If you can't 1. resign your coding job, 2. get hired by a company which does not do code, and 3. earn a comparable or higher salary then coding is a source of

If you can't 1. resign your coding job, 2. get hired by a company which does not do code, and 3. earn a comparable or higher salary then coding is a source of your value. You retain the same general problem-solving ability, but your salary will decrease, probably substantially, which should tell you that general problem-solving ability is not the primary source of most software developers' value. Coding might not have been "the source of value" for Carmack himself: after all, he did make a comparable living doing rocketry at one pont, although he did return to graphics programming after that stint. Now he thinks he might make a living "managing AIs" in the future. I don't know whether managing AIs will become a job in the future or not, but if Carmack thinks people will want to pay _him_ of all people to manage any important AI, he's deluding himself. Everybody knows his managerial qualities from Masters of Doom. Of course, it's all academic: Carmack is a multi-millionaire who has no need for paid employment, and nor need to maintain good mental models of how paid employment works.