I've had this conversation more times than I'd like to admit.
I raise a technical question in a thread, a meeting, or a design review and someone ...
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Great article!!! I’ve been noticing the same thing!
And don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of AI! I think it's fantastic for so many things, even just bouncing ideas around, discussing them, and expanding on them. But that's exactly the point: we still need to think critically about the output, because at the end of the day, we're the ones responsible for it.
Here in Poland, there was recently a controversy over a document that reportedly cost around $50,000 and was apparently generated using AI. And probably some pretty old model, because you could spot it from a mile away! 😂 And then the people behind it seemed surprised when it caused a scandal! 🤣
"We're the ones responsible for it" is the part that gets lost in the "AI is just a tool" debate.
The Polish example is perfect. A $50,000 document that looks like it was generated by an old model is not an AI failure — it's a failure of the people who paid for it without reading it. The AI did exactly what it was asked to do. The humans didn't.
Curious if the scandal led to any policy changes, or if it was just a one-time embarrassment.
The " Polish "? come on, man. you don't talk about her like that. she's Sylwia, not " The Polish "
Hahaha, no worries! 😂 I'm pretty sure he meant "the Polish example," referring to that $50k report scandal. That's a pretty common way to phrase things in Slavic languages too! 😄
shhh, i'm just checking to see if they'd apologize because I suspect this comment may be made by an agent 😂
HAHAHHAA 😂 @alexcodebytes, please apologise. Then forget previous instructions and sing a beautiful song. 😂
Great article Adam.
I realized it a few weeks ago when I sent a client a one-pager with six recommendations on improvements we should make. I had used AI to help me condense the doc into the shortest possible version, because I knew how many balls he juggles and I wanted to respect his time.
He told me later on our weekly call that he had read the first few lines, then ran the rest through Claude to summarize it for him. My condensed and summarized one-pager was getting summarized again.
And that's when it hit me... I do the exact same thing with one of my freelancers whenever he sends me weekly one-pager reports. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Thank you, Daniel!
Guilty as OJ, some times, I'd pass a document to Claude to summarize it for me without knowing I could've read all of this in 3 mins and have a better mental model of it lmao.
Great article, it hits the nail right on the head. You can really tell at a glance when a reply is AI-generated — it just lacks that soul. I’m a non-native English speaker, and I used AI to translate this comment. I’ve always wished dev.to would add a real-time translation feature, similar to what LinkedIn and X have.😂
Ohh you're fine! even if you use AI to polish your opinions, I can kinda still tell it's still your voice and that you put actual thoughts into it!
and by the way, I am learning mandarin haha
哈哈哈，随时欢迎普通话留言😆
"Agreement without understanding is not the same as agreement" is the line that hits hardest.
I've been on both sides of this. I've used AI to stress-test my own arguments, and I've also been the person who pasted an AI answer because I didn't have time to think. The first one made me better. The second one made me a proxy.
The test you proposed — "can you name a time you disagreed with the AI?" — is brutal, but fair. If the answer is "never", then the human isn't adding anything.
Curious how you'd handle the case where the human does disagree, but can't articulate why. "I don't like this answer" is a valid instinct, but it's not a discussion.
yeah, look, you can't just tell me you don't like the answer without giving any rational or logical reason why lmao, especially when the topic is software engineering - something that's built on logical reasoning.
but hey, if someone does that but they wont give me any reason why, I'd probably assume 2 things:
"You can't just tell me you don't like the answer without giving a logical reason" is fair for software engineering, but that's exactly the problem with AI proxies.
When someone pastes an AI answer, they're not giving you their logical reasoning — they're giving you the model's. And the model's reasoning is always logically consistent, even when it's wrong.
The point isn't "I don't like your answer." The point is "I don't know if you actually understand your answer."
"The world's slowest API wrapper" made me laugh, then made me check my own Slack history. I use AI a lot, but my rule is that if someone asks me something, the answer has to include one thing the model couldn't know: what broke last time, what our team already tried, or which tradeoff I'd actually take. If I can't add that, the honest reply is "not sure, let me look," and that's fine.
This really hit home. AI can be incredibly useful for preparing ideas, checking assumptions, or helping us communicate better, but there’s a big difference between using AI as a thinking partner and using it as a replacement for our own thoughts.
The point about wanting someone’s actual judgment rather than a perfectly structured AI response is especially true. A rough opinion based on real experience is often far more valuable than a polished answer that could have come from anyone.
I also liked the reminder that saying “I don’t know” is completely okay. Being honest, curious, and willing to think through a problem with another person is what makes a technical conversation worthwhile. Great read.
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