The very question is biased toward the idea that “something is coming”, as if we’re heading to some technological inevitability. I don’t see it happening. This whole “it’s coming” vibe is the narrative attached to the technology, it has nothing to do with the technology itself. It seems like people who buy it are trapped in the fictional reality of a very cheap advertisement, or should I say, propaganda. Your calculator now supports a new operation, this is not armageddon.
What will be left for us to work on?
131–140 of 291 posts
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If LLMs reach a point of sufficiently high competence to the point that they're capable of producing usable software from vague, and sometimes contradictory instructions - the same software engineers have to regularly deal with, then at that point software will simply be an expectation of ability in any job. I don’t understand how people can say this and then continue talking about software. So we’re saying machine…
The only truly unprecedented thing is the white-collar part. Otherwise it happened many times over that entire regions where suddenly out of job and job prospects. Automation and offshoring have equivalent impacts on the affected job market.
If you automate the creation of software, you essentially can automate almost any white-collar job.
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
There exists to many complex things in the world and we cannot do it all ourselves. We work so that we have something of value to trade to the people who do the work on the things we want. We will never automate all work so we with half of humanity doing nothing of value it will be a struggle for the people who do nothing of value to convince people to do work for them. We can see it now where products dont target th…
So when you say stuff like“ We will never automate all work” generally you’d follow that up with an argument as to why you think that. It’s not fact, YOU think this to be the case. Back it up!
In the extreme, could just agree not to use technology in some areas (which isn't something unheard of).
Human agency is real and powerful - unless humans want to automate all work, it won't happen.
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#134Question: Does anybody here yet personally has less (to) work 'cause of AI?
It depends, but I from what I have seen on multiple projects with different teams/skills, that it amplifies the ability of the person/team.
It pushes the bulk of the work to review. So teams with good practices can account for this.
For junior teams, the time saved is massive, because they aren't doing all the other practices required to prevent technical debt.
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
By achieving the same or a higher level of effectiveness than doctors, obviously.
Nothing effective about self-diagnosis. Quick and easy yes, but not effective. Most things that are worth diagnosing require a visit to a clinic. No doctor is going to lose a job because people are self-diagnosing using the internet.
It wouldn't be "Ah! It's lupus." It would be "I need the results of such-and-such tests to make a differential diagnosis."
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#136The very question is biased toward the idea that “something is coming”, as if we’re heading to some technological inevitability. I don’t see it happening. This whole “it’s coming” vibe is the narrative attached to the technology, it has nothing to do with the technology itself. It seems like people who buy it are trapped in the fictional reality of a very cheap advertisement, or should I say, propaganda. Your calcula…
It's not "coming", it's already here. I barely code anymore, mate. And that happened in a just a few years, imagine in a few more.
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
For example, I think today a strong PM with no technical ability can produce higher quality technical output compared to a mediocre frontend developer with no project management ability. Wishful thinking by the managerial class. At best they can vibe code but they can’t verify that what was written is correct.
Well, they can try it out and see if it does what they want.
Which is basically what most of them already did with software engineers anyway.
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#138Maybe the bottleneck will be the people who have to think of new tasks for AI? That is, markets do saturate; customer demand has limits. After it peaks, what will be left for AI to work on?
There will never be a state of humanity where everyone will have just “completed everything”.
https://www.reddit.com/r/gifs/comments/3p0b3i/graphic_design...
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
If LLMs reach a point of sufficiently high competence to the point that they're capable of producing usable software from vague, and sometimes contradictory instructions - the same software engineers have to regularly deal with, then at that point software will simply be an expectation of ability in any job. So I think it would be more comparable to something like literacy. There was a time when that was a fairly unc…
Right making apps and building infrastructure and scaling and making software will become like reading. Everyone and anyone can do it.
And yet, there is a lot said about how youngsters cannot read with understanding... Fun times ahead...
Re: What will be left for us to work on?
#140I have been writing software for over 40 years and have had a long time interest in and some work in AI over that time. I wouldn’t say this gives me any more prognosticating power about how all of this is ultimately going to go, but I believe we're soon nearing an area of plateauing; whether that's because the science itself is plateauing or the intervention of governments is going to force plateau it. So if things c…
That’s a good analogy, but I think the reason we currently need the "nurse" role is the need to interact with the physical world. Most software products don't require this step, so the demand for “nurses” or "doctors" will likely decrease. If robotics technology continues to advance, the number of nurses in real world will also decrease in the foreseeable future.
The demand for nurses and doctors is only going to go up. Not just int their current roles, but everything adjacent to them as well. Everything involved with running trials of health care products. Humans aren't going away, and they need to be taken care of.