# I struggle to believe that AI R&D is ingenious

- HackerByte page: <https://hackerbyte.net/en/stories/an-article-arguing-that-ai-research-and-development-processes-are-not-as-ingenio-50388513>
- Original source: <https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/DALNiKBjMGMF8grme/arjun-panickssery-s-shortform?commentId=fJtaHHHfx45tD7BSL>
- Hacker News discussion: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50388513>
- Submitted to Hacker News: 2026-11-06T05:19:04.000Z

An article arguing that AI research and development processes are not as ingenious as believed.

## AI-generated summary

The author expresses skepticism about the ingenuity of current AI R&D, particularly regarding autonomous research. They cite examples where AI models fail to identify crucial literature, conduct non\-informative experiments, and pursue trivial research directions. While acknowledging some success in specific, fast\-feedback tasks like optimizing Scrabble move listings, the author notes that significant breakthroughs often still require human guidance.

## Key points

- AI models struggle to identify the most important research papers or blog posts.
- AI often conducts experiments with insufficient data, making results unreliable.
- AI tends to pursue trivial research directions with little value.
- Human guidance is often necessary for AI to achieve significant research breakthroughs.
- AI\-generated reports can be difficult to understand, requiring Q&A to clarify results.