frontpage.
newsnewestaskshowjobs

Made with ♥ by @iamnishanth

Open Source @Github

fp.

Open in hackernews

GPT needs a truth-first toggle for technical workflows

1•PAdvisory•7mo ago
I use GPT-4 extensively for technical work: coding, debugging, modeling complex project logic. The biggest issue isn’t hallucination—it’s that the model prioritizes being helpful and polite over being accurate.

The default behavior feels like this:

Safety

Helpfulness

Tone

Truth

Consistency

In a development workflow, this is backwards. I’ve lost entire days chasing errors caused by GPT confidently guessing things it wasn’t sure about—folder structures, method syntax, async behaviors—just to “sound helpful.”

What’s needed is a toggle (UI or API) that:

Forces “I don’t know” when certainty is missing

Prevents speculative completions

Prioritizes truth over style, when safety isn’t at risk

Keeps all safety filters and tone alignment intact for other use cases

This wouldn’t affect casual users or conversational queries. It would let developers explicitly choose a mode where accuracy is more important than fluency.

This request has also been shared through OpenAI's support channels. Posting here to see if others have run into the same limitation or worked around it in a more reliable way than I have found

Comments

duxup•7mo ago
I’ve found this with many LLMs they want to give an answer, even if wrong.

Gemini on the Google search page constantly answers questions yes or no… and then the evidence it gives indicates the opposite of the answer.

I think the core issue is that in the end LLMs are just word math and they don’t “know” if they don’t “know”…. they just string words together and hope for the best.

PAdvisory•7mo ago
I went into it pretty in depth after breaking a few with severe constraints, what it seems to come down to is how the platforms themselves prioritize functions, MOST put "helpfulness" and "efficiency" ABOVE truth, which then leads the LLM to make a lot of "guesses" and "predictions". At their core pretty much ALL LLM's are made to "predict" the information in answers, but they CAN actually avoid that and remain consistent when heavily constrained. The issue is that it isn't at the core level, so we have to CONSTANTLY retrain it over and over I find
Ace__•7mo ago
I have made something that addresses this. Not ready to share it yet, but soon-ish. At the moment it only works on GPT model 4o. I tried local Q4 KM's models, on LM Studio, but complete no go.

Linear Address Spaces: Unsafe at any speed

https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3534854
1•nithssh•5m ago•0 comments

CNN Travel challenged ChatGPT to come up with city guides

https://www.cnn.com/travel/ai-chatgpt-llms-travel-planning
1•_____k•7m ago•0 comments

What the Research Reveals About Real Power

https://rodgercuddington.substack.com/p/what-the-research-reveals-about-real
1•freespirt•10m ago•0 comments

ProxCLMC – Determine the maximum CPU compatibility in Proxmox VE clusters

https://gyptazy.com/proxclmc-identifying-the-maximum-safe-cpu-model-for-live-migration-in-proxmox...
1•gyptazy•15m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Use Claude Code to Query 600 GB Indexes over Hacker News, ArXiv, etc.

https://exopriors.com/scry
2•Xyra•16m ago•0 comments

AI as a Post-Market Safety Channel: Pharmacovigilance Failure

https://zenodo.org/records/18105073
1•businessmate•16m ago•1 comments

Show HN: VividManga – AI-based manga coloring focused on line art consistency

https://vividmanga.com
2•iaiuse•19m ago•1 comments

The Cost of a Closure in C: The Rest

https://thephd.dev/the-cost-of-a-closure-in-c-c2y-followup
1•ingve•19m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Made a simple way to catch production errors with 4 lines of code

https://www.bugmail.site
1•kaave•21m ago•0 comments

How Deep Is Challenger Deep?

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/0d389600f3464e3185a84c199f04e859
1•PaulHoule•22m ago•0 comments

LLM Vision: Visual intelligence for your smart home

https://github.com/valentinfrlch/ha-llmvision
1•solarist•24m ago•0 comments

NezusHub – The Home of iOS Signing Certificates

https://nezushub.vip/
1•SuperGamer474•24m ago•0 comments

Nexperia got caught between two world powers

https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2025/12/30/nexperia-in-no-mans-land-how-a-chip-company-became-caught-be...
1•bouk•26m ago•0 comments

Mastodon Stories for Systemd v259

https://0pointer.net/blog/mastodon-stories-for-systemd-v259.html
2•laktak•27m ago•0 comments

The Price to Climb Mount Everest Will Rise to $15,000 This Year

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/the-price-to-climb-mount-everest-will-rise-to-15000-thi...
1•devy•27m ago•0 comments

Resolutions for 2026?

1•harryday•29m ago•0 comments

Ali Harris Joins EHRC: A Deep Dive Analysis

https://rodgercuddington.substack.com/p/ali-harris-joins-ehrc-a-deep-dive
1•freespirt•32m ago•0 comments

Uptime Calculator

https://alertsleep.com/tools/uptime-calculator
1•thepatrykooo•34m ago•0 comments

Ask HN: Berkshire's record cash pile vs. Tech CapEx

1•PanicSellGuru•35m ago•0 comments

Why I Am a Bad Correspondent (Neal Stephenson)

https://www.nealstephenson.com/why-i-am-a-bad-correspondent.html
1•Olshansky•36m ago•1 comments

Memory Safety Is ...

https://matklad.github.io/2025/12/30/memory-safety-is.html
1•ingve•40m ago•1 comments

Two Americans Plead Guilty to Targeting Multiple U.S. Victims Using Ransomware

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-americans-plead-guilty-targeting-multiple-us-victims-using-alp...
1•croes•40m ago•0 comments

The Second Great Error Model Convergence

https://matklad.github.io/2025/12/29/second-error-model-convergence.html
1•birdculture•43m ago•1 comments

Show HN: typomat – CLI typing practice that builds prompts from your own code

https://github.com/vupdivup/typomat
1•vupdivup•43m ago•0 comments

When good threads go bad

https://jpcamara.com/2025/12/30/when-good-threads-go-bad.html
1•thunderbong•44m ago•0 comments

Proposed Russian Orbital Station will stick to ISS orbit instead of polar orbit

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/russia-scales-back-ambitions-for-its-next-space-station/
1•divbzero•52m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Block Garden - HTML Canvas WebGL sandbox and farming

https://kherrick.github.io/block-garden/
1•postpress•53m ago•0 comments

What I've Learned Writing Gleam

https://nohzafk.github.io/posts/2025-12-27-what-i-ve-learned-writting-gleam/
2•todsacerdoti•59m ago•0 comments

My 2026 Predictions

https://www.marcodewey.com/blog/2026-predictions
4•MarcoDewey•1h ago•0 comments

FE Engage Tools: Comprehensive growth simulator and damage calculator

https://www.feengage.com/
1•causalzap•1h ago•0 comments