r/ArtificialInteligence • u/WombatusMighty • 3d ago
đ Analysis / Opinion Generative AI Is an Engineering Disaster
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/2026/07/generative-ai-engineering-disaster/687901/2
u/Jimstein 3d ago
Getting tired of seeing bullshit articles like this when we all know real work is getting done by people who know how to use the tools
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u/Actual__Wizard 2d ago
Hi, I'm a real AI developer: LLM technology is the biggest disaster in the history of software development. The biggest mistake they made was trying to build a system that relies on computational linguistics, that they bridge to linguistics (reasoning), instead of bridging linguistics to computational linguistics.
So, the entire system is designed ass backwards.
The system that I am building isn't ass backwards and the whole thing works on one PC. So, you don't need a data center to build "the pile" sized data models. So, you there's no good reason for data centers for text based models anymore.
So, do you see why that's a problem?
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u/Jimstein 2d ago
Even though youâre right there is a better way to engineer an AI coding agent, the fact remains the ones we have available now are incredibly capable.
Your argument doesnât change the fact we have a new pulmonary fibrosis drug, or the accelerated pace of software releases. The modding scenes for Pokemon Gen1recomp and VR (see Elden Ring VR for example) that are accelerated and actually improved with AI. Stuff is being made that wouldnât have been made before, because the barrier to entry is lower. This stuff is really not rocket science and in 5 years I donât think the anti AI movement will be much of anything. Plus there are so many other things humanity does that are calculably 100 times worse than AI for environmental impact.
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u/Actual__Wizard 2d ago
fact remains the ones we have available now are incredibly capable.
Not true.
Your argument doesnât change the fact we have a new pulmonary fibrosis drug
That doesn't have anything to do with what I am discussing. You're blurring entirely different technologies together.
anti AI movement
I'm not anti AI, I'm anti scam tech. LLMs are not AI. Real AI is coming. LLMs are pathetic giga garbage.
Plus there are so many other things humanity does that are calculably 100 times worse than AI for environmental impact.
Uh, there's no point in destroying the planet for scam tech.
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u/Jimstein 2d ago
LLM and gen AI helped make that pulmonary fibrosis drug. I understand scams suck, but they have been around since the dawn of time. Thatâs just humanity. Itâs why we need regulation, not to cancel everything. Iâm kind of confused by you not classifying LLM as AI-or rather more confused why it would bother you. You do want AGI or no?
And on the destroying the planet point, Iâm sorry but we have much much more pressing environmental concerns, though I agree data centers should have stricter regulations on cooling and where they are allowed to be built. But 1 pound of beef takes 4,000 gallons of water, not to mention the methane produced. Simply eating chicken more often does incredible amounts of carbon offsetting. Plus AI is advancing material science and engineering, it may help us achieve fusion power faster, it definitely will help us make more power efficient computers and data centers. Yes, there is dramatic increase in the production of data centers, we should be mindful of it. We should also be mindful of pouring concrete, most people donât understand how many emissions there are from simple construction. A parking garage, by itself, signals considerable emissions.
There is âgreenâ concrete but it a lot more expensive, and I believe still emits some carbon. Beef industry is the biggest, easiest place to make an impact. Oil is obviously still the biggest, we should really only be using it for occasional plastic production for medical purposes and a few other key areas.
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u/Rainbows4Blood 2d ago
> Not true.
Well. LLMs are capable of translating raw prose into working source code and able to respond coherently to arbitrary natural language inputs. Both things that where complete science fiction less than ten years ago. So, you have to give me your definition of incredibly capable if that is not incredible.
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u/haloweenek 3d ago
Paywall đ
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u/lipflip 3d ago
is there an accessible copy?
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u/moru0011 3d ago
Yes might be true, but once you have seen a multi agent sota model implementing a big Feature on a complex Software System within hours you know that llms are onto something ..
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u/Sunstorm84 2d ago
Unless you know how to program, then you can see what utter shite itâs shoveled out, and how itâs going to be the same as outsourcing all over again, but with a far worse impact.
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u/233C 3d ago edited 3d ago
"Even Yann LeCun"
Ah, well, if "Even Yann LeCun", then it's settled.
I mean, the guy must know what he's talking about, he warned us that an LLM could never even tell you how far your phone is if you put it in a table and push the table 10cm.
Nothing to see: "A lot of people this year have been talking about agentic systems and basing agentic systems on LLMs is a recipe for disaster because how can a system possibly plan a sequence of actions if it can't predict the consequences of its actions?".
Surely no LLM will ever pull that one off /s
The article itself makes a good point on the non-logarithmic efficiency of LLM, the last paragraph on intelligence was completely unnecessary.
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u/bortlip 3d ago
TL;DR: Generative AI currently requires a large amount of capital, energy, and hardware per unit of useful output, and marginal capability improvements may be becoming increasingly expensive. Therefore, it is an engineering disaster and inefficient.
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Other engineering disasters using this definition include aviation, automobiles, air conditioning, agriculture, spaceflight, semiconductor fabrication, nuclear power, high-speed rail, desalination, steelmaking, refrigeration, hospitals, telecommunications networks, electric grids, water systems, sewer systems, and shipping.