Code for Cats – or how your LLM is a cosplayer (www.colincornaby.me)

In a recent exploration of AI programming with Claude Opus 4.5, a developer challenged the notion of human-readable code by prompting the LLM to produce code “maintained exclusively by cats.” The resulting function featured excessive whitespace, playful comments, and optimized structure for non-human caretakers, showcasing how LLMs can generate code tailored to whimsical requirements. This approach raises important questions about code quality and the reliance on AI-generated outputs, especially when it comes to debugging and maintenance. The exercise highlighted the potential pitfalls of trusting LLMs without verification, as different prompts yielded dramatically different results, including a preference for a bubble sort algorithm over a more efficient standard library function. This discrepancy emphasizes the need for developers to critically assess LLM outputs, as blindly adhering to recommendations may lead to inefficient or incorrect implementations. Ultimately, this exploration serves as a warning against over-reliance on LLMs, urging engineers to maintain a discerning mindset when navigating AI-assisted development.