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Comment by solenoid0937

2 months ago

It is because HN is contrarian and behind the times.

I work at a big tech company and I don't know a single person that still hand writes code. Most people haven't hand written code for at least half a year now.

I do wonder what sort of bug is making its rounds on HN that people here find this so shocking and unbelievable.

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solenoid0937

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troupo  2 months ago

The bug is called "applying actual engineering principles and critical thinking".

The absolute vast majority of people who point out AI's downsides have used it and use it. People who uncritically write things like "I work at a big tech company and I don't know a single person that still hand writes code." scare the shit out of us for a good reason.

  • solenoid0937  2 months ago

    Using it is not enough. You have to explore its boundaries, see what it can do when cost is not a constraint. This is only really possible at the big tech companies and well funded startups.

    Any eng that is only using Claude Code or Codex or whatever, is frankly not entitled to talk about AI's limits since they are using the most basic harnesses. They literally don't know better.

    When I see Claude Code or Codex users on HN talking about how coding with AI is risky, it's like watching someone that has only ever seen a catapult argue about how space travel must be impossible.

    • camdenreslink  2 months ago

      > Any eng that is only using Claude Code or Codex or whatever, is frankly not entitled to talk about AI's limits since they are using the most basic harnesses. They literally don't know better.

      I really doubt big tech has much better harnesses than are publicly available. Definitely not "catapult vs space travel". They have the same base models we all have access to.

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    • troupo  2 months ago

      You only explore boundaries of an AI if you are actually training and evaluating your own models.

      Harnesses aren't testing boundaries of AI. They inject "make no mistakes" in various forms and provide some session management tools.

      And, as with any people fully buying into and promoting hype, "my harness is in another castle" (they never show anything they boast about") lathered with huge amounts of crude demagoguery and analogies.

    • SpicyLemonZest  2 months ago

      Would you care to share the name of a good harness which might qualify someone to talk about AI's limits? There's quite a lot of big tech companies and well funded startups using Claude Code and Codex, although I suppose it's possible that none of them know what they're doing.

      4 replies →