The more woodworking tools are hyped these days, the more I realize how immensely important real craftsmanship is. I recently stopped using saws, planes, chisels, and routers because of this. Tool dependence hits hard, the learning effect is zero, and the outcome is not really something a person without adequate woodworking expertise can properly judge.

Sorry, but to me an LLM is nothing but a tool. It is not a replacement for my expertise and it is definitely not something to outsource my thinking to.

But such broad statements imho do not help us understand wh we can use these tools and how one can learn to use them in a reasonable and useful way (for our own learning as well as for the outcomes).

You're very close but to woodworking AI is more akin to a 3d printer than even a CNC let alone swas and planes.

Yes, a 3d printer and not even a CNC. That difference nicely illustrates the difference of what AI brings to the table for any domain of competence.

> Sorry, but to me an LLM is nothing but a tool. It is not a replacement for my expertise and it is definitely not something to outsource my thinking to.

Great on you, that's indeed how LLMs should be used, proper. But if anything, the article demonstrates someone is trying to outsource thinking to an AI agent.

The irony here that if you ever do any kind of practical woodworking lessons or general hands on craft work, metal working, or any 3D, you will be encouraged to use hand-tools over bandsaws, etc. The reasoning being so you know the fundamentals of what you're trying to achieve with the more complex tools later on.

It's always held true: You'll never get the most out of advanced tools unless you can 'do it by hand' so to speak

I studied computing at AS level in the UK (16-17 years old). I learned about: computer components (disks, memory, cpu), binary, ASCII, assembly and machine code. We programmed in Turbo Pascal. I then spent ten years doing non-computer things until I came back to a masters. I was one of the top students in my masters because i didn't need help with fundamentals. The other top student had previously made contributions to the linux kernel (even though he was a philosophy grad...).

The argument for having autonomous LLMs/Agents often ends up as "none of us need to know about assembly, why do i need to know about the code?".

I cringe every time I see this argument.