Top all-time · #4036
Steve Newman
Personal blog · secondthoughts.aiaiphilosophy
Steve Newman writes Second Thoughts, a personal blog at secondthoughts.ai about ai and philosophy. Since 2025, 19 different Hacker News readers have linked it 34 times, most often “AI coding tools can reduce productivity”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-14, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (5) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Steve Newman's posts on AI coding productivity, why robotics is hard, and a walkthrough of an IMO math problem. Commenters cite them as sources; none explicitly praise the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 5 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Accessible analysis of the big issues in AI.
Most-linked posts?
- AI coding tools can reduce productivity4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2025-07-10
- Reasons robotics is hard3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2026-09-02
- A Project Is Not a Bundle of Tasks3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-11-04
- GPT-5: The Case of the Missing Agent3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-09-04
- We should prepare for the possibility of profound change2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-12-19
- Software Too Cheap to Meter2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2026-01-06
What Hacker News says?
The mathematics research results are certainly impressive, but I don't see what that has to do with robotics. Waymo is getting somewhere, but it's been a long slog. There doesn't seem to be much progress on, say, package delivery. For more, see: https://secondthoughts.ai/p/14-reasons-robotics-is-hard
Comment linking /p/14-reasons-robotics-is-hard
on “I resigned from Anthropic today”Submitted AI coding tools can reduce productivity as a story · 279 points
HN discussionFor people who prefer reading to watching videos, I wrote a detailed account of my process for solving one of last year's IMO problems, along with thoughts on how this relates to AI: https://secondthoughts.ai/p/solving-math-olympiad-problems
Comment linking /p/solving-math-olympiad-problems
on “OpenAI claims gold-medal performance at IMO 2025”Submitted Reasons robotics is hard as a story · 131 points
HN discussionTheres an interesting recent study showing how poorly developers measure their own productivity: https://secondthoughts.ai/p/ai-coding-slowdown HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44526912
Comment linking /p/ai-coding-slowdown
on “AI coding tools can reduce productivity”Submitted Human Drivers Will Kill 11 People While You Read This as a story · 7 points
HN discussion> I am not a coder (much), but I have to wonder if my experience is common in the coding world? It is, yes. Surely someone will come and tell you it doesn’t happen to them, but all that tells you is that it ostensibly isn’t universal , but still common enough you’ll find no end of complaints. > Maybe there are ways to avoid this (and others) pitfall with prompting? Prompting can’t help you with things not in the tra…
Comment linking /p/ai-coding-slowdown
on “To AI or not to AI”Submitted A Project Is Not a Bundle of Tasks as a story · 5 points
HN discussionIt's funny how that works in your mind. There comes a snake oil salesmen and says that LLMs are the bees'knees and you just take as a given without any critical thought. But when people actually have proof that LLMs are nothing special and even reduce productivity (by 19% in experienced developers): https://secondthoughts.ai/p/ai-coding-slowdown you are screaming to the heavens for proof. I am the last to stop the A…
Comment linking /p/ai-coding-slowdown
on “It Would Be Good If the AI Bubble Burst”Submitted Slow Adoption Applies to Evil AI, Too as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted AI Can Help Plan a Bioweapon as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted Don’t Believe Robotics Demo Videos as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted We should prepare for the possibility of profound change as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted Never Trust a Number as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted 45 Thoughts About Agents as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Software Too Cheap to Meter as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Presenting the Case That the Future Will Be Unrecognizable as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Current AIs struggle to create a whole that exceeds the sum of its parts as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted A Project Is Not a Bundle of Tasks as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted GPT-5: The Case of the Missing Agent as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Anthropic's Scion: A Four Year Project in Five Months as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted What I saw around the Curve as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Anecdotes Everywhere, Evidence Almost Nowhere (The State of AI in Mid-2026) as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted From Compute Overhang to Compute Crunch as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Is AI 2027 coming true? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Centaur Era as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted To Forecast AI's Impact on Biosecurity, We Asked: Why Are Attacks So Rare? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Clawdbot and Moltbook Are a False Alarm – For Now as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Discarding the Shaft-and-Belt Model of Software Development as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Software Too Cheap to Meter as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
