Are you kidding? Microsoft has always been shit at math. According to Microsoft Excel, 2 + 2 = 12:04 AM Jan 1, 1900.
this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2025
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Integers are days in Excel, no? So I think 2+2= 12:00 AM Jan 5, 1900.
There's an old story about the lead developer at Texas Instruments saying "I want a computer that fits in my pocket". And then his staff dutifully measured the pocket to spec before proceeding to perform a feat of miniaturization that would revolutionize the modern world.
I'm trying to imagine one of the techies, from way out in the back, saying "Does it have to get the right answer?" Then getting fired, walking off the job, and walking into Microsoft with 10x the salary the next day.
Give Microsoft some credit! Excel has been able to come up with wrong answers for decades. For example, reporting 1900 as a leap year.
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Intel already did that in the 90's with the FDIV bug.
Wrong, they already had that with Excel. There were a bunch of functions that delivered wrong returns for years, and none of the users (mostly economists) had noticed.
What, you don't always work with 16 digit numbers that are automatically truncated? What could go wrong? We don't use 16 digit numbers for anything, really./
It's hard to believe that's still a thing but it is!
Why would anyone use an LLM as calculator?
That just doesn't make sense.
It is like using a calculator as typewriter because it can spell 80085.
So what you are saying is, my car is a typewriter?
Did you just take a picture of your car's boobs at 60k/h? High speed boobs shots hahahaha
Maybe :P
It's a legal requirement when your car hits 80085 that you must take a photo, it supersedes all other laws.
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There are things that could be done to improve Excel. For instance, fully integrate python and allow it to be used to create custom functions. Then, maybe one day, VBA can ride off into the sunset where it belongs.
Adding Copilot to Excel is not an improvement because Copilot and all other LLM based platforms frequently barfs out totally incorrect information about how to do something in Excel.
"You do that using formula."
No, I can't, you worthless pile of shit because THAT FORMULA DOESNT EXIST.
Integrated python scripts in excel sounds like a malware developers dream.
And a nightmare for an application developer told to make some app with a spreadsheet for a database scale
Could result in some very cursed codebases.
"We dont use git, we just update the excel spreadsheet"
I've worked at places where they did that anyway lol
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I mean... Yeah, but the same can be said for VB?
Especially since VBA can make calls to the Windows API directly and through that avenue do all kinds of funky things to your system.
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Surely there’s some sort of sandboxing that could be done? Like start by disallowing sys calls entirely
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This is such a misguided article, sorry.
Obviously you’d be an idiot to use AI to number crunch.
But AI can be extremely useful for sentence analytics. For example, if you’re trying to classify user feedback as positive or negative and then derive categories from the masses of text and squash the text into those categories.
Google Sheets already does tonnes of this and we’re not writing articles about it.
Yeah, it's like complaining that a hammer isn't good at turning a screw. There's a whole trend of Chess content creators featuring games against ChatGPT where it forgets the position or plays illegal moves, and it just doesn't mean anything. ChatGPT was never designed or intended to be able to evaluate a chess position, and incidentally, we do have computer programs that do exactly that and have been better than any human player since the 1990s. So what is even the point?
And what you could do is to enable an LLM to use these tools and reason about their outcome. Complaining that an LLM isn’t good at adding numbers is like complaining that humans aren’t as fast as calculators when multiplying large numbers.
Our very own economic Butlerian jihad.
Such a complicated way just to add more RAND() to formulas.
OK, I'm not really mad at this. I already used Copilot to design a table for me in Excel and it worked really well. It did everything for me, and I just had to copy-paste the formulas into their appropriate spots. If it's built-in, possibly will work better.
Not everybody needs to be an Excel expert, after all. Having that functionality might be actually beneficial.
How do you know those formulas are correct?
I'm talking about using it when you're "not great at Excel", not when "you can't do basic math".
Always verify the results given to you by LLMs.
By verifying that they're correct...? 🤔
I think the concern is that you can come up with a number of formulas that will get correct answers for some combinations of values and not others.
If you do not understand the logic of the formula, and what each function does, how do you verify they are correct and will always give you the results you think they will? Double check every result in its entirety?
I think you're completely missing the point here.
I'm not great at Excel. That doesn't mean I can't do basic math, it means I struggle designing an xlookup or hlookup.
If AI does that for me, I'll be a happy bunny. And then run a dozen different iterations of data to verify that the results I'm getting are correct.
This is what this integration is for - it's not a replacement for a human brain, it's an assistant. As are all LLMs.
it's not a replacement for a human brain, it's an assistant.
This is what I think AI and automation is generally good at and should be used for - mitigating unpleasant or repetitive work so that the focus of the user is productivity/creativity.
This is what this integration is for - it's not a replacement for a human brain, it's an assistant. As are all LLMs.
The context is something we disagree on wholeheartedly. Those funding and fundraising for AI and an enormous subset of those using are not looking to use AI in the way we are talking about. The prior are hoping to use AI to extract value from it at the expense of people who would otherwise need to be paid, or they and claim it can do anything and everything. Those using it, many of them, do not have a sufficient understanding to comprehend the solution. They are basically "vibe coding". Tell the LLM to do something they aren't knowledgeable about, then keep telling it to fix the problems until they don't see problems anymore. Yes, spreadsheet formulas are likely simpler than an app but I know people who use AI for Google Sheets and they rarely test any results, let alone rigorously.
Anecdotal, sure, but I don't have enough faith in humanity to presume everyone else is doing something wildly different.
Edit: To expand, LLMs specifically, are what I consider to be the worst side of "AI". You can use ML and neural networks to create "AI" (self altering, alien blackbox algorithms) to become proficient in analyzing information and solving problems. LLMs create a situation where the model appears intelligent because it knows how to mimic language... and so now we pretend like it can do whatever people can do.
Well... Yeah, I get what you mean, and - in general - I agree.
However, to me it's also a bit like criticising the use of hammers because a lot of idiots hit themselves on the heads with them. Or, even worse, hit others on the heads.
AI/LLMs are a tool, and just like any other tool, they can be misused. That doesn't mean the tool is bad, or immoral, or whatever, to use.
That's why I hate the today's discourse of "anything that has AI is shite be default" that so many people online have.
Let's laugh at obviously bullshit attempt of shoving AI down consumer's throats, but when it comes to actual, proper implementation - like in the case of baking Copilot into Excel - it becomes yet another optional tool at users' disposal.
I think it would be infinitely better for an LLM to walk a user through the use of the formula in their specific use case rather than do it for them... but that won't sell as well because most people don't want to learn to use a spreadsheet they just want to do a thing and move on to something else. This is how it is sold and this is why it is used, in most cases. It's not a hammer that people misused despite there being nothing in the sales material about it's usefulness as a bludgeoning device against other humans. LLMs, spreadsheet copilot included, is commonly packaged and sold as a magic solution that will just do the work for you, with an asterisk and fine print stating that it's for entertainment purposes only and that whoever isn't liable for any false information or whatever bullshit clause they come up with. People use it as it is sold to them and that's what worries me.
another optional tool at users' disposal.
I just had my place of work upgrade me to Windows 11 this week. In order to install office, I was directed by Microsoft to download the "Office 365 Copilot" app which downloaded the office installer. Copilot is not subtle. It may be technically optional but good lord does it want you to know about and use it for everything.
And no, I didn't try it yet. I will likely be trying it and Gemini soon out of curiosity. Last time I tried to use it I was given hallucinated nonexistant python modules and powershell commands that wasted my time. It's been a year or so though.
That's my thinking
If you know what you're doing, it's significantly easier to do it yourself
You at least have some reassurance it's correct (or at least thought through)
Verification is important, but I think you're omitting from your imagination a real and large category of people who have a basic familiarity with spreadsheets and computers, so are able to understand a potential solution and see whether it makes sense, but who do not have the ability to quickly come up with it themselves.
In language it's the difference between receptive and productive vocabulary: there are words which you understand but which you would never say or write because they're part of your receptive, but not productive knowledge.
There are times when this will go wrong, because the LLM will can produce something plausible but incorrect and such a person will fail to spot it. And of course if you blindly trust it with something you're not actually capable of (or willing to) check then you will also get bad results.
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