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An LLM is a lossy encyclopedia

(simonwillison.net)
509 points tosh | 1 comments | 29 Aug 25 09:40 UTC | HN request time: 0.244s | source

(the referenced HN thread starts at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45060519)
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baq ◴[02 Sep 25 09:43 UTC] No.45100866[source]▶
It's also important to say what it isn't. LLM detractors, for lack of a better word, expect an oracle and then when they find out it's just a lossily compressed blob of human knowledge with natural language as a query interface they say the tool is useless.

I've got my opinion on whether that's useful or not and it's quite a bit more nuanced. You don't zoom-enhance JPEGs for a reason either.

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1. osn9363739 ◴[02 Sep 25 11:21 UTC] No.45101557[source]▶
An oracle was expected because that's what everyone kept saying it was or would be. If LLMs were shown and demonstrated realistically people would think they were really neat and find ways to use them. Instead I'm told I have phd™ level intelligence in my pocket. So of course people are going to be mad when it gets stumped on problems my 4yo could figure out.