AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton • Hacker News Board

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#251

Post by fauigerzigerk » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:19 AM UTC

alphazard wrote: post #174

paulryanrogers wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumes every individual is capable of succinctly communicating to the AI what they want. And the AI is capable of maintaining it as underlying platforms and libraries shift. And that there is little value in reusing software initiated by others.

> This assumes every individual is capable of succinctly communicating to the AI what they want. And the AI is capable of maintaining it as underlying platforms and libraries shift. I think there are people who want to use software to accomplish a goal, and there are people who are forced to use software. The people who only use software because the world around them has forced it on them, either through work or frie…

>The only time reuse really matters is in network protocols. Communication requires that both sides have a shared understanding.

A lot of things are like network protocols. Most things require communication. External APIs, existing data, familiar user interfaces, contracts, laws, etc.

Language itself (both formal and natural) depends on a shared understanding of terms, at least to some degree.

AI doesn't magically make the coordination and synchronisation overhead go away.

Also, reusing well debugged and battle tested code will always be far more reliable than recreating everything every time anything gets changed.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#252

Post by josefrichter » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:19 AM UTC

AI most definitely is a coworker already. You do delegate some work for which you previously had to hire humans.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#253

Post by MattGaiser » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:21 AM UTC

alphazard wrote: post #158

There's an undertone of self-soothing "AI will leverage me, not replace me", which I don't agree with especially in the long run, at least in software. In the end it will be the users sculpting formal systems like playdoh. In the medium run, "AI is not a co-worker" is exactly right. The idea of a co-worker will go away. Human collaboration on software is fundamentally inefficient. We pay huge communication/synchroniz…

> We pay huge communication/synchronization costs to eek out mild speed ups on projects by adding teams of people.

I am surprised at how little this is discussed and how little urgency there is in fixing this if you still want teams to be as useful in the future.

Your standard agile ceremonies were always kind of silly, but it can now take more time to groom work than to do it. I can plausibly spend more time scoring and scoping work (especially trivial work) than doing the work.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#254

Post by progx » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:25 AM UTC

josefrichter wrote: post #252

AI most definitely is a coworker already. You do delegate some work for which you previously had to hire humans.

And than you fix the produces shit, got high blood pressure and think "damn it,how I would love to yell at that employee"

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#255

Post by p-e-w » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:26 AM UTC

josefrichter wrote: post #252

AI most definitely is a coworker already. You do delegate some work for which you previously had to hire humans.

And the amount of work that could be delegated, with equal or better results than those from average human workers, is far higher than currently attempted in most companies. Industries have barely started using the potential of even current-generation AI.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#256

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:26 AM UTC

ukuina wrote: post #228

ehnto wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just good writing structure. I get the feeling many people hadn't been exposed to good structure before LLMs. LLMs can definitely have a tone, but it is pretty annoying that every time someone cares to write well, they are getting accused of sounding like an LLM instead of the other way around. LLMs were trained to write well, on human writing, it's not surprising there is crossover.

Not so sure about that. There are many distinct LLM "smells" in that comment, like "A is true, but it hides something: unrelated to A" and "It's not (just) C, it's hyperbole D".

[deleted]

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#257

Post by eCa » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:28 AM UTC

fdefitte wrote: post #163

[dead]

> That's not augmentation, that's a completely different game

Not saying that this comment is ai written, but this phrasing is the em-dash of 2026.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#258

Post by tovej » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:29 AM UTC

entrox wrote: post #234

overgard wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't agree more, isn't that the bizarre thing? "We have this great intellectually challenging job where we as workers have leverage. How can we completely ruin that while also screwing up every other white collar profession"

Why is it bizarre? It is inevitable. After all, AI has not ruined creative professions, it merely disrupted and transformed them. And yes, I fully understand my whole comment here being snarky, but please bear with me. Let's rewind 4 years to this HN article titled "The AI Art Apocalypse": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32486133 and read some of the comments. > Actually all progress will definitely will have a…

The premise of those comments, just like the premise in this thread, is ridiculous and fantastical.

The only way generative AI has changed the creative arts is that it's made it easier to produce low quality slop.

I would not call that a true transformation. I'd call that saving costs at the expense of quality.

The same is true of software. The difference is, unlike art, quality in software has very clear safety and security implications.

This gen AI hype is just the crypto hype all over again but with a sci-fi twist in the narrative. It's a worse form of work just like crypto was a worse form of money.

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#259

Post by RealityVoid » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:29 AM UTC

progx wrote: post #254

josefrichter wrote: post #252

AI most definitely is a coworker already. You do delegate some work for which you previously had to hire humans.

And than you fix the produces shit, got high blood pressure and think "damn it,how I would love to yell at that employee"

Just like a real employee!

Re: AI is not a coworker, it's an exoskeleton

#260

Post by p-e-w » Fri, Feb 20, 2026, 9:31 AM UTC

Tade0 wrote: post #250

alphazard wrote: post #158

There's an undertone of self-soothing "AI will leverage me, not replace me", which I don't agree with especially in the long run, at least in software. In the end it will be the users sculpting formal systems like playdoh. In the medium run, "AI is not a co-worker" is exactly right. The idea of a co-worker will go away. Human collaboration on software is fundamentally inefficient. We pay huge communication/synchroniz…

> The benefits we get from checking in with other humans, like error correction, and delegation can all be done better by AI. Not this generation of AI though. It's a text predictor, not a logic engine - it can't find actual flaws in your code, it's just really good at saying things which sound plausible.

You’re committing the classic fallacy of confusing mechanics with capabilities. Brains are just electrons and chemicals moving through neural circuits. You can’t infer constraints on high-level abilities from that.