friend, coworker, or spouse, you use your judgment and track records to decide when to trust what is being said based on subject matter and stakes.

    Domain matters. I have found it good at history, but less trustworthy in others. For examle, the llm gave me a bunch of bogus advice as I repaired my dishwasher based on weather models that weren't accurate. There is also a lot of bad information on Reddit and Appliance blogs. Repairman are almost as bad as the tour guides, willing to lie straight to your face. I deal with it the same way.

    • deaton  2 hours ago

      Because generally speaking people have a firm grasp on truth and lies are intentional, predictable, and rare. LLMs have a tenuous grasp on reality at best and make things up constantly.