3 ms·
I feel like you underestimate how much effort goes into making CPUs reliable and how low level/well specified the problem of building a VM/compiler is compared
by rafaelmn 2y ago
I feel like you underestimate how much effort goes into making CPUs reliable and how low level/well specified the problem of building a VM/compiler is compared to getting a natural language specification to executable program. Solving that reliably is basically AGI - I doubt there will be many humans in the loop if we reach that point.
- brookst 2y agoI get CPU’s; I worked at Intel and cut my teeth on x86 assembly. But the fact that some people need to understand CPU architecture does not mean all people need to. The vast, vast majority of programmers do not need to understand CPUs or compilers today. That’s fine. It is also fine that many new programmers won’t even think in the form of functions and return values and types the way we do. I’m not saying traditional hard science tech is useless. I am saying it is not mandatory for everyone.
- rafaelmn 2y agoYeah but what I'm saying is the level of engineering power that goes into making such relatively simple abstraction is huge and we have decades of experience. I think if AI ever gets to the point where it's so reliable for natural language -> code - we're into the AGI era and I don't see the role of programmers at all - bridging that layer successfully requires some very careful analysis and context awareness. Unless you think we're headed off in a direction where LLLms are gluing idiot proof boxes that are super inefficient but get the job done. I can sort of see that happening but in my experience reasoning through/debugging natural language specs is harder than going through equivalent code - I don't think we're getting much value here and adding a huge layer of inefficiency.