7 ms·

It's a tough predicament when the industry you're in is moving towards violating your personal preferences and ethics. I'm neither agreeing with or disagreeing

by jmathai 14d ago

It's a tough predicament when the industry you're in is moving towards violating your personal preferences and ethics. I'm neither agreeing with or disagreeing with the author's stance. But this tension crosses the line of "I have an opinion" to "I have an opinion that impacts my livelihood". And I'm witnessing a lot of it.

dbt00 14d ago
For someone who doesn't like doing cryptocurrency, advertising, gig economy bullshit or a host of other things, this is not a new problem. But yeah, it sucks.
pixl97 14d ago
Programmers then: "We don't need unions, it's a bunch of communism that keeps me from making as much money as possible" Programmers now: "Oh no, holy shit, what am I going to do as the market forces us to be a bunch of fucking gremlins. Too bad I threw away the power of collective bargaining" It seems people keep forgetting why unions formed in the first place. Given a chance a company of any size will fully optimize for its own profit regardless of how awful the side effects are to individuals, the environment, and society at large.
- xwkd 14d ago
  If the problems are solved, wouldn't you rather all those programmers use their productive systems-oriented brains on other problems?
  - js8 14d ago
    Yeah. But, unlike China, the West doesn't seem to want to invest very much into real-world engineering. Except maybe military for forever wars, which is ethically way worse. This is a side effect of capital accumulation. There's no one to buy the products (as low/middle class gets squeezed) so no reason to invest. Instead, oligarchs hold money in assets and compete over control, ultimately with violence.
- goatlover 14d ago
  See West Virginia coal mining in the early 20th century. Resulted in a lot of violent conflict as desperate workers were getting squeezed for every penny and owned little of their own, often working in company towns.
- js8 14d ago
  I was about to say, it's not just IT industry, it's capitalism leading to this.
- bbor 14d ago
  I love the pro-union sentiment, but I don't think we need to treat "programmers" so monolothically, and we definitely should act like its too late. Now is the perfect moment to unionize!
- matherial 14d ago
  I don't think there are successful examples of unions being able to fight major technological shifts in the long haul. At best, they can force the management to accept a suicide pact - we're all slowly going down together. That may be preferable to sudden layoffs, but it's still not great, as evidenced by the troubles of the US auto industry. Instead, I think that doctors and lawyers have it right: they effectively have the authority to decide who's allowed to practice the profession, so ChatGPT can't write you prescriptions or defend you in court.
  - vips7L 14d ago
    Other engineering specialties are typically protected under law in many states as well.
almostdeadguy 14d ago
I was probably close to where the author was a couple months ago, and now am even more on the "doomer" side of things. But I think many skeptics of the technology have the idea in the back of their mind that "if this thing actually pans it out will be worse than if it doesn't". If it doesn't pan out, the thing evaporates in a bubble, your job goes back to normal. If it does, your job is toast no matter what (and seemingly many jobs). If software is primarily supply constrained, that will eventually change. Lately I'm more inclined to believe the latter is true, but I think skeptics are often hedging like this.
- jmathai 14d ago
  The chasm is wide between skeptics and optimists. It's as interesting psychologically as it is technically.
  - sweetheart 14d ago
    It really is, it's fascinating.
  - goatlover 14d ago
    The question for optimists is, if AI succeeds in it's promise, what sort of society do they envision being the result? For one thing, I don't think everyone except the extremely wealthy being on basic income is ideal or better than what we have now.
    - almostdeadguy 14d ago
      Yeah I'd actually call myself a "pessimist" personally, I think AI seems to be advancing at a rate where we should be concerned about that. I used to be of the mind that dooming was entirely about marketing/hype, but I don't believe that any more. The models are really good, the huggingface hack was extremely concerning, and when their executives post things like this, I believe them (even if I don't like them): https://x.com/deanwball/status/2094788634729660906 https://x.com/deanwball/status/2094788634729660906
    - 14d ago
calvinmorrison 14d ago
not really. I don't work for FAANG because they're evil (plus im unqualified). I choose to mostly work for ethical companies. Locally declined to interview at the casino gambling company, the local buy now pay later usurers as an app, for elsevier. I left jobs when they offshored teams. I left jobs when they mandated unproven vaccines. I don't make as much money as others though. I should totally write python and join some fintech

by jmathai 14d ago

dbt00 14d ago

For someone who doesn't like doing cryptocurrency, advertising, gig economy bullshit or a host of other things, this is not a new problem. But yeah, it sucks.

pixl97 14d ago

Programmers then: "We don't need unions, it's a bunch of communism that keeps me from making as much money as possible" Programmers now: "Oh no, holy shit, what am I going to do as the market forces us to be a bunch of fucking gremlins. Too bad I threw away the power of collective bargaining" It seems people keep forgetting why unions formed in the first place. Given a chance a company of any size will fully optimize for its own profit regardless of how awful the side effects are to individuals, the environment, and society at large.

xwkd 14d ago
If the problems are solved, wouldn't you rather all those programmers use their productive systems-oriented brains on other problems?
- js8 14d ago
  Yeah. But, unlike China, the West doesn't seem to want to invest very much into real-world engineering. Except maybe military for forever wars, which is ethically way worse. This is a side effect of capital accumulation. There's no one to buy the products (as low/middle class gets squeezed) so no reason to invest. Instead, oligarchs hold money in assets and compete over control, ultimately with violence.
goatlover 14d ago
See West Virginia coal mining in the early 20th century. Resulted in a lot of violent conflict as desperate workers were getting squeezed for every penny and owned little of their own, often working in company towns.
js8 14d ago
I was about to say, it's not just IT industry, it's capitalism leading to this.
bbor 14d ago
I love the pro-union sentiment, but I don't think we need to treat "programmers" so monolothically, and we definitely should act like its too late. Now is the perfect moment to unionize!
matherial 14d ago
I don't think there are successful examples of unions being able to fight major technological shifts in the long haul. At best, they can force the management to accept a suicide pact - we're all slowly going down together. That may be preferable to sudden layoffs, but it's still not great, as evidenced by the troubles of the US auto industry. Instead, I think that doctors and lawyers have it right: they effectively have the authority to decide who's allowed to practice the profession, so ChatGPT can't write you prescriptions or defend you in court.
- vips7L 14d ago
  Other engineering specialties are typically protected under law in many states as well.

almostdeadguy 14d ago

I was probably close to where the author was a couple months ago, and now am even more on the "doomer" side of things. But I think many skeptics of the technology have the idea in the back of their mind that "if this thing actually pans it out will be worse than if it doesn't". If it doesn't pan out, the thing evaporates in a bubble, your job goes back to normal. If it does, your job is toast no matter what (and seemingly many jobs). If software is primarily supply constrained, that will eventually change. Lately I'm more inclined to believe the latter is true, but I think skeptics are often hedging like this.

jmathai 14d ago
The chasm is wide between skeptics and optimists. It's as interesting psychologically as it is technically.
- sweetheart 14d ago
  It really is, it's fascinating.
- goatlover 14d ago
  The question for optimists is, if AI succeeds in it's promise, what sort of society do they envision being the result? For one thing, I don't think everyone except the extremely wealthy being on basic income is ideal or better than what we have now.
  - almostdeadguy 14d ago
    Yeah I'd actually call myself a "pessimist" personally, I think AI seems to be advancing at a rate where we should be concerned about that. I used to be of the mind that dooming was entirely about marketing/hype, but I don't believe that any more. The models are really good, the huggingface hack was extremely concerning, and when their executives post things like this, I believe them (even if I don't like them): https://x.com/deanwball/status/2094788634729660906 https://x.com/deanwball/status/2094788634729660906
  - 14d ago

calvinmorrison 14d ago

not really. I don't work for FAANG because they're evil (plus im unqualified). I choose to mostly work for ethical companies. Locally declined to interview at the casino gambling company, the local buy now pay later usurers as an app, for elsevier. I left jobs when they offshored teams. I left jobs when they mandated unproven vaccines. I don't make as much money as others though. I should totally write python and join some fintech