Asking AI....

[Mont Y. Märzen]

There is no matrix of salts. You are seasoning your beer, just like you season food. It is to taste. Yes, certain salts enhance certain flavors or sensations and those can be desired or not in a style. That is why there is no calculator to 'suggest' the amounts you should put in the beer. But the calcs will tell you what effect they will have on pH and calculate the total concentration. This is no different than the main calculator reporting values for a recipe you formulate. It won't suggest malts or hops or yeast.

And I don't mean I guess & check when aiming for a desired result in a style. That is something I learned based on what the style guidelines suggest the beer should taste like. Then I adjust my salts to achieve the proper balance and hit my target flavors. There was a little trial and error at first as I learned just what 100ppm Calcium achieved or what a certain Chloride:Sulfate ratio tasted like, but that was quick, maybe a few batches worth, and none of those learning beers were terrible, most were quite better than previous iterations of their respective styles. Now, I don't need to waste my time on that research. I just choose my targets, enter my salts, and can even roughly nail the amount on the first try with maybe slight fiddling that likely isn't even detectible. I let the calc do the math and I trust the chemistry for all of my ingredients, salts included.

 

[Sunfire96]

We've implemented AI tools at work and it's been an absolute gamechanger. Some of my team are performing tasks in half the time using a AI chatbot skill/tool that I designed. I use it daily.

Like any other tool it has strengths and limitations and its up to the user to understand those weaknesses to use it most effectively.

 

[Dave Y]

We've implemented AI tools at work and it's been an absolute gamechanger. Some of my team are performing tasks in half the time using a AI chatbot skill/tool that I designed. I use it daily.

Like any other tool it has strengths and limitations and its up to the user to understand those weaknesses to use it most effectively.

I guess you've been fooled too

Like any other tool, you can become proficient and use it with skill, or you be the one saying 'hold my beer' and make it to youtube infamy.

 

[Mont Y. Märzen]

To each their own of course. I'd rather use an actual tool rather than something not designed for my purpose. And I like to learn stuff just because, and so I can be a better brewer. Everyone has their own reasons for brewing. Some folks want to perfect their craft, some like to experiment, some thrive on competition, and others just want to get sloshed and share good times with friends.

 

[Donoroto]

I have found AI tools to be both highly accurate timesavers and ridiculously wrong time-wasters.

At this point, it is still up to the human to trust but verify.

Programming is an AI strength, as the task is determinate: it is correct or not. Creativity is not a strength, as a few posters have noted about ‘answers’, as it is indeterminate. Summaries and certain data analyses are typically faster and as good as.

 

[Hawkbox]

I'd personally rather stop working in IT entirely than give "AI" control of anything. I personally want to understand how things work and I don't have any interest in helping cook the planet while Oracle and Nvidia try to find a way to make money off of cooking video cards.

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

I'd personally rather stop working in IT entirely than give "AI" control of anything. I personally want to understand how things work and I don't have any interest in helping cook the planet while Oracle and Nvidia try to find a way to make money off of cooking video cards.

I quit and regret it, semiretired, I work harder now at a low level job, the money is terrible and tired every night

 

[Hawkbox]

Considering the primary business argument for it is firing people I don't know if buying in would save you. Though the token costs are finally starting to enter the actual realm of what the compute costs and people are losing their minds.

 

[Megary]

Some folks want to perfect their craft, some like to experiment, some thrive on competition, and others just want to get sloshed and share good times with friends.

And others just enjoy the hobby because they find the process of brewing beer relaxing and it gives them some personal Zen time. The rest is irrelevant.

 

[HighVoltageMan!]

I respectively disagree. Asking AI what "recipe" of additives will achieve the desired water profile is considerably more efficient than "guessing and checking".

I guess I have two disagreements with water profiles in general and using AI for coming up with a profile for you.

Water profiles have often been exaggerated among homebrewers and pro's alike. Yeah, it's important, but you really have to have everything else in your process nailed down hard. Even when everything else is perfect, it has a small impact on the beer. If any thing is off on the mash, fermentation, ingredients, etc., it will skew the results of the mineral profile to the point of negation.

Second, everyone perceives flavors slightly different. High levels of sulfate don't taste dry to me, it adds a mineral finish. Others say something else. Understanding you palate will help you discern flavors more accurately, so when some says this finish is dry or not dry or even sweet, you will be able to have a more intelligent conversation about. Unfortunately, you may have to "guess and check" as a process of learning. It's really to important to understand not only the "what" in brewing, but the "whys" may be even more important. AI can get you started, but in the end it's a cooking art done by humans for humans.

 

[Hawkbox]

If someone wants to use something like this I truly don't care that much but I don't understand why people would rather hand it off to a chatbot rather than learn it and understand it.

 

[NorthCoastBrewer]

Agreed - as long as one accepts that responses are (still) statistical word generation.

I also agree with your point, but I refute they are useful for "organizing, analyzing, and otherwise manipulating data and information", because they are not designed for those purposes. The design is to *fool* you into thinking they are.

Back in early 2026, Anthropic build a working C compiler using their 'Generative AI' tools. It didn't match the quality of professional, 'hand crafted', C compilers. But it does offer insights into what is possible with 'Generative AI' models. I've seen similar results, when starting with well written prompts, in other (but much smaller) subjects / topics / 'bodies of knowledge'.

Given that most people using AI are likely spending their work day reviewing AI generated content, it's likely that they won't want to spend 'hobby time' doing the same.

 

[Mont Y. Märzen]

Back in early 2026, Anthropic build a working C compiler using their 'Generative AI' tools. It didn't match the quality of professional, 'hand crafted', C compilers. But it does offer insights into what is possible with 'Generative AI' models. I've seen similar results, when starting with well written prompts, in other (but much smaller) subjects / topics / 'bodies of knowledge'.

Given that most people using AI are likely spending their work day reviewing AI generated content, it's likely that they won't want to spend 'hobby time' doing the same.

And that brings some of that hidden cost to light. Devs and Engineers are now spending loads of time reviewing rapidly generated voluminous code. The bottleneck was never the code generation, it was the review and testing. Using an LLM to generate code faster is just filling up the funnel faster. The size of the neck hasn't changed. Costs are rising quickly, mostly because the relevant companies have been using this as a loss-leader underpricing their own delivery (compute) costs. As they start to move toward profitability, capital outlays are going to skyrocket, which will quickly pin-prick this massive bubble and lots of folks are going to be left with gum in their hair. And that still leaves the technical debt of code no one wrote and even fewer understand.

 

[Mont Y. Märzen]

The one thing that folks are missing is that 'AI' is *not* a tool. It wasn't even designed as one. But it certainly is sold as one, complete with stage magic illusions. (hence my fraud assertion)

The best off-the-cuff analogy I can think of here is pool noodles. If someone claimed pool noodles could be used as hammers, would that make them a tool to drive nails? The folks spending countless hours learning to tweak their prompts are like someone wasting life trying to compress a pool noodle into a shape dense enough to drive a nail. Maybe it will work sometimes, maybe not. But does that really make it a hammer? Then some genius tries to drive a screw with it...

No, the pool noodle was created as a floatation device, not a hammer or screwdriver.

The best part is that may not be true either, while the origin is disputed, one story claims it was originally pipe insulation.

Yes, people do all sorts of crafty things with their noodles but that doesn't mean they are necessarily using their noggins.