My thousand dollar iPhone can't do math
by rafaelcosta on 2/1/2026, 8:51:56 PM
https://journal.rafaelcosta.me/my-thousand-dollar-iphone-cant-do-math/
Comments
by: csmantle
Methodology is one thing; I can't really agree that deploying an LLM to do sums is great. Almost as hilarious as asking "What's moon plus sun?"<p>But phenomenon is another thing. Apple's numerical APIs are producing inconsistent results on a minority of devices. <i>This</i> is something worth Apple's attention.
2/2/2026, 12:16:15 AM
by: raincole
Low level numerical operation optimizations are often not reproduceable. For example: <a href="https://www.intel.com/content/dam/develop/external/us/en/documents/run-to-run-reproducible-results-with-intel-tools.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.intel.com/content/dam/develop/external/us/en/doc...</a> (2013)<p>But it's still surprising that that LLM doesn't work on iPhone 16 at all. After all LLMs are known for their tolerance to quantization.
2/1/2026, 11:08:02 PM
by: Buttons840
I clicked hoping this would be about how old graphing calculators are generally better math companions than a phone.<p>The best way to do math on my phone I know of is the HP Prime emulator.
2/1/2026, 10:58:19 PM
by: lionkor
I could not parse most of this article. So, it's all vibe coded and you're blaming the silicon?
2/1/2026, 11:14:53 PM
by: johngossman
Posting some code that reproduces the bug could help not only Apple but you and others.
2/2/2026, 12:06:32 AM
by: _kulang
Maybe this is why my damn keyboard predictive text is so gloriously broken
2/1/2026, 11:45:22 PM
by: giancarlostoro
I closed the article when I read the first sentence. LLMs are not the first thing I grab when I want to do math, they're maybe the second tool.
2/1/2026, 11:40:22 PM
by: bri3d
I love to see real debugging instead of conspiracy theories!<p>Did you file a radar? (silently laughing while writing this, but maybe there's someone left at Apple who reads those)
2/1/2026, 10:46:19 PM
by: the_arun
Is it a clickbait? Can’t it do math or run llm?
2/1/2026, 10:46:26 PM
by: refulgentis
.
2/1/2026, 11:50:47 PM
by: tehwebguy
Here’s one that kills me:<p>- Tightening some bolts, listening to something via airpods<p>- Spec tells me torque in Nm<p>- Torque wrench is in ft lbs<p>- “Hey Siri, what’s X newton meters in foot pounds?”<p>- “Here’s some fucking website: ”
2/1/2026, 11:49:25 PM
by: PlatoIsADisease
You don't buy Apple products because of the quality, you buy it because its more expensive than the value of it. Its a demonstration of wealth. This is called Veblen good, and a phenomena called out as early as Thomas Hobbes.<p>What you need to do is carry 2 phones. A phone that does the job, and a phone for style.<p>I didn't invent the laws of nature, I just follow them.
2/1/2026, 11:18:30 PM
by: vanviegen
Perfect conclusion: my expensive and rather new phone is broken by design, so I just buy an even newer and more expensive one from the same vendor.<p>The heroic attempt at debugging this though makes me sympathize with all of those engineers that must be doing low-level LLM development these days and getting just noise out of their black boxes.
2/1/2026, 10:59:01 PM