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There's no point at which turning your brain off will work

204 points · 156 comments · robin_reala

  1. Arubis · · focus · HN ↗
    Yes, and: the most important time to use your brain isn't in the loop.

    That _is_ valuable, and will remain so, but the temptation to turn it off is there because the loop is good and getting better at what it does. Once you're in the loop, with the rare high-value exception of catching total mistakes nad redirecting, you're mostly choosing between similar-yet-reasonable options. This isn't so much right-vs-wrong as relativistic optimization. Letting the loop do the work will get you a mediocre result quickly, and that's usually fine.

    The most important time to use your brain is _before the prompt_. Once you engage with your LLM and agent, you start biasing yourself, and its reasonable suggestions constrain your visibility into other options, other worlds.

    First, use your brain. Then write the prompt.

    1. xendo · · focus · HN ↗
      I don't agree. I'm recently a huge believer in Programming as Theory Building. The software creation itself is the part that makes you understand what you are building. It's impossible to understand things before you start building them, initial prompt can help you explore, but the idea that after that you can lean back is ridiculous. Most or maybe even all successful software projects are still heavily relying on the best software engineers. That's why anthropic and others are still hiring SDEs.
      1. CamperBob2 · · focus · HN ↗
        That's great, but you and your family will go hungry as a result. If not this year, next year.

        Your stance isn't new, if it's any comfort. I heard (and probably said) exactly the same thing when C compilers started getting good enough to eliminate the need for most assembly coding.

        1. kbelder · · focus · HN ↗
          Understanding assembly coding makes you a vastly better C coder.
          1. CamperBob2 · · focus · HN ↗
            Nah, not really. Not anymore. Nice skill to have when debugging weird stuff, but nothing you can't get by without.
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