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Software Engineering as a professional discipline without any specialization (and writing CRUD applications or websites don't count in my opinion) never made se

Software Engineering as a professional discipline without any specialization (and writing CRUD applications or websites don't count in my opinion) never made sense to me. Software engineers producing web applications are modern day equivalent of production line workers who were mostly replaced by automation. So, AI will likely replace such software engineers. In contrast, automation and technology did not replace "real" engineers. If anything, it made their job more productive. All this to say that a generic software engineer with no specialized skills might be replaced by other professionals (engineers, accountants, etc.) who might be able to leverage AI to create production quality software.

windowshopping 3y ago
Gonna go ahead and strong disagree. Dismissing a huge portion of engineers as "production line workers" whose work takes no thought or creativity is incredibly reductive and makes me wonder if you've ever tried doing their job. Web applications are a category of software with just as much variance in their complexity as anything else. Are mobile apps and desktop apps also trivial? What's the difference? And if none of mobile apps, desktop apps, or web apps require "real engineering," then what does? Presumably games are just "repetitious production-line-like usage of a game engine." So what's real? The Linux kernel? Are the only real engineers those writing never-before-seen C code? This reads to me like a self-serving humblebrag setting yourself aside as a real engineer, not like those other engineers.
- beryilma 3y ago
  You are assuming too much about what I think of myself. I am a software engineer and have been so for a long time. And I've written my fair share of UIs and apps. If all the things we do are so varied and creative, then we shouldn need to worry about AI replacing our jobs. But that is not what I am reading in this post. What software engineering jobs will AI replace then? In fact, what I wrote suggests that specialization is a way to make software engineering save itself from the AI threat by making the task of the software engineer more irreplaceable. No matter what you think about its complexities, making web sites is not it.
  - windowshopping 3y ago
    > If all the things we do are so varied and creative, then we shouldn need to worry about AI replacing our jobs. Your argument is built on this flawed premise. ChatGPT can generate poetry and stories. Does that mean writing poetry and stories is neither varied or creative? The fact that AI can do something doesn't diminish its value when it comes from the hands of a human. Machines in factories can make all sorts of household decorative goods too, but there's a reason people still buy hand-made things.
    - beryilma 3y ago
      > The fact that AI can do something doesn't diminish its value when it comes from the hands of a human. Sure. Morally it doesn't. Financially, it certainly does. This is essentially in the definition of automation. Turning software engineers into artisans will not save %95 of software engineers.

windowshopping 3y ago

Gonna go ahead and strong disagree. Dismissing a huge portion of engineers as "production line workers" whose work takes no thought or creativity is incredibly reductive and makes me wonder if you've ever tried doing their job. Web applications are a category of software with just as much variance in their complexity as anything else. Are mobile apps and desktop apps also trivial? What's the difference? And if none of mobile apps, desktop apps, or web apps require "real engineering," then what does? Presumably games are just "repetitious production-line-like usage of a game engine." So what's real? The Linux kernel? Are the only real engineers those writing never-before-seen C code? This reads to me like a self-serving humblebrag setting yourself aside as a real engineer, not like those other engineers.

beryilma 3y ago
You are assuming too much about what I think of myself. I am a software engineer and have been so for a long time. And I've written my fair share of UIs and apps. If all the things we do are so varied and creative, then we shouldn need to worry about AI replacing our jobs. But that is not what I am reading in this post. What software engineering jobs will AI replace then? In fact, what I wrote suggests that specialization is a way to make software engineering save itself from the AI threat by making the task of the software engineer more irreplaceable. No matter what you think about its complexities, making web sites is not it.
- windowshopping 3y ago
  > If all the things we do are so varied and creative, then we shouldn need to worry about AI replacing our jobs. Your argument is built on this flawed premise. ChatGPT can generate poetry and stories. Does that mean writing poetry and stories is neither varied or creative? The fact that AI can do something doesn't diminish its value when it comes from the hands of a human. Machines in factories can make all sorts of household decorative goods too, but there's a reason people still buy hand-made things.
  - beryilma 3y ago
    > The fact that AI can do something doesn't diminish its value when it comes from the hands of a human. Sure. Morally it doesn't. Financially, it certainly does. This is essentially in the definition of automation. Turning software engineers into artisans will not save %95 of software engineers.