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> The statement "Elon is snowball" is a misunderstanding. Elon is likely referring to Elon Musk [...]. The term "snowball" typically refers to a phenomenon, often used metaphorically to describe something growing rapidly in size or importance. [...]

So, the AI despite all its knowledge, can't draw the parallel at all. The question isn't whether the parallel is valid or not, but I think it's obvious to any human that has read a little bit that one could see a parallel.

I don't want to "spoil" the example by being too blunt about what the parallel is, to give AI experts the time to query their favorite models before they index this post and have it too easy, so I intentionally remain vague.

I'm not a AI expert and I frankly don't spend much time thinking about AI in general, but given how intensely AI capabilities are praised all around, I'm rather surprised by this result.

So, my question to HN: Why isn't Google's AI capable of even seeing the link? Is it just their model, or is it something fundamental to LLMs? How long until LLMs can make this link all by themselves?

Comments (16)

PaulHoule · 1d ago

My take on it is that certain people's image, likeness or name are commonly used to induce a state of disorientation and manipulate people. For the past 20 years for instance any site like Yahoo Finance has pictures of Warren Buffet that are used to sell the exact opposite of Buffet's value investing. There was that fad for Dr. Oz. Similarly people today see Elon as either a villain or a savior. It's bad enough that I think of hitting the flag button on any post about him whether it is positive or negative.

Somebody who thinks this way training an AI would try to discourage it from making aimless speculations about him or talking about him any more than necessary.

vdupras · 1d ago

That sounds plausible. Would we call this "alignment"? Could we then speculate that an unaligned model would guess the meaning of that phrase?

PaulHoule · 1d ago

Yes and maybe. I'd guess you could align one to always make a whackadoole argument for something.

JohnFen · 1d ago

> I think it's obvious to any human that has read a little bit that one could see a parallel.

I don't see the parallel, and I'm human. To me, it just reads as a nonsensical statement. I have no idea what it's supposed to mean.

vdupras · 1d ago

Yeah, not the best phrasing ever. I guess I should have written "any human who have read a particular book, which is among the classics"

licebmi__at__ · 1d ago

I tried with Chatgpt, which inferred the relation with Animal Farm. So if they tweaked the model or somehow give weight to this thread, they are really quick.

almosthere · 1d ago

What the hell is "Elon is Snowball"?

Next thread: Can current AI models grok "latte hot"?

rolph · 1d ago

you seem to be concerned about subjectivity, something even humans have trouble with parsing, especially when context is not present

vdupras · 1d ago

I don't think so. I'm not really concerned about whether Google's AI has an opinion about "Elon is Snowball". However, the answer I received is, I believe, the equivalent of "meaning not found". Out of all possible meanings for these 3 words, it couldn't find anything relevant. I'm just saying I'm surprised that despite its enormous corpus and inference capabilities, it couldn't do better.

robthebrew · 1d ago

I couldn't find any meaning either, or indeed grammatical sense.

vdupras · 1d ago

Oh well, it looks like I've missed my mark. I thought this was a good AI example.

So, although I'm spoiling the example, I don't want to drive anyone crazy with nonsense either, so here is it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_(Animal_Farm)

JohnFen · 1d ago

Ahh. Although I've read that book numerous times, I don't think I would ever have connected it to "Elon is Snowball". There's just not enough contextual clues to point me in the direction of Animal Farm to help with the interpretation.

rolph · 1d ago

here it is, context, the subjectivity is now soluble for those familiar with literature.

vdupras · 1d ago

Am I being too optimistic about AI capabilities for supposing that "current events" are always their context? For example, shouldn't an AI infer that anything related to "smoke" just before or after the Pope dies is likely to refer to the Conclave?

rolph · 1d ago

context is very fluid, for example the puff of smoke may have little or nothing to do with conclave, as someone may puff thier smoke to celebrate the life and/or meaningful death of one whom they admire, then next sentence may refer to conclave as one may see the puff of smoke, as they puff thier smoke

incomingpain · 1d ago

>> The statement "Elon is snowball" is a misunderstanding

I had no idea what you meant. I asked Deepseek qwen3 8b. 7 seconds later, explained the whole thing in good depth.

>Is it just their model, or is it something fundamental to LLMs? How long until LLMs can make this link all by themselves?

Obviously not a LLM problem because I guess I knew the whole elon musk is a career snowball guy; but really had no idea what was meant here until after an LLM explained it.

What Elon does is rather simple. 100 years from now, what will exist that doesnt right now. Lets do it; no fear no doubt. We'll do the blood sweat and tears and be the one to do it.

Usually isn't the very first on the scene, optimus robot was started long after boston dynamics had lots of success. Tesla? There were loads of electric self-conversions on the road long before lithium ion batteries were commercialized. He just said it's time to do it.