it sounds like backing up any learning... not just coding
Learning to code is still worthwhile
21–30 of 326 posts
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#22To create things via AI without being able to comprehend the output is to trust completely in the agent(s). Operating that way is more optimistic than experience has taught me to be.
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#23Those are not compelling arguments. If the best we've got for convincing people to learn to code is that it's like math notation (the most hated part of math for the uninitiated), or pretty like a violin (useless for a new grad), then coding is in serious trouble. IMO a better argument is it helps you "think like a computer". But if you wanted to learn that there are many video games I'd recommend mastering instead o…
The most compelling reason to learn to code is exactly the same reason to read lots of books (fiction or otherwise). It exercises your brain. A brain that can easily sort, parse, and understand basic logic and control flow is more resistant to propaganda and influence. Which is the same benefit a lot of reading does, but for different avenues of thinking (more worldviews exposed to -> more critical thought of each of those views -> more critical thinking in general).
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#24I think pieces like this miss the forest for the trees. Software is the bottleneck for a vast array of economic activities. Attention from intelligent people is most of the rest. Both are mostly-commoditized already and are just waiting around for technological diffusion and the closing of the RSI loop. Unless you're doing so as a hobby with no expectation of returns, I'm not sure what, if anything, is worth learning…
I don't know how one would build anything without knowing. If it was true, I would be building a competitor to Anthropic right now.
I mean only people with billions of dollars can make competitors to anthropic because of necessary compute costs
that's the barrier to entry
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#25Learning anything is worthwhile. Just because you code in Python it doesn't mean that knowing how instructions are processed in a CPU or the memory is managed is useless. The excuse that we don't need to know how things work because AI will take care of it is going to bite a lot of people on their asses
> The excuse that we don't need to know how things work because AI will take care of it is going to bite a lot of people on their asses
Abstractions always led to this sort of behavior. So many of my web development peers screamed at me for being curious about what happens behind/further down then the stack we were learning, and this was decades ago. Seems it differs a lot per person, and what I've found out only later, depending on the situation; nowadays I'm comfortable with both approaches of "this is below the abstraction I actually care about" and "No, I have to dive deeper to actually understand properly the abstraction level I'm at right now"
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#26Anecdotally, the people who I know who were not particularly good developers pre-llms still manage to produce bad code even using flagship models now.
I think having solid knowledge/understanding of good architecture and general practices is still crucial, and it's easy to forget that the foundational knowledge and instinct you take for granted now actually took a lot of time and effort to learn when you were less experienced.
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#27Those are not compelling arguments. If the best we've got for convincing people to learn to code is that it's like math notation (the most hated part of math for the uninitiated), or pretty like a violin (useless for a new grad), then coding is in serious trouble. IMO a better argument is it helps you "think like a computer". But if you wanted to learn that there are many video games I'd recommend mastering instead o…
i think video games are to abstract to connect them to learning to think like a computer.
the most useful thing i learned about computers is to create logic gates by hand. nothing gave me a deeper insight into how a computer works than that. programming is the next step up. you can skip all the layers in between because you can extrapolate them. no need to learn assembler, but it may be worth reading about it, just to get an idea.
understanding the layers from logic gates, to assembly, to programming, to games and now AI is kind of like reading about the OSI model to understand networking. it's one layer of abstraction on top of another.
learning programming is worthwhile because it is the highest layer of abstraction that is shared by everything above it. despite there being hundreds of programming languages, the concepts are all the same. once you understand programming through learning one language you can apply that understanding to almost all other languages. on the other hand there are tens of thousands of games in hundreds of types. not to mention all the other applications. the tree of variation explodes at that level.
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#28> Code is a beautiful form of creative expression, as rich as literature or music Something I'm trying to do right now is to build something and avoid using LLMs to write any code. I still use it to consult. I'm writing a Dota2 tournament match aggregator in Elixir that takes tournament streams and chronologically orders them in a format that makes it easier to watch them sequentially since I find YouTube hard to use…
> I want to build. It's human to want to build.
Anything a human feels is human, regardless if it's to build or to not build :) Some people prefer some ways of building, others in other ways, it's all fine. I think lots of people forget that programming is a heavily creative endeavor in the end.
If I wanted to be slightly controversial, I'd argue building a program is more like painting a painting than building a bridge, for better and worse.
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#29The era of LLMs is similar to when Magic was discovered in the 1400s. The layperson may be able to get ahold of a spellbook, but without Understanding it comes with high risk of turning your niece into a frog. Whereas Wizards can cast increasingly powerful spells that build on each other, and make Art.
I can’t tell if you’re serious or not.
Re: Learning to code is still worthwhile
#30Those are not compelling arguments. If the best we've got for convincing people to learn to code is that it's like math notation (the most hated part of math for the uninitiated), or pretty like a violin (useless for a new grad), then coding is in serious trouble. IMO a better argument is it helps you "think like a computer". But if you wanted to learn that there are many video games I'd recommend mastering instead o…
The most compelling reason to learn to code is exactly the same reason to read lots of books (fiction or otherwise). It exercises your brain. A brain that can easily sort, parse, and understand basic logic and control flow is more resistant to propaganda and influence. Which is the same benefit a lot of reading does, but for different avenues of thinking (more worldviews exposed to -> more critical thought of each of…
learning lots of different games would achieve the same objective.