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> I argue that there will be plenty for us to work on, grounded in the “AI as normal technology” thesis There is no doubt that AI is creating more work than it

by panny 21d ago

> I argue that there will be plenty for us to work on, grounded in the “AI as normal technology” thesis There is no doubt that AI is creating more work than it produces. Every single line it writes has to be reviewed by someone because AI cannot take responsibility. And it can spew out decades worth of written code every day. Every line is untrustworthy and must be manually verified. The problem is I don't want to do this work. You don't either. Everyone I've seen using AI to write code does not do this work. Anyone who says they do this work is lying, to you or themselves or a little of both. People just YOLO and ship it. If that is the only work left to do when using AI, I'll just do it the old way. If that's not good enough to stay employeed, then I'll just find a new career.

copperx 21d ago
Programming is a vocation. It became a career because of sheer luck.
r_lee 21d ago
what makes you think companies will do it the "old way" when the new way is much more economically viable? I'm not saying this as in I love it but I just don't see how we'd go back
sublinear 21d ago
This is exactly correct. The whole point of software is to precisely build what is intended. The perception of the quality of the result is relative to the original requirements and expectations. It shouldn't be surprising that people who are ignorant of industry specs and who have very low standards are impressed. They've always been impressed by any software at all if it scratches their immediate itch. The bigger threat to employment is the same as it's always been: the employer's wishes. Many of those wishes are not out of the kindness of their heart. They are forced by regulations and contractual obligation. What we actually saw was an initial dismissal of how deep that specification can/should go. I'm expecting there to be a wave of people pushing for reform instead when they realize LLMs aren't moving the needle much. That's good. That's where all this energy belongs. We always want better ideas. It doesn't change the fact that humans still need to implement the new specs when they're new. Ah, you say, then the bots take over? No. As ever, that's just packaged as a standard library. There's always another new layer to think about integrating it with which again requires a human in the loop. What's most surprising isn't the AI, but all the profound ignorance that exists out there, even from big shot execs! All work works like this. If it didn't, the economy would have collapsed during every technological milestone in human history.

by panny 21d ago

copperx 21d ago

Programming is a vocation. It became a career because of sheer luck.

r_lee 21d ago

what makes you think companies will do it the "old way" when the new way is much more economically viable? I'm not saying this as in I love it but I just don't see how we'd go back

sublinear 21d ago

This is exactly correct. The whole point of software is to precisely build what is intended. The perception of the quality of the result is relative to the original requirements and expectations. It shouldn't be surprising that people who are ignorant of industry specs and who have very low standards are impressed. They've always been impressed by any software at all if it scratches their immediate itch. The bigger threat to employment is the same as it's always been: the employer's wishes. Many of those wishes are not out of the kindness of their heart. They are forced by regulations and contractual obligation. What we actually saw was an initial dismissal of how deep that specification can/should go. I'm expecting there to be a wave of people pushing for reform instead when they realize LLMs aren't moving the needle much. That's good. That's where all this energy belongs. We always want better ideas. It doesn't change the fact that humans still need to implement the new specs when they're new. Ah, you say, then the bots take over? No. As ever, that's just packaged as a standard library. There's always another new layer to think about integrating it with which again requires a human in the loop. What's most surprising isn't the AI, but all the profound ignorance that exists out there, even from big shot execs! All work works like this. If it didn't, the economy would have collapsed during every technological milestone in human history.