I like magic as a frame for things that are powered by LLMs.
- I like magic as a frame for things that are powered by LLMs.
- Normal programming is mechanistic.
- It does exactly what it was told to do, even if that's not exactly what the creator meant.
- But LLM-powered experiences have some inherent squishness.
- They fill in the underspecified parts with frog DNA, reasonable guesses.
- Even with the fully specified parts, sometimes they just… forget.
- LLMs are not deterministic.
- Well, technically if given the precise same seed and precise prompt they are in the strictest sense, but that is rarely how they're used in practice.
- Using the frame of magic helps users see it as a thing that could be great, but could also just misfire in an unexpected or weird way.