Re:I'm Becoming AI-Blind
by FartyMcFarter on Friday August 21, 2026 @05:59PM
(#49394235)
The Google search bar is not capable of generating original text though. LLMs definitely are - you can get pretty creative output easily.
String concatenation will generate "original text" by that definition.
Obligatory "yes, I know that's not what an LLM is", purely pointing out the metric.
If the Google search bar ran results through a thesaurus, it still wouldn't be intelligent.
The google search bar is surprisingly smart sometimes. What's your definition of intelligence that completely excludes most of what a computer does?
Happily, I don't need to define "intelligence" here, because it's squarely in "I know it when I see it" territory. It's notoriously hard to define.
I also don't ascribe intelligence to a pocket calculator.
I don't find it's particularly hard to define loosely, but then I don't think of it as a special property of humans other than it tends to be quite high in them. But we are obviously talking about different things and if you're not going to provide a definition then it's not really the basis for a productive conversation.
To address this similarly to my sibling reply, I don't have a definition of intelligence that provides value here.
And your loose definition isn't doing a lot of help either, beyond perhaps noting: that Google search bar _is_ similarly "intelligent" to an LLM? Which says what, a lot about search? A lot about modern LLMs?
Similar in kind, but not degree. An LLM is a lot more intelligent than the google search bar.
Do you ascribe intelligence to a gorilla? How about a goldfish?
Would you ask either of them to review a PR? Or a calculator to eat a banana? Or an LLM to calculate prime factors?
These aren't interesting questions. As much as any definition is in use here, we're not going to get much value talking about "intelligence" this way.
Re:I'm Becoming AI-Blind
by Quarrelsome on Friday August 21, 2026 @06:02PM
(#49394263)
I mean I'm quite proud of some of my search queries in the same way I'm quite proud of some of the LLM output I get. I'm probably just very arrogant and enjoying myself via some LLM indirection.
Am I the only one that sometimes reads back particularly good emails they've written? I feel like its a similar thing :).
So does the Google search bar, but I don't ascribe intelligence to it.