Nikhil Thorat
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nst.bsky.social
Nikhil Thorat
@nst.bsky.social
AI quality at Databricks. Past: Co-founder of Lilac AI, acquired by Databricks. Co-created TensorFlow.js and Know Your Data. Google Brain // PAIR // Responsible AI. nsthorat@ over there
I hate to be that guy, but I’ll go out on a limb and say this prediction is complete bullshit.

A more realistic take is: LLMs will aid humans at all of these stages, which makes them insanely valuable tools. And that’s why I’m excited about them. But replace is a bit of a grifter take, IMO.
February 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
I’m not sure if y’all have used LLMs in serious software engineering, but we’re not even at milestone 0 robustly. LLMs still completely screw up even when slightly complex technical constraints are well formed, in extremely subtle and frustrating ways.
February 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
For humans, these are all pretty intermingled, and you need software engineers at all of these stages. I think it’s safe to assume you have to get to milestone 3 to “fully replace all software engineers”
February 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
Milestone 2: an AI translation layer of product requirements from a human to large scale technical requirements.

Milestone 3: AI coming up with product requirements altogether.
February 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
Milestone 0: AI can translate very focused technical requirements into software.
Milestone 1: AI can translate project-scale technical requirements into software. This means understanding how many large technical components fit together.
February 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
the day-night edge is so surprisingly sharp
January 5, 2025 at 5:31 PM
You would be a master VJ, one day i’ll make an llm to convert your animations to touch designer
December 1, 2024 at 5:31 PM
oh yeah it is, I just never think to use gemini directly I guess!
November 30, 2024 at 6:45 PM
November 24, 2024 at 7:34 PM
November 24, 2024 at 7:34 PM
Wait… is that what they call it here? That is absolutely hilarious.
April 29, 2023 at 2:33 PM
Yeah it does! It’s so cute. And it contributes to a central database to track bird migration patterns. ~~For science~~
April 28, 2023 at 12:00 AM