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Comment by errlogic | Hacker News Reader

I generally agree with your take at first, but the following statements are funny to me:

“ I am probably weak on the subject material myself. eg writing quirky love poems to my wife in different styles.”

“ For domains where high rational quality doesn’t matter like love poetry, it is amazing.”

So, self-described weak at love poetry, but confident that it is a domain that LLMs excel at. That is an interesting take. Perhaps the LLM is just as weak at liberal arts as it is hard science, but it is just more difficult to measure since you aren’t in the domain. Most poetry I’ve seen from LLMs has been pretty rote and boring although as you say, not a “rational quality” I suppose.

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I was about the comment something like this, but you put it well.

If you don't read a lot of poetry, what LLMs output look like poems, but almost always lack wit, a through-line, coherence and poignancy. It usually contains the individual parts, but never fitting as a whole.

Yes, but then unless you're really into poetry, or some poetry critic, none of that matters. For everyone else, all that matters is that it looks like a poem should, and that it makes the reader feel something.

Instrumental vs terminal values, I guess. Makes me think of coding - the overlap between good code, and code that makes money, is nearly empty.

I like you bringing in instrumental vs. terminal values because I think it is an important frame when talking about generative AI, but I think your application is mixed up by applying a strictly capital-based value system.

The end result of good code is to do a thing. That might result in money, but the instrumental value is in the thing it does rather than for the joy of coding.

Many people will assume that artists create things strictly for the terminal value of just doing the thing because the prose doesn’t “do” anything so the artist must have just enjoyed making it. But the artist usually wants to make an impact - communicate an idea, change a mind, etc. Not just “make a thing that looks like a poem so that I can sell it.”

I say this is an important frame to look at the problem in because there is pretty much zero instrumental value in generating LLM output beyond the kind of gatcha-style fun of putting in words and seeing something pop out the other end and the terminal value is always measured in money or “time efficiency” because what else is there to measure in?

Did I actually craft a love poem that communicates my true feelings in prose with all of the little flaws and personalizations that only we know in one of our most intimate relationships? Did I choose my voice or was it someone else’s? What is the value I’m getting when I fish something out of a generative AI? Did I really get the same value fishing with prompts through and AI’s output than making the thing? Maybe, maybe not.

Perhaps the example I used wasn't the best one; I wanted to focus more on the code aspect than the money. My main point is, what is considered Good Art, as declared by the critics, curators, educators, is quite different than what people actually want to experience. Importantly, many of the qualities that make art Good are beyond perception of the layman. The poster's love poems may lack coherence and underlying thought-line, but the poster's wife probably won't notice it - like 99% of the population. So, as a criticism of LLM output, holding it to the standards of the Art is irrelevant, because it's not what the poem was generated for.

There's probably a term for that which I'm forgetting, so let's provisionally call it tangential mediocrity - when the work is mediocre by general standards, but quite good for purpose it was made for.

LLMs don’t excel at love poetry. However love poetry doesn’t have to be excellent to be effective.

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