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Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

normaltech.ai

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Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#351

Post by zombot »

saltcured wrote: post #228
altern8 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think, is that everyone who needs small software to manage a todo list or synchronize files, or whatever "normal" people do, will end up with bespoke personalized software written by their own AI People can't be bothered to cook for themselves, and often order crappy, unhealthy food that costs 10 times as much just so they don't have to cook. Now they're going to build their own software every time they think the…

I think this is an interesting analogy. If AI is really progressing as rapidly as some describe, should we expect a robotics renaissance with automated-chef appliances etc? In other words, when will we really see a transition from "yet another token generator" to something that appears to coherently observe, perceive, form intent, plan, and act in a way that is compatible with an existing, long-running human context?…

If these things happen, they will be privacy nightmares, just as our cars are becoming.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#352

Post by scotty79 »

thewhitetulip wrote: post #307
zuzululu wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is a good example of how the optics as business owners and laborers are arbitraged successfully again and again. almost all businesses do not care about your opinion of codebase or quality. they just want it to work and not fail. on top of that the token costs are dropping as AI giants fight over marketshare.

Token costs are reducing for Chinese models, yes. Claude costs are going up!

Which basically just means Anthropic is losing the game.

Check out Fable 5 results on DeepSWE.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#353

Post by scotty79 »

Jioon wrote: post #349

AI isn't replacing software engineers as a whole; it is replacing specific tasks within their role. Because there are still dimensions of the job that only human engineers can handle, AI won't eliminate the profession entirely. However, this isn't unique to software engineering. AI can automate parts of any job. It just so happens that software engineering faces the highest proportion of this displacement. Therefore,…

> it is replacing specific tasks within their role

What's shortsighted is thinking that it won't be able to replace other specific tasks of there role until there's zero specific task in that role left for humans to do.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#354

Post by zombot »

anonzzzies wrote: post #112
prmph wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this reasoning, and yet it is pervasive. Just because non-engineering people come up to you with apps they have created does not mean AI has or will replace software engineers. Consider: - I can read about my symptoms from Dr. Google, try a lifestyle change, herbal remedy, or over-the-counter drug, and that may actually work. This does not mean in the slightest that doctor are being made obsolete - I can…

I guess maybe it's your definition of 'software engineers' ; if you meant that to mean people who know what they are doing, then there is a massive gap. However if you mean people who are hired as software engineer/developer then it's already replacing many and will replace many more. Many of these are worth absolutely nothing and never have been. They survived because software was considered magic and they talk a lo…

> who just do exactly what a ticket says and then go to the next without caring if the rest implodes behind them

But that's exactly what an LLM does, so by using it you're not improving anything.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#355

Post by scotty79 »

tripleee wrote: post #319
aenis wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, and I generally agree with most of his thesis - but the stuff he says about AI coding is the weakest part of his spiel.

He heavily leans on developers for his points on coding, and then spices it up. > For example, major media outlets will gladly write that “AI can build software,” but said sentence suggests that you can just type “build me Slack 2” into Claude and have it fart out a fully-functional, production-ready piece of software, rather than a quasi-functional mound of code-slop that can do enough to trick a business idiot or l…

> sentence suggests that you can just type “build me Slack 2” into Claude and have it fart out a fully-functional, production-ready piece of software, rather than a quasi-functional mound of code-slop

How's that different from randomly selected human developer team? Other than price, time and hr. Most software project always failed for a reason.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#356

Post by JimDabell »

nec4b wrote: post #323
JimDabell wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most organisations need a high quality design system and to be able to assemble pages from it. Totally bespoke design will start with the designer using an agent. So the way I see it, the everyday stuff will be the first to go, followed by designers taking the rest of it. Front-end developers have their area eroded from the bottom then the top. As far as frontend vs backend, there’s a greater scope for fuckups when d…

The frontend feedback is much harder for AI. AI needs to be able to see the page with all the moving parts and sounds and have a bit of sense for the layout and taste in colors etc. I think it much harder for AI to recognize what feels good for the human user. Backend is devoid of that personal touch. By definition you are building for the machine. You have APIs, databases and infrastructure which is logical and easy…

I think you’re conflating development and design there. I’m saying that development is at risk, I’m not commenting on design. Taste in colours and things like that are design.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#357

Post by thewhitetulip »

scotty79 wrote: post #352
thewhitetulip wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Token costs are reducing for Chinese models, yes. Claude costs are going up!

Which basically just means Anthropic is losing the game. Check out Fable 5 results on DeepSWE.

There are reports that gpt prices might be reduced

That would put pressure on anthropic

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#358

Post by tossandthrow »

allajfjwbwkwja wrote: post #347
tossandthrow wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, so when a tool is walking any monkey through a process, it does bit have a value anymore. This is why people stopped adding word, excel and googling skills into their resumes - it is assumed that you know how to use the office suite and a browser.

State of the art tools will soon be even better at being generalists and handling abstraction than at coding. Even GPT 4 could do a better job planning a project than implementing it. The main bottleneck is context, which all of the big companies are solving by hoovering up all their internal data that's in writing into agentic knowledge graphs. The end game is fully autonomous teams of agents, led by other agents.

Project planning is not more abstraction - a lot of companies use junior staff as project managers. And sure, they will also find a hard time finding jobs, unless they can move up the hierachy.

Re: Why AI hasn't replaced software engineers, and won't

#359

Post by jaymzcampbell »

altern8 wrote: post #47
baalimago wrote: post #6

It most certainly will replace software engineers. What's missing is, as the article suggests, the "Delivery" bit. But that's not the realm of software engineers, that's the realm of DevOps/SRE/Cloud engineers. I work as a cloud engineer and have been contacted by multiple non-engineering friends who have now been able to create their pet projects from scratch in different languages and have it running locally, as we…

AI-assisted coding is great, but vibe coding IMO is only good for disposable prototypes. You're not going to vibe-code a financial app that needs to be maintained indefinitely. You're also not going to mess with legacy systems. I think that AI has definitely replaced _some_ engineers, but I don't think your use case is relevant. Your non-engineering friends have created their pet project because they now can, but it'…

> it's not as if they were going to hire anyone to do it

So many of the comments here seem to be glancing over this point entirely!

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