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[ARTICLE · art-93230] src=news.ycombinator.com ↗ pub= topic=ai-agents verified=true sentiment=· neutral

How do you decide that an agent's output is good enough to stop iterating?

A developer on Hacker News asks how to decide when an AI agent's output is good enough to stop iterating, citing the Henry Kissinger anecdote where he repeatedly asked Winston Lord if a document was his best work. The author warns that with AI, this process can lead to infinite loops and seeks community approaches.

read1 min views1 publishedAug 12, 2026

| |||||||||||| 1 point by | You may know the anegdote of Henry Kissinger. He asked Winston Lord to prepare a document. Each time Winston handed him the document, he asked, “Is this the best you can do?” He finally started to read it only when Winston said "yes". With AI it is easy to work like that, but hard to decide when to stop and we can fall in an infinite loop. Curious to know what your approaches on that point? | ||||||||||| |

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