[handfuloflight]

You're conflating different types of cognitive overhead. There's mechanical overhead (syntax, compilation, language quirks) and strategic overhead (architecture, algorithms, business logic). I'm eliminating the mechanical to focus on the strategic. You're acting like they're the same thing.

Yes, I still need to verify that the generated code implements my architectural intent correctly, but that's pattern recognition and evaluation, not generation. It's the difference between proofreading a translation versus translating from scratch. Both require language knowledge, but reviewing existing code for correctness is cognitively lighter than simultaneously managing syntax, debugging, and logic creation.

You are treating all cognitive overhead as equivalent, which is why you can't understand how automating the mechanical parts could be valuable. It's a fundamental category error on your part.

[obirunda]

Do you understand what conflating means? Maybe ask your favorite gpt to describe it for you.

I'm talking about the entire stack of development, from the architectural as well as the actual implementation. These are intertwined and assuming they somehow live separately is significant oversight on your part. You have claimed English is the programming language.

Also. On the topic of conflating, you seem to think that LLMs have become defacto pre-compilers for English as a programming language, how do they do that exactly? In what ways do they compare/contrast to compilers?

You have only stated this as a fact, but what evidence do you have in support of this? As far as the evidence I can gather no one is claiming LLMs are deterministic, so please, support your claims to the contrary, or are you a magician?

You also seem to shift away from any pitfalls of agentic workflows by claiming to be doing all the due diligence whilst also claiming this is easier or faster for you. I sense perhaps that you are of the lol, nothing matters class of developers, reviewing some but not all the work. This will indeed make you faster, but like I said earlier, it's not a cost-free decision.

For individual developers, this is a big deal. You may not have time to wear all the hats all at once, so writing the code may be all the time you also have for code review. Getting code back from an LLM and reviewing it may feel faster but like I said unless it's correct, it's not actually saving time, maybe it feels that way, but we aren't talking about feelings or vibes, we are talking about delivery.

[handfuloflight]

You're projecting. You're the one conflating here, not me.

You've conflated "architectural feedback from running code" with "architectural feedback from typing syntax." I am explicitly saying implementation feedback comes from "running code and testing behavior, not from typing semicolons", yet you keep insisting that the mechanical act of typing syntax somehow provides architectural insights.

You've also conflated "intertwined" with "inseparable." Yes, architecture and implementation inform each other, but that feedback loop comes from executing code and observing system behavior, not from the physical act of typing curly braces. I get the exact same architectural insights from reviewing, testing, and iterating on generated code as I would from hand-typing it.

Most tellingly, you've conflated the process of writing code with the value of understanding code. I'm not eliminating understanding: I'm eliminating the mechanical overhead while maintaining all the strategic thinking. The cognitive load of understanding system design, debugging performance bottlenecks, and architectural trade-offs remains exactly the same whether I typed the implementation or reviewed a generated one.

Your entire argument rests on the false premise that wisdom somehow emerges from keystroke mechanics rather than from reasoning about system behavior. That's like arguing that handwriting essays makes you a better writer than typing them : confusing the delivery mechanism with the intellectual work.

So yes, I understand what conflating means. The question is: do you?

[obirunda]

You keep sidestepping the core issue with LLMs.

If all that you are really doing is writing your code in English and asking the LLM to re-write it for you in your language of choice (probably JS), then end of discussion. But your tone really implies you're a big fan of the vibes of automation this gives.

Your repeated accusations of "conflating" are a transparent attempt to deflect from the hollowness of your own arguments. You keep yapping about me conflating things. It's ironic because you are the one committing this error by treating the process of software engineering as a set of neatly separable, independent tasks.

You've built your entire argument on a fragile, false dichotomy between "strategic" and "mechanical" work. This is a fantasy. The "mechanical" act of implementation is not divorced from the "strategic" act of architecture. The architectural insights you claim to get from "running code and testing behavior" are a direct result of the specific implementation choices that were made. You don't get to wave a natural language wand, generate a black box of code, and then pretend you have the same deep understanding as someone who has grappled with the trade-offs at every level of the stack.

Implementation informs architecture, and vice versa. By offloading the implementation, you are severing a critical feedback loop and are left with a shallow, surface-level understanding of your own product.

Your food processors and compiler analogy—are fundamentally flawed because they compare deterministic tools to a non-deterministic one. A compiler or food processor doesn't get "creative." An LLM does. Building production systems on this foundation isn't "transformative"; it's reckless.

You've avoided every direct question about your actual workflow because there is clearly no rigor there. You're not optimizing for results; you're optimizing for the feeling of speed while sacrificing the deep, hard-won knowledge that actually produces robust, maintainable software. You're not building, you're just generating.

[handfuloflight]

You completely ignored my conflation argument because you can't defend it, then accused me of "deflecting", that's textbook projection. You're the one deflecting by strawmanning me into defending "deterministic LLMs" when I never made that claim.

My compiler analogy wasn't about determinism: it was about abstraction levels. You're desperately trying to make this about LLM reliability when my point was about focusing cognitive energy where it matters most. Classic misdirection.

You can't defend your "keystroke mechanics = architectural wisdom" position, so you're creating fake arguments to attack instead. Enjoy your "deep, hard-won knowledge" from typing semicolons while I build actual systems.

[obirunda]

Here is the thing. Your initial claim was that English is the programming language. By virtue of making that claim you are claiming LLM has deterministic reliability equivalent to programming language -> compiler. This is simply not true.

If you're considering the LLM translation to be equivalent to the compiler abstraction, I'm sorry I'm not drinking that Kool aid with you.

You conceded above that LLMs aren't deterministic, yet you proceeded to call them an abstraction (conflating). If the output is not 100% equivalent, it's not an abstraction.

In C, you aren't required to inspect the assembly generated by the C compiler. It's guaranteed to be equivalent. In this case, you really need not write/debug assembly, you can use the language and tools to arrive at the same outcome.

Your entire argument is based on the premise that we have a new layer of abstraction that accomplishes the same. Not only it does not, but when it fails, it does so often in unexpected ways. But hey, if you're ready to call this an abstraction that frees up your cognitive load, continue to sip that Kool aid.

[handfuloflight]

You're still avoiding the conflation argument because you can't defend it. You conflated "architectural feedback from running code" with "architectural feedback from typing syntax." These are fundamentally different cognitive processes.

When I refer to English as a programming language, I mean using English to express programming logic and requirements while automating the syntax translation. I'm not claiming we've eliminated the need for actual code, but that we can express the what and why in natural language while handling the how of implementation mechanically.

Your "100% equivalent" standard misses the point entirely. Abstractions work by letting you operate at a higher conceptual level. Assembly programmers could have made the same arguments about C: "you don't really understand what's happening at the hardware level!" Web developers could face the same critique about frameworks: "you don't really understand the DOM manipulation!" Are you writing assembly, then? Are your handcoding your DOM manipulation in your prancing purity? Or using 1998 web tech?

The value of any abstraction is whether it enables better problem-solving by removing unnecessary cognitive overhead. The architectural insights you value don't come from the physical act of typing brackets, semicolons, and variable declarations; they come from understanding system behavior, performance characteristics, and design tradeoffs, all of which remain fully present in my workflow.

You're defending the mechanical act of keystroke-by-keystroke code construction as if it's inseparable from the intelligence of system design. It's not.

You've confused form with function. The syntax is just the representation of logic, not the logic itself. You can understand a complex algorithm from pseudocode without knowing any particular language's syntax. You can analyze system architecture from high-level diagrams without seeing code. You can identify performance bottlenecks by profiling behavior, not by staring at semicolons. You've elevated the delivery mechanism above the actual thinking.