Tim Hergert in Elk: "@Tattie I often use this when trying to..."

I studied Artificial Intelligence for four years, and I am not touching LLM AIs with a ten-foot pole.

It's not really about the insane electricity demands, the water usage, tho that's a good reason. It's not even, if I'm honest, about the disastrous effect on the sum of all human art and knowledge.

It's because a) I've studied enough AI to know it's a trick, a sort of linguistic illusion, and b) I've studied enough everything else to understand that I'm not immune to such illusions.

I often use this when trying to explain LLMs to people

#AI #LLM #OhNoWereGonnaNeedAnotherTimmy

November 1, 2025 at 6:57:32 PM

I find myself agreeing with the latter comments and 100% disagreeing with the first. Both feeling bad for Tim the Pencil and thinking chat bots might be alive seem to me a sign of advanced empathic skills-- of being able to identify with something totally unlike ourselves.

I would hypothesise, in fact, that people without a sense of empathy would be very unlikely to believe a chatbot is human.

wait on second thoughts I'm not sure what the first comment was implying. It could be read both ways.

I don't think it's implying that thinking a chatbot is human is a good or bad thing in terms of our human qualities. It's just stating the facts. If anything, it's implying that there are risks, but that's not the same as saying it's 100% bad - just something to be aware of.