[simpaticoder]

>It read a whole codebase and suggested a place to insert a new feature—with sample code.

I'm hopeful that this is going to be more like the invention of the drum machine (which did not eliminate drummers) and less like the invention of the car (which did eliminate carriages).

[tgv]

There were and still are a lot of bands that have no drummer, though. You can think of that what you will, but "did not eliminate drummers" is just not a useful statement in this context.

[simpaticoder]

The comparison is between drummers:drum-machines and carriage-makers:car-makers. The first number is non-zero in both cases, but the ratios are far different, and the first ratio >> the second.

I think that's useful.

[sologoub]

An interesting comparison - there are far more cars today than carriages/horses at peak, and also far more drivers of various sorts than there were carriage drivers at peak.

Another comparison could be excel with the various formulas vs hand tabulation or custom mainframe calculations. We didn’t get less employment, we got a lot more complex spreadsheets. At least this is my hope, fingers crossed.

[exodust]

Drum machines are rarely used by drummers. A more fitting analogy would be technology drummers use to improve or broaden their drumming, without giving up their sticks, pedals and timing. The reasoning here is human coders still need to be present, thoroughly checking what AI generates.

Regarding AI image generation. If an artist decides to stop making their own art, replacing their craft with AI prompts, they have effectively retired as an artist. No different to pre-AI times if they swapped their image making for a stock art library. AI image generation is just "advanced stock art" to any self-respecting artist or viewer of art. Things get blurry when the end result uses mixed sources, but even then, "congrats, your artwork contains stock art imagery". Not a great look for an artist.