It's a false dichotomy. Something that
s "just another tool" can still have the capacity to end the world as we know it.
Steam engine and electricity ended the world as 99% of human history knew it. Nuclear bombs can very well end the world as we know it, or even end it altogether literally.
When we constraint the scope to coding, AI can very much end it, if not for everybody, for the huge majority of current professionals - they'll either be out of a job, or glorified prompt jockeys, and both cases would be "the end of coding as we know it" for them.
justinpaulson•6mo ago
I think "glorified prompt jockeys" is an interesting description, and reminds me of the term "code monkey." I feel that the real job is to be a "product developer", and it always has been.
Whether I'm a "glorified code monkey" or a "glorified prompt jockey", I'm still just trying to create a product as quickly as I can and add value to the process along the way (maybe that's the glorified part?).
Now, we can spend even more time focusing on making a good product for users and less time on coding abstractions.
coldtea•6mo ago
>I feel that the real job is to be a "product developer", and it always has been. (...) Whether I'm a "glorified code monkey" or a "glorified prompt jockey", I'm still just trying to create a product as quickly as I can and add value to the process along the way
I dunno, I didn't get into IT to be a "product developer" or to "solve business problems" in the abstract sense.
I got to it because I liked coding, computers, algorithms, solving problems with code, and all the rest.
If I had such little regard for coding and so much regard for solving business problems and developing products, I'd just start out to be a manager :)
taylodl•6mo ago
- Visual Studio changed coding as we knew it
- SQL changed coding as we knew it
- Haskell changed coding as we knew it
- APL changed coding as we knew it
- HTML + CSS + JavaScript changed coding as we knew it
I could go on and on and on and on, I'm just violently agreeing with you! :)
Will AI change coding as we know it? Yes! And for many of us, it already has!
coldtea•6mo ago
Nah, none of them changed coding as we know it.
At best they changed some aspects of coding for some niche or some subset of users. But at best they just introduced a new workflow or paradigm that co-existed with the others.
APL and Haskell are so niche as to not have any impact (Haskell inspired languages like Elm and Rust included) to most working programmers and programming "as we know it".
Same, before SQL there were many query dialects, for both relational and non-relational database engines, and of course many non-relational engines (the norm in the 70s).
HTML+CSS+Javascript still involved ages old coding practices (a C/algol style language, prototypes and scheme-like closures, etc) and UI practices (forms, buttons, dropdowns, textboxes, callbacks, RPCs), plus hefty backend server programming.
AI, on the other hand, has the potential to change coding altogether, end to end (whether one writes C drivers or front-end code or whatever) and even eliminate the field for MOST people.
taylodl•6mo ago
> at best they just introduced a new workflow or paradigm that co-existed with the others
Which is all AI is doing. The workflow is the only thing that has changed so far.
coldtea•6mo ago
Nobody argued it has already ended coding or at least coding as we know it.
We argue whether it will end it.
That said, "the workflow is the only thing changed so far" you omit that the workflow change includes the code being written automatically for you in large part. That's not batch compiling to personal compiler. That's not editor vs IDE. That's way bigger.
gregplaysguitar•6mo ago
The fact that it is both the end of coding as we know it and also just another tool is essentially the point of the post. It doesn’t quite come through in the title.
coldtea•6mo ago
Steam engine and electricity ended the world as 99% of human history knew it. Nuclear bombs can very well end the world as we know it, or even end it altogether literally.
When we constraint the scope to coding, AI can very much end it, if not for everybody, for the huge majority of current professionals - they'll either be out of a job, or glorified prompt jockeys, and both cases would be "the end of coding as we know it" for them.
justinpaulson•6mo ago
Whether I'm a "glorified code monkey" or a "glorified prompt jockey", I'm still just trying to create a product as quickly as I can and add value to the process along the way (maybe that's the glorified part?).
Now, we can spend even more time focusing on making a good product for users and less time on coding abstractions.
coldtea•6mo ago
I dunno, I didn't get into IT to be a "product developer" or to "solve business problems" in the abstract sense.
I got to it because I liked coding, computers, algorithms, solving problems with code, and all the rest.
If I had such little regard for coding and so much regard for solving business problems and developing products, I'd just start out to be a manager :)
taylodl•6mo ago
- SQL changed coding as we knew it
- Haskell changed coding as we knew it
- APL changed coding as we knew it
- HTML + CSS + JavaScript changed coding as we knew it
I could go on and on and on and on, I'm just violently agreeing with you! :)
Will AI change coding as we know it? Yes! And for many of us, it already has!
coldtea•6mo ago
At best they changed some aspects of coding for some niche or some subset of users. But at best they just introduced a new workflow or paradigm that co-existed with the others.
APL and Haskell are so niche as to not have any impact (Haskell inspired languages like Elm and Rust included) to most working programmers and programming "as we know it".
Same, before SQL there were many query dialects, for both relational and non-relational database engines, and of course many non-relational engines (the norm in the 70s).
HTML+CSS+Javascript still involved ages old coding practices (a C/algol style language, prototypes and scheme-like closures, etc) and UI practices (forms, buttons, dropdowns, textboxes, callbacks, RPCs), plus hefty backend server programming.
AI, on the other hand, has the potential to change coding altogether, end to end (whether one writes C drivers or front-end code or whatever) and even eliminate the field for MOST people.
taylodl•6mo ago
Which is all AI is doing. The workflow is the only thing that has changed so far.
coldtea•6mo ago
We argue whether it will end it.
That said, "the workflow is the only thing changed so far" you omit that the workflow change includes the code being written automatically for you in large part. That's not batch compiling to personal compiler. That's not editor vs IDE. That's way bigger.
gregplaysguitar•6mo ago