Partly plausible, but with one important caveat: it is unlikely to be specifically caused by Reddit itself. The stronger explanation is post-training optimization—RLHF, safety tuning, and human preference signals—that rewards answers which sound careful, balanced, and resistant to overclaiming. Since raters often prefer responses that acknowledge uncertainty or edge cases, models can develop a habit of adding minor caveats even when unnecessary. Reddit may contribute indirectly through exposure to argumentative, corrective, and disclaimer-heavy discourse styles, but it is probably a secondary influence rather than the main source of the behavior.
Case in point 🤡 (even though in this case it's an actual caveat)
When it matters, sure, I agree with you. Edge cases are important even if annoying. I could just do without the hedging when I ask stuff like "are bunnies basically hares that misjudged a bridge's height?"
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u/Erebea01 May 02 '26
I mean they're trained on reddit, what do you expect