Michael Peyton-Lebed wrote: > > In an attempt to steer this discussion back in a constructive direction, I > > would like to state that I don't think we should always adopt new > > technologies > > or services without careful consideration. This seems to directly > > contradict > > the main argument of the people who are in favor of LLM use, which is > > that they > > want to be free to use whatever "tools" they want. > Historically people have been able to use whatever tools they want to > *produce* open-source contributions.
That statement sounds good, but unfortunately it is not true. In the creation of an MIT licensed code, you were never able to use GPL 3 codes. In the creation of any such code, you were never able to use tools at anyone's disposal such as theft, espionage, plagiarism. Those are facts so basic that it's easy to forget them, so when another such basic fact comes under discussion, its mere discussion is dismissed outright. In fact there have been heated debates about each of those in the programming community before the time of some people discussing this in this thread, so it's important to remind those discussion have indeed happened. > Nobody has argued that we need some > kind of consensus on whether or not people can write their code in Vim or > Emacs. There has never been question of who the code belongs to once it's been written out of Vim or Emacs. If an editor attempted this I can assure you there would be considerations, as there have been in the past, e.g. with pastebins that had egregious policies. > We do need consensus on tools that are shared by the whole > development community, e.g. CI. I disagree, everyone can run their own CI if they so wish. Many have. > That is to say, "we" are not adopting LLMs. Some contributors are. If Bob adopts LLMs and the substance we work with, the code in the repository, now contains LLM output, then if I start working with, or merely even utilizing, this code, then I too have adopted LLMs. Adoption by one contributor immediately means adoption by not just all contributors, but also by all users. I'm surprised people will have long discussions about the "virality of GPL", the outcomes of which can be ignored by every end user, whereas in this situation, where there isn't even a way to excuse yourself out of the outcomes, there is no recognition of such an issue. > This is one of the reasons why I think Simon's proposal is pretty good: it > focusses on the part of the process that exists in the shared space that we > all occupy: the contribution and review process; our growth as a community > of developers who care about the project. The ownership of the code in the repository everyone commits to is a matter that exists in the shared space we all occupy. > To be blunt, I think this is the best we can do right now. It seems to me > that the *crux* of the most heated disagreements in this thread is about > whether or not use of LLMs is *immoral*. There has never been an argument over whether using Vim or Emacs is immoral. Therefore there is no analogy. I am 100% sure if some unsavory people came out with EugenicsEmacs or GenocideVim we'd be having a discussion about it and whether we want contributors using these, and if users caught wind of this being allowed there would at least be five separate boycotts of Haskell as a whole. > I think it's totally > understandable for people to care about that, in both directions, and I > agree that (if you oppose the use of LLMs) collective action via individual > projects rejecting them can be effective. But it also seems clear that the > GHC developers as a group do *not* have consensus on that question. Maybe > other projects do, especially smaller and less diverse ones. But given the > state of disagreement it seems to me that the only reasonable goal for > a *policy > for GHC* can be to focus on the things we *do *agree on, which I think the > current policy does pretty well. > > We should continue to talk about the issues, but I think it would benefit > everyone to stamp out even a limited policy now so we have something! > > M I think a policy allowing by fiat a questioned practice without addressing the posed questions because those questions are difficult to answer is not a good policy. Instead what Mr Jaro said before applies: "I don't think we should always adopt new technologies or services without careful consideration". > On Fri, 31 Jul 2026 at 12:45, Jaro Reinders via ghc-devs < > [email protected]> wrote: > > In an attempt to steer this discussion back in a constructive direction, I > > would like to state that I don't think we should always adopt new > > technologies > > or services without careful consideration. This seems to directly > > contradict > > the main argument of the people who are in favor of LLM use, which is that > > they > > want to be free to use whatever "tools" they want. > > Besides that argument, the only argument I've heard is that LLM use gives > > people the feeling of being more productive. But this has not been backed > > up > > with "hard evidence", let alone under the requirement of "carefully > > reviewing > > and understanding every line generated by an LLM". I doubt anyone can > > really > > achieve a worthwhile productivity gain compared to limiting LLM use to: > > prototyping, high level design, asking questions, and reviewing code (uses > > of > > LLMs which are not in question). > > Jaro > > _______________________________________________ > > ghc-devs mailing list -- [email protected] > > To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected] > > _______________________________________________ ghc-devs mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]
