I teach coding to high schoolers, and often wonder the same thing. One reason is it helps with problem solving skills - to code, you need to first be able to de

I teach coding to high schoolers, and often wonder the same thing. One reason is it helps with problem solving skills - to code, you need to first be able to decompose problems, and structure your thinking. So in that sense, it's a proxy rather than a necessary outcome in itself; kind of like maths (very few people need the level of maths taught in schools), but more modern and sexier. What I've been wondering is, with the likes of Siri and Google Now being able to be 'programmed' with natural language, how much longer we will need to code, compared to talking to a computer/AI to achieve the required outcome.