AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

> AI is keeping engineers at their desks longer, not freeing them up. Random rewards, dopamine hits, and no natural stopping points create a loop comparable to casino gambling.

> The fix is deliberate habits, not restricted tools. Time-box sessions, separate exploration from execution, and treat recovery as maintenance.

Getting tired of AI slop telling me about AI.

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#5

Post by hirvi74 » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 4:43 PM UTC

What type of AI coding? I do not have the attention span to sit there and let these LLMs just churn away. I have to be the one doing the typing or nothing will be accomplished. I tried playing Claude Code and Codex a bit. While impressive in their outputs (at times), I just find the workflow to be so dissatisfying.

One other aspect of LLMs that I do not enjoy when it comes to development is the fact that LLMs minimize my contributions. I do not feel like I can take credit for anything I create if I technically did not create it.

However, I absolutely adore LLMs for learning new concepts and for troubleshooting. To me, that is where they shine the brightest.

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#6

Post by eithed » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 5:04 PM UTC

vijayst wrote: post #2

I can't agree more. I spent 4 hours debugging an issue with Claude from 10PM to 2AM which I will never do - before Claude.

Same; the most infuriating parts - Claude caused the issue and Claude misdiagnosed the issue, making me spend more time than if I was debugging it myself.

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#7

Post by yungtunafish » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 5:11 PM UTC

Just started at a company and the amount of irresponsible AI use is appalling. I asked an employee whose job involves AI adoption/training how large their diffs are for pull requests. They told me that their diffs are "As much as the model can produce given its reasoning level".

In the end, this is going to create unmaintainable code that no one understands. It also discourages reviewing the code because no dev can meaningfully review 1000s of lines of code in a day while also accomplishing their tasks.

NOTE: I am still pro AI, just like I am pro heavy machinery. I just don't want people to cut off their legs...

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#8

Post by dominotw » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 5:21 PM UTC

yungtunafish wrote: post #7

Just started at a company and the amount of irresponsible AI use is appalling. I asked an employee whose job involves AI adoption/training how large their diffs are for pull requests. They told me that their diffs are "As much as the model can produce given its reasoning level". In the end, this is going to create unmaintainable code that no one understands. It also discourages reviewing the code because no dev can m…

why do you care how large the diffs are. isnt there any other way to measure if ai is producing value?

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#9

Post by devld » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC

Or "paying the price" literally. I'm returning after a small break and into new GitHub Copilot prices. A simple question / request / analysis on Sonnet - that will be 29 cents, please. I can't imagine how much it will cost to do actual development with it.

Re: AI coding is addictive. Engineers are paying the price

#10

Post by chrisandchris » Fri, Jul 03, 2026, 5:32 PM UTC

dominotw wrote: post #8

yungtunafish wrote: post #7

Just started at a company and the amount of irresponsible AI use is appalling. I asked an employee whose job involves AI adoption/training how large their diffs are for pull requests. They told me that their diffs are "As much as the model can produce given its reasoning level". In the end, this is going to create unmaintainable code that no one understands. It also discourages reviewing the code because no dev can m…

why do you care how large the diffs are. isnt there any other way to measure if ai is producing value?

Not OP, but I think it's not about producing value now, but how much it will cost in the long term. If you have unmaintaable code that is N times larger than a hand-written codebase, what is the cost to be?