> After the LK-99 debacle

"Debacle"? That was the most fun I've had on the Internet in years. When's the last time so many people engaged in so many arguments about materials science and electromagnetism? Sometime in the 1800s?

I think, of course, skepticism around this "LLM discovers X" thing is warranted, and there have been plenty of more recent examples around questionable LLM "discoveries". Just stating this because the LK99 thing I believe was notable as a (supposed) room-temp _super_conductor while this is about a _semi_conductor.

Yeah I remember going to my physics professor super excited about LK-99 to ask him if he heard about it, and him just telling me "yes but stuff like that happens twice per year, they will find something is off", and in fact it's what happened...

I start my day with plenty of optimism, then I go back and forth in the CLI and find out most of whats posted online is fake, and then towards the end of the day 2h past my bed time I end up ed zitron maxxing, it is the way it is ig

Even without the LK-99 debacle, I am *way* less excited about this than I was the original LK-99 announcement. The chance that this is real is close to 0%

I’m not sure what you mean by debacle

That was one of the best examples of science working nearly perfectly. One of the rare times I felt ok being human

this isn't about supercondutors, though

You probably meant "I'm taking this with a tiny pinch of salt". The amount of salt is directly proportional to how much of the claim you are willing to accept.

Edit: I stand corrected. According to Gemini:

Me: Does using more salt mean accepting more of that claim?

Gemini: No, it actually means the exact opposite. If you say you need to take a claim with a huge pile of salt (or a shovel of salt), it means you believe the claim is highly unbelievable and you need an immense amount of skepticism to accept it. How the Metaphor Scales

• A single grain of salt: "I am slightly skeptical, but it could be true."

• A pinch of salt: "I have a healthy amount of doubt about this."

• A grain of sand / A truckload of salt: "This sounds completely made up, and I barely believe a single word of it."

The salt represents your skepticism, not your belief. Therefore, the more unbelievable the claim, the more "salt" you need to swallow it.