| >previous 'computing saturation is at 100% or close' pronouncements go back to 1953 Yes, pronouncements can come early. They can also come at the point in time that they hold. Previous pronouncements having come early doesn't mean the same pronouncement will never hold. In any case, those pronouncements didn't match an 1:1 (or even 3:1, considering laptop+work computer+smartphone) ratio of computer to person. >obviously (?) such a computer can't be manufactured by current manufacturing techniques, but also obviously it will work once you figure out how to make it. In any case, fitting "400 quadrillion such computers into the space of the human body", even if possible, doesn't require 400 quadrillion programmers. Or even necessarily that much programmer. After all programmers genereally don't increase based on the count of cpus (that's a less strong correlation), but based on the number of individual software programs. Such a development might not even require more programmers than there are today. In fact, if LLMs improve similarly as original GPT to GPT 4, or (even worse) if AGI is achieved before those nanocomputers, their software might require exactly 0 programmers. In any case, the eventual (?) achievement of those "400 quadrillion such computers into the space of the human body" (while still waiting for flying cars, robot servants, and cold fusion) would be so far ahead to make the point moot regarding the job prospects on programmers in the industry given the raise of LLM in the next 30-40 years. >as for corporatism, corporatism seems very unlikely to become established in the current political environment outside of backwaters like argentina. Outside of backwaters? Corporatism has been the status quo in the US for several decades now... |
the only handwaving in the bit you quoted consists of saying that it's not possible to build computers where the entire computer is less than a micron across with current manufacturing techniques
it's certainly true that computers don't require programmers. i think it's easier to reason correctly about the issue the other way around; programmers can do anything, but they require computers to do it
50 years ago, if you wanted to cycle the current in a voltammetry lab setup or make your windshield wipers intermittent, you designed a circuit. if you wanted to get a screw machine to cut a new kind of screw, you probably cut some new cams out of steel sheet. if you wanted to retard the spark timing on your engine ignition, you adjusted a screw
now in all those cases you just write a program, or perhaps even change some parameters to a program, because all those things are controlled by computers now. so suddenly you have lots of programmers working in these areas
today, if you want a ditch dug, you don't write a program; you rent a backhoe or pick up a shovel. but that's just because your dirt isn't programmable yet
the flying cars problem is well documented to be a question of regulatory obstacles and governance, not technical capabilities. lots of people do fly ultralights today, you can find videos on youtube
will the same problem force you to move your dirt with a shovel 50 years from now instead of just telling it where to go? yeah, plausibly, but that's just a question of amish-style or tokugawa-style rejection of technology, not a question of saturating the possibilities
as for corporatism in the usa, it definitely isn't a thing. possibly you just don't know what corporatism is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatism