People keep assuring me that LLMs writing code is a revolution, that as long as we maintain sound engineering practices and tight code review they're actually extruding code fit for purpose in a fraction of the time it would take a human.

And every damned time, every damned time any of that code surfaces, like Anthropic's flagship offering just did, somehow it's exactly the pile of steaming technical debt and fifteen year old Stack Overflow snippets we were assured your careful oversight made sure it isn't.

Can someone please explain this to me? Is everyone but you simply prompting it wrong?

It's a good thing programmers aren't susceptible to hubris in any way, or this would have been so much worse.

@bodil we have sound engineering practices at home
@dysfun my theory is that you're about as likely to produce quality code from LLMs through "sound engineering practices" and "careful oversight" as you are to write safe C code by being more careful.
@hugo basically the main difference i am sensing is the ability to fool yourself. those who can love LLMs and those who can't hate them.

@dysfun I would even slice it not just to those who can vs those who can't, but perhaps say those who know they can be fooled but don't want to be.

I know there are psychological hazards there that are extremely powerful and subtle. I don't want to subject myself to that.

@hugo i've been watching lots of aviation videos. they give a shit in that industry, it's weird.