It should obviously not come as a surprise that having areas of the brains working differently can explain an awfull lot of things... but to answer your question directly, yes of course of course there are!
Simply look up all the many, well
-supported and -researched known correlations with ADHD first. In the second step, you can construct the set of all possible correlations, and subtract the well-researched ones if it. What is left is the set of correlations that are either not explained by ADHD (the big majority I would assume) or explained by ADHD, but as-of-yet unknowingly so.
This might be a bit anticlimatic, but clinical psychology is pretty straightforward study design and statistics, and set theory is not that new either, so... no big surprises I am afraid.
Not sure the thrust of your comment, but what is really going on is just novelty seeking to get a bit of a dopamine rush, which slides into creativity.
It all comes down to dopamine at the end of the day.
Indeed, the link in the parent even says it hasn't been used since May 2000. So, yeah, it certainly wasn't used "famously".
Perhaps the commenter is thinking of the fact it was used globally prior to May 1, 2000. From a civilian point of view, GPS appeared to be invented around this time but it had actually been available for a couple of decades already, just in a degraded form that wasn't very useful.
Differential GPS was already in widespread use in many counties by 2000, which made "selective ability" pointless at it provided automatic corrections to the 'degraded' GPS signal.
The easiest one to think about is that the larger the company (or division), the more likely there are leaks. Think about how much as leaked in Apple's hardware or software division. If they were doing incredibly underground marketing, someone would've bragged on LinkedIn or to a reporter.
I like it because each individual piece can happen and we probably all know people by now that have some aspect of Aaron - massive AI use, or into prediction markets, or live streaming, or just a friend who we have learned over time lacks scruples, or have watched them fade in response to life's challenges. The combination of all of these is then easy to imagine and that idea makes a good story.
It's not the ocean, it's the poster's own team. A simple "AI comments suck" in a sprint retro would be trivially easy and would at least start the conversation.
While I agree with the spirit of what you're saying, it is very similar to whenever anyone complains about things where they work. "Well, why don't you just raise it with management?" You're assuming that management
1) Understands the problem ("what are comments?")
2) Accepts that it is a problem ("how can more comments be a bad thing?")
3) Cares enough to solve the problem ("is this issue really a priority to solve right now? just accept the PR and we'll go back and fix if needed some other time cough never cough")
4) Believes you (this can take many forms, but the most common is, subconsciously, "this other engineer says it's not a problem, so I'll just assume it's not since that's easier")
All of these logistical, political and social factors are "the ocean"
Sprint retro is with your own team. And disagreement isn't a problem, at least then there would be the potential to come to a common understanding between the GP comment and their coworkers.
I usually require to file an issue in bug tracker about problem in #3 and then follow all its updates to prevent silent closing by management. It won't help but annoys management a lot and they afraid to get more backlog issues of such sort from me in the future.
Doesn't matter. You'll come off as the baddie. It's the foreseeable future. Best just to learn how to interpret AI generated shit, or learn how to run it through AI and have it translate it to a more concise format without all the buzzwords. It'll take getting used to, but it'll save your career.
You don't have to come across as the baddie. There are plenty of neutral ways to start the conversation. E.g., "I notice that there's a lot more generated comments lately. How much are people finding those useful?"
If you really want to save your career, learning how to have real conversations is a vital skill.
Have you worked in corporate recently or at a particularly toxic one?
Asking because when I was at capital one, certain comments or questions about topics like this, would actually get you noticed negatively by your manager and being disruptive to what leadership wants hurts your career.
In fact being the one to ask and point out questions like yours ultimately got me PIP'ed and removed from the company. So, like, yeah, being vulnerable and the first one to tell the truth is risky. That's why the bystander effect can happen and in politics or risky situations silence is a common response, and why we don't have more courageous people doing the right thing - because the risk is higher on the person speaking up and the rewards aren't disproportionately in their favor (but are evenly distributed though, so its not favorable for you as I learned from a game theory perspective to voice up / defend certain stances).
Capital One is a particularly toxic work environment, and I'm not sure that your experiences there apply to other companies.
I started my first post-Capital One job a few months ago, and I'm still not used to the fact that this company expects everybody working here to still be working here in two years. Most employers are not going through everybody with a fine tooth comb every 6 months hunting for any hint of an excuse to PIP them.
The founder CEO (with a cult of personality) really believes that it is the way to "top tech talent." He comes from a management consulting background and tries to manage the software organization like they're consultants. Leads to a very bottom heavy organization, with a lot of juniors, many of whom get PIPed right as they're starting to become useful. It leads to high turnover with a lot of backstabbing, and very short term thinking because everybody is always focused on the next performance management cycle.
It was really a bizarre place to work, because work-life balance was amazing, the benefits and vacation were great, but twice a year there was this insane hunger games.
They really chilled out the performance management process from 2020 or so through 2023, so people who worked there then didn't always notice.
Ah yeah that explains my experience a bit better. I was there in the COVID wfh time, 2020 or so, then rejoined 2024 when I experienced things not too unlike what you described. (except I joined as a principal, ~8-10 years of experience, and received backstabbing and lies from juniors and managers (edit and tech lead)).
I don't recommend going to Plano, TX and joining the Auto Navigator product division.
I grant that sane behaviors may not always be successful at toxic companies. That seems true by definition. But I don't think general career advice should be based on what is (temporarily) safe at the bottom decile.
Also, if you go back you'll note that I didn't suggest that people "tell the truth". I suggested people ask a neutral question about an obvious phenomenon. If it's unsafe to give an honest answer, most people won't, so it'll be a short discussion. But if it's a topic with some room, it can be the start of a good conversation and possibly a useful change.
Ah, I see. I didn't specifically think Capital one was toxic, though, more recently after sharing about my experience more I've been realizing it may have been.
I can see how that technique works great at a non-toxic company. Thank you.
What is this defeatist attitude? I don't know where you work, but it is not my impression that AI has instantly turned all developers into mindless AI-pilled sheep. If you feel like a simple suggestion like that will cost you your career, then it doesn't sound like a place where any constructive criticism would have been accepted even before AI.
There is no single conforming "corporate world" that applies to all companies. If AI is treated religion in your company that sounds like a local problem, even if it seems like a trend.
Besides, GP was not talking about corporate, but about the inability to even suggest an improved usage of LLMs among their developer peers, as if every line of code generated by AI is now gospel and questioning it is treated as heresy. This level of defeatism is beyond cynical and approaching childish.
This reply is not directed to you specifically, but that attitude is why improvement doesn't happen.
"My peers are all bad", "Management has no idea what's going on", "My boss is out of touch", "My staff keep screwing up".
But if you're consistently seeing the problems while everyone else becomes defensive, you (that think that way) need to learn how to communicate effectively in a way that doesn't result in being 'the baddie' and solve the interpersonal dynamic along with the technical problems. "Crucial Conversations" is a good place to start.
When AI directives are coming from the top down - when everyone above you all the way up to the CEO is all in on AI - the writing is on the proverbial wall. I'm not saying it will be that way forever, but it is the foreseeable future, and those that don't jump on the train will be left behind. It's just life.
There's a reason 3rd places exists. There's a social construct that off-work discussion (even when on-work) stays off work.
If your coworker is professional and cares about keeping channels open, they too will respect the unspoken rules that govern 3rd place neutral locations.
Blame it on the alcohol later on if it actually pisses someone off.
This is the third place. There is no real 3rd place in real companies usually. Not in mine, when i work remotely for company from other side of continent.
I think the biggest issue might not be the immediate team but upper leadership. Companies which have mandated AI usage override a lot of what an individual or individual team wants. If that’s the case then it would be a lot like fighting the ocean, especially if your immediate team sees having AI write docs as an easy way to move the needle on LT’s AI monitoring dashboard.
> My coworkers continue to dump hundreds of lines of AI documentation in every PR and every other line of code has between one and ten lines of AI generated comments
That's the behavior being discussed. In my experience, overly large PRs are a detriment to productivity, so if anything my suggestion (asking one's coworkers to stop that) might lead to an improvement in velocity. If I have to read an essay before and throughout every PR, I'm not going to be able to review that very quickly.
It's the management desired direction, if the place is anything like my workplace. Everyone is all in on AI, and if you're not using it for everything possible, you're on the chopping block.
And, really, it works. You can copy and paste between tickets and Claude, and then do manual testing. Then you tell Claude to self-review for clarity and minimalism, and stop worrying. Sure, today it's not as good as a human, but for almost all the code out there, it gets the job done. There's no skill needed any more, and if the boss doesn't care about quality, I don't see why I should.
Your boss can get Claude to make unreadable, noisy, confusing code just as well as you can.
There may not be a career left in software development with these monstrosities, but if there is, it's in using decades of experience to get the abominations to produce something other than unreadable dreck.
If the code itself truly doesn't matter any more, programmers will no longer be paid.
Oh, yeah, the amount of skill needed for programming is quite low these days, the people paying just haven't figured it out quite yet. There's still some needed, but it's closer to line cook than nuclear physicist.
But the managers won't do it, because you still need manual testing to make sure that the AI models got things right. Managers will want to hire someone to do the manual testing.
The amount of skill required is still pretty high, IMO - if we set a requirement that a programmer thoroughly understand what they're shipping.
If we remove that requirement (as most around me seem to be doing), then yeah, not much skill required, but the system is going to steadily trend towards being a buggy, unmaintainable pile of sloppypasta.
Maybe the models get good enough they can handle maintaining that, but anecdotal reports so far seem to indicate we aren't there yet.
Everybody generally agrees on what is garbage. Lot of senior management doesn't think AI is garbage or even if they privately think so, they don't say that openly. Falling in line, peer pressure, not wanting to come across as anti-AI luddite etc. All those issues affect the individual contributors too + the added challenge of perception in front of those who decide the bonus and lately, continued employment.
In this fucked up job market, it is easier said than done.
I feel like the chain kinda goes all the way to the top, to the level of shareholders. My boss needs to give his boss the perception that the engineering team is firing on all cylinders and has high velocity, so that he can sell that story to shareholders who could easily invest in another "AI-native" company and make more money because they're growing like crazy.
I feel like it's all just perception and how companies can sell their stories to investors or potential acquirers, and everything else can be punted and dealt with later when we get acquired or when share prices are a zillion dollars etc.
I read the full article and have the same reaction. He's worried that civil rights will be in a better position and that we'll have to continue to defend them from that better position.
Very strong reasoning here. Is there anything this ADHD condition cannot explain?
reply