[elpocko]

>Normal computer tools can be verified to work reliably. Cat can be tested to copy data. Sort can be confirmed to sort properly.

Right. You can indeed verify that a given computer program can reliably copy or sort data.

>You can't verify that a coding agent can reliably produce code

That's not the goal. You don't need to verify that a coding agent can reliably produce "code". You only need to verify that the solution produced by the agent solves a given problem. And that's already been done and verified many, many times. I hear most code is written by LLMs nowadays, and not all of their users are idiots.