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Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

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Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#191

Post by SamaraMichi »

johnsmith1840 wrote: post #97
tomwojcik wrote: post #54

People's minds will become even lazier due to prolonged daily use of LLMs. They literally won't be able to think for themselves without AI assistance (that's why OpenAI won't fall, btw). Attention spans will drop even lower, causing severe psychological problems. Think 'Digital Dementia 2.0.' Later, LLMs will be portrayed as something evil, yet everyone will still use them. Parents will use them, while telling their…

I don't get this take. My knowledge and engineering has only gone up over time. I read significantly more and higher quality technical information and need to debug problems significantly harder. I think AI will in general make everyone a lot smarter. Maybe the people who use AI as a companion will melt? I'm sure there's some kind of repetitive addiction loop that could melt your brain just like anythibg else though.

Have you considered that you are a minority who leverages LLMs for your own personal gain? The parent is referring more to the general population who is already doomscrolling away and would LOVE a service that generates prompts for them due to the hassle this represents for them.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#192

Post by lotsoweiners »

tetris11 wrote: post #157
protortyp wrote: post #155

Positives: - Major breakthroughs in robotics research thanks to ultra scalable simulation software and RL - AI will become even more useful in daily life - New drug discoveries or successful stage 3 clinical studies related to / similar to GLP-1. Also in longevity research. - Renewables will get even cheaper - Creators will thrive with all the new AI tooling - Government services will become more digital (at least in…

> Major breakthroughs in robotics research thanks to ultra scalable simulation software and RL I was hoping that plumbers, electricians, construction, factory workers still had another 10-20 years before being priced out of the work pool. I was also hoping we had that much time to use threat of mass protest to keep our politicians aligned. I genuinely think it's game over for 99% of humanity's interests once the top…

Hey if developers and office jobs get fucked by AI “promises” then fuck blue collar as well. You need a united population to destroy the interests of the 1%.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#193

Post by Havoc »

Think we'll have the first job niche shock from AI that the wider public notices. A bit like online translation market just vanishing...except big enough for people to go "oh". Probably transport or warehouse related.

US democracy fundamentally breaks (more).

Substantial global turmoil directly resulting from US losing it's way. Will take time for an alternate order establishing itself in that void.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#194

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 »

DANmode wrote: post #147
A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 wrote: post #89

So far.. my track record has not been great, but maybe I was being a little too optimistic as I shuffle various futures in my head so lets start from more likely to more fun: - Unabated push towards 'Snow Crash' level of extremely localized power structures at the expense of federal government ( think K shaped economy, but for governmental structures ) - Actual further descent into K shaped economy -- that.. I fear..…

Why is Bitcoin crashing? Also, sometimes headlines claim 11% down is crashing - what’s “crashing” here?

Honestly, I think it ran out of speculation runway and current 'crashing' is just poeple cashing out the profits they made on the recent swings. It doesn't take away my 2026 prediction tho:P

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#195

Post by ggrantrowberry »

y0eswddl wrote: post #188
Sammi wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like saying in the 1970s that people would become dumber because of calculators. It's a tool. You can use it lazily and not learn much, or you use it actively as something that propels you further along in your learning.

no, its not - with calculators, it was up to the person using the tool to figure out which formula to use and which values to plug into the calculator. The human has to have enough understanding of the problem to know which math to apply and calculate in the first place. That requires understanding and discernment. This works the brain. This mental work strengthens our problem solving ability. Whereas with AI, you ju…

Nah. It is the same but at a different scale.

You give a calculator a problem and it gives an easy answer thus involving no further work from the human brain which causes it to atrophy just like any other underused muscle.

Just like a calculator can easily solve some problems so can AI. Sure the set of problems it can solve is bigger than a calculator. AI just enables you to work on bigger problems because you’re not spending so much time “calculating by hand”.

If you delegate all your thinking to AI or you use AI when the point of the activity is to do the activity (ie homework at school) then I think you’ll see problems. Just like using a calculator when you’re supposed to be learning how to add will stunt your growth.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#196

Post by bayareapsycho »

Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #130
bayareapsycho wrote: post #76

There will be a cliff in the number of people in this industry. There will be a bunch of senior people floating around the job market and no more junior talent. There will be fewer new grads and the pipelines will dry up. If they go down the route of automating as much as possible, it'll destroy the social pipelines that allow companies to reproduce themselves. I don't think that'll actually happen, but it'll be inte…

What are your opinions on accepting junior talent say, 4 years from now? Would there be any changes because I feel like a lot of junior talent isnt picked because of AI but I feel like given a long enough timescope, AI bubble will burst and so taking that into account, what would you say about the job market?

I don't think the "bubble will burst" in the sense that all of this tooling will go away. Maybe companies shift the focus on running them more efficiently.

I don't think companies will suddenly turn over a new leaf and start hiring juniors like they were in 2020. Even if they tried, within 2 or 3 years they won't be able to as easily.

Fewer people will major in a field where there's some shrieking news headline every 5 seconds about how it's going to get automated out of existence. And the candidate quality will go down, since why bother leetcoding or reading a bunch of textbooks to upskill if there's no ROI associated with it.

If I was an undergrad right now, I totally wouldn't. And I wouldn't have read all of the books that I suffered through to develop understanding. Choosing a major is just betting on the future.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#197

Post by handoflixue »

kingkongjaffa wrote: post #167
mike_hearn wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is losing the ability/interest in navigating through a paper map by hand bad, though? Humanity has adopted and then discarded skills many times in its history. There were once many master archers, nobody outside of one crazy Danish guy has mastered archery for hundreds of years. That isn't bad, nobody cares, nothing of value was lost.

What we call knowledge work is a bit different to archery though. Writing for example is proven to be better done by hand with a pen and paper, people who take typed notes don’t retain as much. AI has accelerated the most simple and obvious answers to easy questions. For more difficult things deep thinking and writing, partly with pen and paper notes and diagrams are still the most effective tools.

You can still use pencil and paper for the difficult things. In fact, you'll have more time for doing so, because you don't have to use pencil and paper for the simple things.

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#198

Post by DANmode »

nearlyepic wrote: post #186
DANmode wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Horrific whitewashing of the story. Chevy made it about as fuckin’ unattractive as they could manage, AND THEY WERE STILL GREAT CARS. You can buy them at the right price even today, and people have been adding range to them.

I totally agree that you can make the argument that people didn't buy them because they weren't sexy. Post-2008, new cars became luxury items almost exclusively. So given that, there's no reason they would catch on now unless somebody makes a sexy one.

They’re a brand new or single owner car for $13k, you can’t think of room for that?

Re: Ask HN: What are your predictions for 2026?

#199

Post by Imustaskforhelp »

bayareapsycho wrote: post #196
Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are your opinions on accepting junior talent say, 4 years from now? Would there be any changes because I feel like a lot of junior talent isnt picked because of AI but I feel like given a long enough timescope, AI bubble will burst and so taking that into account, what would you say about the job market?

I don't think the "bubble will burst" in the sense that all of this tooling will go away. Maybe companies shift the focus on running them more efficiently. I don't think companies will suddenly turn over a new leaf and start hiring juniors like they were in 2020. Even if they tried, within 2 or 3 years they won't be able to as easily. Fewer people will major in a field where there's some shrieking news headline every…

I just don't think that AI will get any better, its basically become a benchmaxxing contest of sorts and I think one of the issues I have with this is that when companies realize that this is the AI that we are gonna get, like sure it can be beneficial for some people but people (seniors atleast) want autonomy of their code and they would most likely use it as a code review and I have heard many instances where seniors are tired of reading junior ai generated code

I think that this is going to continue and although AI can be good for proto-typing ideas and similar (which is mainly what I use it for), in my opinion, I feel like AI is still black magic where everyone is winging it but I feel like the way AI is right now (generate all code sort of) would lead to more bugs and issues and just frustration by seniors overall

There have been studies where companies who use AI lose money Companies who generate AI lose money in training costs/others There are studies where people who use AI actually lose productivity There are many anecdotal evidences that seniors dont like to waste time on ai generated slop code to code review

So in a sense, this would be a tool which can have vast productivity differences, people might want to get the speed but I feel like that when these bubble bursts and these companies give the real prices of their tooling which can be a lot in my opinion. I feel like a lot of companies will see even more losses/ its not that good overall

As I have said within the 2020's the interest rate was down so people hired more and there was already a hiring freeze of sorts when interest rates were raised

I feel like 4-5 years down the line, interest rates can go down again and with all the other AI things seeping into reality/market corrections overall, I feel like there can be cases where using AI can panic the market and lose stock prices and so with all the other factors, I feel like employment will go up again

To be honest, I dont know too much about employment, I feel like its similar to mathematics in a sense but I read books on finance and so my honest opinion is that the goal of being financially independent is to do the work that you like and I genuinely enjoy doing this work for the most part and so no matter how much it pays (which I assume to be honest would be good enough for me considering I live in third world country and I am frugal anyways) plus with all the other factors, i am pretty optimistic. I am also optimistic that I can create my own businesses much rather easily by prototyping multiple ideas with LLM generated code and then locking in on those which have a market fit to gain a sustainable cash cow. I will do these things when I get into university and then 4 years down the line, I do think that I can find something which can hopefully click but I still might do a job.

In my opinion, the companies not hiring right now are gonna cause an higher issue down the line and I am confident that no matter what, I just wanna do the thing I like as a job and there are other opinions on this matter (see other comment) which are optimistic down 4-5 years and I share that opinion

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