Post #1452053

2026-03-27 19:05 UTC

@gumnos it's engineering in the same way that "social engineering" is engineering. and that's kinda what this is. you're coercing it into following your rules.

Replies (2)

@CapitalB@noauthority.social 2026-03-27 19:08

@feld @gumnos Never let language lead to think you or you'll end up as a meat-LLM: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CF%84%CE%AD%CF%87%CE%BD%CE%B7

Open ##1452054
@gumnos@mastodon.bsd.cafe 2026-03-27 19:28

@feld I grumble about that (ab)use of the term "engineering" too. I prefer to call it "prompt alchemy" The understanding of the underlying mechanisms differs little from putting mercurial saturnine antimonial dissolvent in your reverbatory furnace distillation apparatus as you pursue potable gold of the philosophers. Do useful things come out? Maybe. Are they reproducible? eh…different models and temperature settings almost *ensure* that different, uncorrelated outputs will occur from the same "engineered" prompt input. But is it science/engineering? not in the least

Open ##1452055