Earlier quoted context omitted.
They're saying writing code is programming but not all programming is writing code. What is Scratch?
A graphical means of writing and manipulating a program.
Aka Claude Code.
AI coding is gambling
311–320 of 471 posts
Re: AI coding is gambling
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but I finally feel like I'm _good_ at programming, which is insane, because I literally haven't written a line of code myself in months This is exactly the sort of mentality that makes me hate this technology You finally feel good at programming despite admitting that you aren't actually doing it Please explain why anyone should take this seriously?
I know how to build a house for the most part. But I don't have time to build a house. If I get a robot someday and manage it daily before I leave for work to slowly build a house, when it's done, I gotta be honest and admit I'll consider myself a home builder. Otherwise, who is a home builder? Very few people do every single part themselves, even if they technically could.
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Re: AI coding is gambling
#313Life is full of variable reward schemes. Probably why we evolved to be so enamoured by them. Sometimes I think we put the Carr before the horse. We gamble because evolution promotes that approach. Yes I could go for the reliable option. But taking a punt is worth a shot if the cost is low. The cost of AI is low. What is a problem is people getting wrapped up in just one more pull of the slot machine handle. I use AI…
>Life is full of variable reward schemes. Probably why we evolved to be so enamoured by them.
Important to point out that that every high culture produced restrictions on exactly those behaviors, gambling was a universal vice when that concept still mattered.
America in particular had a work culture that favored well, work and technical excellence. Now work is for suckers, thinking is for suckers, precision not worth it when you can have some machine do it half-right.
"Yes I could go for the reliable option. But taking a punt is worth a shot if the cost is low.", might as well be the national slogan from vibe-coding to the department of defense. Even the venture capital industry that excels at slot machine sectors was itself already a slot machine.
Re: AI coding is gambling
#314All of this new capability has made me realize that the reason i love programming _isn't_ the same as the OP. I used to think (and tell others) that I loved understanding something deeply, wading through the details to figure out a tough problem. but actually, being able to will anything I can think of into existence is what I love about programming. I do feel for the people who were able to make careers out of falli…
> but I finally feel like I'm _good_ at programming, which is insane Yes, it is insane. You couldn't torture this confession out of me. But that's the drug they're selling you, isn't it? You don't even write code, but you're getting a self-inflated sense of worth. It must be addicting! Of course, whether or not the programs you prompt are actually good surely has no relation to whether you feel they're good, since yo…
> LLMs can build an idea into a prototype in a weekend
Just to nitpick, because I think the difference is relevant: "Idea to prototype in a weekend" was possible for a spirited coder already before LLMs.
Now it's "Idea to prototype in a few minutes".
Re: AI coding is gambling
#315Earlier quoted context omitted.
Flat out wrong. The most impressive engineers I've met in my career did not care for fancy tools with bells and whistles.
Sure, I bet they didn't outright dismiss them as useless to the entire field though! I'm sure they still understood the value those fancy tools provided to their peers.
Unless someone is trolling, it’s rare for people to deem it as “useless”. Most counterpoints have been about ethics and issues that surround LLM usage. Things like licensing, coding vs review time, correctness and maintainability of the generated code, etc… Unless you believe we’re in a software engineering utopia, I think it’s fair to call those out.
Re: AI coding is gambling
#316I see whole teams pushed by c- level going full in with spec driven + tdd development. The devs hate it because they are literally forbidden to touch a single line if code. but the results speak for themselves, it just works and the pressure has shifted to the product people to keep up. The whole tooling to enable this had to be worked out first. All Cursor and extreme use of a tool called Speckit, connected to Notio…
yeah i'm not gonna be an AI company's guinea pig just because the c-suite wants to sign me up. "the results" you mean AI-psychosis and dunning-kruger syndrome?
Like I said, devs don't like it. He said productivity went up 3-4x. "It works". There was no question of denying that as far as he was concerned. At the same time he was going to look for another job as it was just painful to work like that.
Re: AI coding is gambling
#317Hiring a human is gambling too.
Re: AI coding is gambling
#318Earlier quoted context omitted.
"I really really love cooking. In fact, I have optimized my cooking completely, I go out to restaurants every night!" I believe gp and others just like food instead of cooking. Which is fine, but if that's the case, why go around telling everyone you're a cook?
But are you doing real food preparation unless you are hunting and dressing the animals and foraging for your own food?
Ah geeze. I am utterly destroyed by this comment. Will need to sit and think now.
Re: AI coding is gambling
#319Earlier quoted context omitted.
> literally forbidden to touch a single line if code. That is extremely stupid. What does that ban get you? I reqct to this because a friend mentioned exactly this. And I was dumbfounded.
It seems like just a CxO dick measuring exercise. CEO1: "We allow our engineers to use AI for all work." CEO2: "Oh yea? We mandate our engineers use AI for at least N% of their work!" CEO3: "You think that's good? We mandate our engineers use AI for all code!!" CEO4: "Pfff, amateurs. We don't even allow our engineers to open source code editors or even look at the LLM output..."
I also thought it was pushing it to the limit, but I think this is just some Founder of a successful company deciding engineering was going to transform to this way of working. A huge bet, but the implementation didn't feel amateuristic or ad hoc. Just not very pleasant for most devs to work that way. I'm sure some will look elsewhere. I know I would!
Re: AI coding is gambling
#320I disagree. I have a successful software product that I vibe coded using claude code starting last June. It does something novel and useful that wasn't yet offered on the App Store or any app on Android.
I am not going to say what it is because all of the AI haters will immediately flock to leave it bad reviews and overwhelm my support systems with bad faith requests (something that has already happened).
I've been writing software for 25 years, I know what I am doing. Every bug I shipped was my fault either because I didn't test well enough or I did not possess enough platform knowledge to know myself the right way to do things. "Unknown unknowns"
But I have also learned better ways to do things and fixed every bug using AI tools. I don't read the code. I may scan it to gain context and then tweak a single value myself, but beyond that I don't write or read code anymore.
Its not a magical few shot prompt then reap profits machine. I just feel like a solopreneur ditch digger who just got a lease on a new CAT excavator. I can get work done faster I can also do damage faster if I am not careful.
Beyond this concern,