This 1983 paper on ironies of manufacturing engineering was referred to me on twitter, and I think it makes many excellent observations that apply to post-AI coding, e.g.:
> By taking away the easy parts of his task, automation can
make the difficult parts of the human operator's task more
difficult. Several writers (Wiener and Curry, 1980; Rouse, 1981)
point out that the 'Fitts list' approach to automation, assigning to
man and machine the tasks they are best at, is no longer sufficient.
It does not consider the integration of man and computer, nor
how to maintain the effectiveness of the human operator by
supporting his skills and motivation.
recursivedoubts•42m ago
> By taking away the easy parts of his task, automation can make the difficult parts of the human operator's task more difficult. Several writers (Wiener and Curry, 1980; Rouse, 1981) point out that the 'Fitts list' approach to automation, assigning to man and machine the tasks they are best at, is no longer sufficient. It does not consider the integration of man and computer, nor how to maintain the effectiveness of the human operator by supporting his skills and motivation.