Tuesday, January 07, 2025
I am Socrates
I tried reading this with an open mind, but then I came across this:
This is a very easy fix. If I paste the error back into the LLM it will correct it. Though in this case, as I’m reading the code, it’s quite clear to me that I can just delete the line myself, so I do.
Via Lobsters, How I program with LLMs
My initial reaction to this was Woah there buddy! Are you sure you want to use your brain? Yes, caustic sarcasm is not a pretty reaction but I am what I am. [A reactionary cynical neo-Luddite? —Editor] [Shut up you! —Sean] Further down the page, the author presents some code the LLM wrote and then says:
Exactly the sort of thing I would write!
And I'm like, Yeah, you have 30 years of programming experience backing that up. What about programmers today who don't have that experience? They just accept what's given to them uncritically? [Yup, A reactionary cynical new-Luddite. —Editor] [Sigh. —Sean] At least the code in question were unit tests and it wasn't he who had to write unit tests for AI written code (which was my fear just prior to leaving The Enterprise).
But reading further, I can't help but think of Socrates:
For this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not practice their memory. Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are no part of themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory within them. You have invented an elixir not of memory, but of reminding; and you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise.
Plato rejects writing by the mouth of Socrates
While that's true to some degree, over the past 2½ millenium since then, it's been, overall and in my opinion, a positive thing. But then again, writing and books have been a part of my world since I was born, so it's the natual part of the way the world works:
Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
Can you guess I'm older than thirty-five?
So I'm resigned to the fact that this is our new reality—programmers will use AI (against my better judgement but nobody asked me—it really is alien to my way of thinking) and it's for the future to see if it was worth it in the long term.
But in the mean time, I am Socrates (and no, the irony that his thoughts on writing were written down is not lost on me).
