Harnesses still matter: why models won't figure out their own scaffolding

omarsar0 · x · 2026-09-12

Responding to the claim that models will figure out harnesses on their own, Elvis Saravia argues that generalized models still fail badly in specialized contexts, so harnesses remain a core part of the intelligence stack. He calls for fluid, self-improving harnesses — minimal and adaptive, combining strong context, tools, memory, verifiers, and evals — and shares a reading list of seminal harness papers.

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