[mouzogu]

yes only matter of time until you can present an AI with a specification and mockup and it will give you the code/app

it would need some human touch but most of the work will be done already

edit: i just had this thought that my dev job has become less coding and more process and tooling over the years. which is why i dont enjoy it. it feels like tedium that should be automated.

[dartos]

The issue isn’t implementing mockups, it’s integrating with poorly documented existing systems, anticipating what could go wrong given a users path through the site, making it efficient, understandable, and maintainable.

Most of those tasks will be heavily changed by AI, but not replaced.

If you honestly think that statistics based AI can replace software engineers, then you either have no software engineering experience, don’t understand how AI works under the hood, or haven’t worked anywhere that does anything more than CRUD api development.

[ben_w]

> If you honestly think that statistics based AI can replace software engineers, then you either have no software engineering experience, don’t understand how AI works under the hood, or haven’t worked anywhere that does anything more than CRUD api development.

I don't understand how brains work under the hood (does anyone?), but zoom into the brain and you get chemistry, zoom into the chemistry and you get quantum mechanics, and that quantum mechanics is statistical in nature.

I don't know if that truth matters or not, because I don't know which layer of abstraction is the most relevant one for our intelligence. And without knowing that, I don't know if these models we have now can or can't be scaled up to do what we do: if what we are really does depend on some microtubule quantum computation, then no, no classical computer can ever be like us (though it is, still, statistics); on the other hand, if everything we are comes from the strengths of synaptic connections and internal bias of our neurons, then any sufficiently complex model can absolutely do all that we can do, and much faster too.

[dartos]

> I don't understand how brains work under the hood, but zoom into the brain

Come on, really? Are you comparing using your brain to using an LLM.

I didn’t even need to read the rest to know it was all nonsense.

LLMs aren’t magic. If you understand how they work, then you can understand the limitations of the approach. You seem to not.

[ben_w]

> I didn’t even need to read the rest to know it was all nonsense.

So, you're pattern matching without using careful logical analysis? Yes, this is a totally convincing demonstration of how humans are not at all like LLMs.

> LLMs aren’t magic.

Are humans?

I really liked the occult when I was a teenager. Despite trying, never found any real magic.

> Are you comparing using your brain to using an LLM.

Do you know where the name "neural network" comes from?

'course, the person I'm replying to probably isn't reading this anyway, given they said they stopped reading too soon the last time. This made me think: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39504270

[mouzogu]

i think there will be white box context sensitive solutions. which also takes into consideration privacy and intellecual property concerns.

but that probably will take much longer.

[dartos]

Those already exist, but are understood and provide professional support (in the form of engineers who extend the platform for a customer) (Hybris, CrystalCommerce, phpbb, discourse, etc.)

That engineer probably can’t even be replaced by AI since every new business is a snowflake once the low hanging fruit is gone.

I don’t think our current form of statistical models will ever be able to generalize and get into specifics at the same time.

AI will change how individual engineers work by being a more proactive search engine, but will not be relied on, by engineers, to write code entirely.

[megamix]

It seems that AI gurus don't believe in diminishing returns. I don't think it's just linear from here.

[ben_w]

> it would need some human touch but most of the work will be done already

By that very loose standard, the matter of time is 2 years 6 months 18 days ago — 10th August 2021 was OpenAI's blog post about the Codex model, with a chat interface producing functional JavaScript: https://openai.com/blog/openai-codex

Right now, what I see coming out of these tools (and what I see in the jobs market) gives me the vibes these tools are very much at the level of "why do we need to hire interns and possibly also junior developers anyway?", but mid and senior levels are still better at seeing bigger pictures and subtle issues that both juniors and LLMs have a harder time with… and, indeed, standard new programmer questions like "why doesn't my code compile?".

[spratzt]

I agree with this.

Developers whose primary skill and interest is in coding seem to be in complete denial about the future.

[stef25]

There's this joke about clients not knowing what they want, so they couldn't possibly explain it to an AI and therefore developers will keep their jobs.

Honestly AI works for writing a small function, and it's definitely superior to Google / SO when searching for code examples.

But in the context of a large app with more exceptions than business rules and where you have to take in to account legacy code & constraints ... I don't see an AI figuring that all out for the simple reason that it's too hard to explain to it the big picture.

[rchaud]

Sounds like the ultimate business idea. Sell customers a magic shovel that eliminates their need to hire shovelers. If it doesn't work, just tell them to be more specific with their requests to the Shovel.

[wiltonn]

Agree as well. We are at the very beginning, AI is the worst it will be right now. Those who keep saying 'I can't see how my job is at risk' living under a rock.

[0thgen]

any advice for what developers should do given you think workforce reduction is on it’s way?

[xetplan]

I remember watching streaming video on the real player on a 56k modem. It was a complete joke but you could envision things getting much better.

Is it fair to say TV broadcasters/production professionals were in danger of losing their jobs in that moment? Kind of, but TV broadcasters/production professionals were also the people in the best position to take advantage of the new advances.

Of course, that was predicated on being open to change and not clinging to the past.

Surely, anyone on HN talking about AI right now is in good shape.

We are inside the bubble. There is a huge % of even young people who have no interest in any of this. It is like 50% of 18-29yo haven't even used chatGPT themselves in the US.

[realusername]

Good luck with that, this is already a communication task that most humans struggle with.