This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Jarrod Roberson
TL;DR
This series has been inspired by “conversations” I have had on dev.to and medium.com. Some of which were constructive and drove me and others to new ways of thinking about things, and some were sources of new information for my block lists on the respective platforms.
This series is going to be how I approach instructing machines to produce non-trivial behaviors and applications without any direct support from anyone else without the dogma of all the various religous sects: Clean Code, TDD, DDD, BDSM, XYZ, HEXthisthatandtheother thing ... things to drive you to buying their books, courses or consulting on how to do things their way; the right way.
There is a lot of misinformation about the career I currently refer to as a Machine Instructor. But I am looking for something even more semantically accurate.
So I did what the cool kids do and I went and asked a LLM, in this case Bard.
The first prompt just generated all the ubiquitous but useless terms like:
Prompt
What do you call someone who programs computers?
Response
A person who programs computers is called a computer programmer. They use programming languages to write, test, and maintain code. Computer programmers are essential to the development of software and applications, and they play a vital role in the technology industry.
Here are some other terms that are sometimes used to refer to computer programmers:
- Software developer
- Software engineer
- Coder
- Developer
- Engineer
No matter what they are called, computer programmers are essential to the development of the technology that we use every day. They are the people who create the software that we use to work, play, and communicate. Without computer programmers, our world would be a very different place.
This is the kind of amazing drivel that you get out of these systems right now. I got lucky and it is factually correct on the first try, but as all the output they generate it lacks any nuance and any useful context to the tiny bit of “insight” it seems to be alluding to in the last sentence.
All of those titles are so vague or generalized to the point that they are meaningless. They tell you something and in the case of engineer, they are not even correct. They are no better than when your parents tell people you “work with computers”.
After a few iterations I was able to coax it into giving me something a bit more useful for my intentions in this article.
Prompt
What do you call someone who programs computers? Do not include anything that has programmer, software engineer, developer, software, architect, computer, engineer code or any variations of these words.
What I got back was a bit better, but as you can tell it just ignored part of my constraints.
Response
Here are some alternative names for someone who programs computers, without using the words "programmer", "software engineer", "developer", "software", "architect", "computer", "engineer", or "code":
- Codesmith
- Code monkey
- Code jockey
- Techie
- Geek
- Nerd
- Hacker
- Wizard
- Magician
- Creator These terms are all informal, but they can be used to describe someone who is skilled in programming computers.
These are more evocative and in some cases semantically informative, and contrary to popular belief, there is a semantic difference between Geek and Nerd. Again, the last entry is the most compelling. Creator. I am disappointed that Craftsman or Craftsperson was not included.
So I figured, let me lean into the strengths of a LLM, the large language part, and see if it can find some words that I may have forgotten about.
On my second try I got it to spit out something to inspire some rabbit holing.
Prompt
What are some variations and synonyms for teacher? Include the definition for each output.
Response (abbreviated)*
Here are some variations and synonyms for teacher, along with their definitions:
- Coach - a person who trains and guides a sports team or individual.
- Mentor - a trusted advisor or guide.
- Pedagogue - a teacher or educator.
- Preceptor - a teacher or tutor.
- Scholar - a learned person, especially one who has made a significant contribution to a particular field of study.
- Schoolmaster - a male teacher, especially in a primary school.
- Schoolmistress - a female teacher, especially in a primary school.
- Master - a person who has control or authority over something.
- Mistress - a woman who has control or authority over something.
- Schoolmarm - a derogatory term for a female teacher, especially one who is considered to be strict or old-fashioned.
- Guru - a Hindu or Sikh spiritual teacher.
- Docent - a teacher or lecturer in a museum or art gallery.
- Academician - a person who is an expert in a particular academic field.
- Catechist - a person who teaches the catechism, especially in the Roman Catholic Church.
- Student teacher - a person who is training to be a teacher and is working in a classroom under the supervision of a qualified teacher.
- Pedant - a person who is excessively concerned with minor details and rules.
- Don - a British term for a university professor.
- Drillmaster - a person who trains soldiers or other people in military exercises.
- Governess - a woman who is employed to take care of and educate children in a private household.
- Tutoress - a woman who gives private lessons to students.
- Homeschooler - a parent who teaches their children at home instead of sending them to school.
- Inculcator - a person who instills a particular belief or attitude in someone.
- Practice teacher - a student teacher who is working in a classroom under the supervision of a qualified teacher in order to gain practical experience.
- Regius professor - a professorship that is endowed by a royal charter.
- Didact - a person who teaches in a formal or didactic manner.
- Moralizer - a person who gives moral advice or instruction.
- I removed the obvious/pedestrian output like Educator, Instructor, Professor, Lecturer, etc.
I was delighted that it included Pedagogue, Didact, Preceptor and my favorite Inculcator.
It is interesting that it included Master and Mistress, since neither of those have anything to do with teaching or instruction. I know that what we referred to as Principal now was once Head Master/Mistress, but it did not use those.
That is a significant point that should not be overlooked when using these tools, they are nothing more than data mining tools. The data they mine is the internet and what they infer is what they infer. What this machine learned is that there is a systemic authoritarian aspect implicitly associated with learning/teaching/education for it to include those terms as output from the provided prompt. Same with Pedant, it inferred that a minor details and rules are important to teaching as well. In these cases, this is not the machine hallucinating, it is telling us what the data shows, and it is not wrong.
In the end, I did not find anything more compelling than _Machine Instructor. _
I literally give machines instructions to carry out. The processor has an instruction set, not much more semantically accurate or specific than Machine Instructor when you think about it.
So that is why this series is named like it is.
This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Jarrod Roberson
Jarrod Roberson | Sciencx (2023-05-21T12:02:24+00:00) Solo Machine Instructor Series – Introduction. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2023/05/21/solo-machine-instructor-series-introduction/
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