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This is a tired trope, that engineers who don’t use software assistants will be left in the dust and need to hop onboard asap. It’s really easy to learn how to

This is a tired trope, that engineers who don’t use software assistants will be left in the dust and need to hop onboard asap. It’s really easy to learn how to use software assistants. Those engineers can hop on or off any time. It’s really hard to build up fundamental engineering skills.

mouse_ 2y ago
Thanks for putting this better than I could have.
chii 2y ago
Not really. Imagine if it was driving a truck instead. Anyone, realistically, could've learnt to do it. But if you don't already know how to drive one, you're never going to get hired as one. And by the time the truck driving jobs are the only jobs there is left, it's a tad late - you're already behind everyone else who's got some years of experience.
- f1shy 2y ago
  I think it is a bad examples. It would be like: new trucks are automatic, while current manual. If you don’t learn to drive automatic, you can do that anytime, no problem, as long as you are proficient in driving manual.
f1shy 2y ago
I would argue even the opposite. And that is the reason I resist to using them (assistants). Just as people using GPS are loosing the orientation abilities, I’m afraid that excesive use of assistants may deteriorate our abilities.
- uludag 2y ago
  To further this point, while the vast majority of people could go without such skills, there are jobs where such skills are valuable. So developing skills pretty much everyone has given up on allow one to carve a unique niche for themselves.
- itishappy 2y ago
  Unfortunately, a company making deliveries won't necessarily need an expert at orientation once GPS is reliably available.
  - f1shy 2y ago
    Neither needed they before. Just needed people who could drive to the destination. The ones who can without GPS, will be very much capable to work with it, and when the nav app. goes crazy for whatever reason, they will be still making useful work for the company. Even everyday routes, when they know better, because of experience. So those who can w/o will be more valuable. Anyway, like any analogy, it has its limits, and trying to base the whole discussion in that analogy is not productive
    - itishappy 2y ago
      Sounds good in theory, but is that really true in practice? Are there delivery companies paying premiums today for drivers with demonstrable orienteering skills?
- trod1234 2y ago
  I've seen this as well, but more pronounced in the areas impacted by AI the most. If there is little to no professional work in a scope, people don't get smarter, they get dumber, and it happens through simple atrophy. Good engineering is the constant mental build up, natural tear down (atrophy) involved, where reality favors us with resiliency. AI replacing large swathes of work will cause those neurons to not fire as often, eventually you'll lose the connections. I don't think there is any safe amount of use that doesn't already create a persistent, self-fulfilling cycles of demand, where overuse would naturally occur just to compete in the labor market. Its effectively a n-body problem with no visibility since the measurements would ultimately be based on value which is subjective. It collapses the value of inherent skilled labor down to 0 paving the way for slavery or death when natural dynamics collapse the economic production system.
nepthar 2y ago
I've just hopped on. I agree completely and I've had the distinct pleasure of avoiding the past year's worth of churn as the tooling & best practices were changing frequently.
doctoboggan 2y ago
> It’s really easy to learn how to use software assistants. I somewhat disagree with this statement. Just look in this thread and you will see people who have tried using AI assistants and got no utility out of them. Prompting is a skill. Here are some areas that a skilled user of AI needs to develop: * What sort of questions are good for AI to answer * What context/information is needed for an AI to give a good solution. * Identify when the AI is hallucinating and going in loops. * Which of the many AI tools to use in a given situation. However I agree that engineers still need to build fundamental engineering skills. I am not sure what the next generation will do, but in general I think the kids will be alright.
- klik99 2y ago
  Oh the kids will be alright but what about me??!? I jest, of course, but I have very specialized skills in an industry that requires esoteric bespoke things, so I feel less at immediate risk. That said, I should start building those skills, and I do see a lot of older engineers being left in the dust if they don’t adapt. Especially web / front end dev and dev ops, any field that has a bunch of boilerplate and repeated conventions will suffer first.

mouse_ 2y ago

Thanks for putting this better than I could have.

chii 2y ago

Not really. Imagine if it was driving a truck instead. Anyone, realistically, could've learnt to do it. But if you don't already know how to drive one, you're never going to get hired as one. And by the time the truck driving jobs are the only jobs there is left, it's a tad late - you're already behind everyone else who's got some years of experience.

f1shy 2y ago
I think it is a bad examples. It would be like: new trucks are automatic, while current manual. If you don’t learn to drive automatic, you can do that anytime, no problem, as long as you are proficient in driving manual.

f1shy 2y ago

I would argue even the opposite. And that is the reason I resist to using them (assistants). Just as people using GPS are loosing the orientation abilities, I’m afraid that excesive use of assistants may deteriorate our abilities.

uludag 2y ago
To further this point, while the vast majority of people could go without such skills, there are jobs where such skills are valuable. So developing skills pretty much everyone has given up on allow one to carve a unique niche for themselves.
itishappy 2y ago
Unfortunately, a company making deliveries won't necessarily need an expert at orientation once GPS is reliably available.
- f1shy 2y ago
  Neither needed they before. Just needed people who could drive to the destination. The ones who can without GPS, will be very much capable to work with it, and when the nav app. goes crazy for whatever reason, they will be still making useful work for the company. Even everyday routes, when they know better, because of experience. So those who can w/o will be more valuable. Anyway, like any analogy, it has its limits, and trying to base the whole discussion in that analogy is not productive
  - itishappy 2y ago
    Sounds good in theory, but is that really true in practice? Are there delivery companies paying premiums today for drivers with demonstrable orienteering skills?
trod1234 2y ago
I've seen this as well, but more pronounced in the areas impacted by AI the most. If there is little to no professional work in a scope, people don't get smarter, they get dumber, and it happens through simple atrophy. Good engineering is the constant mental build up, natural tear down (atrophy) involved, where reality favors us with resiliency. AI replacing large swathes of work will cause those neurons to not fire as often, eventually you'll lose the connections. I don't think there is any safe amount of use that doesn't already create a persistent, self-fulfilling cycles of demand, where overuse would naturally occur just to compete in the labor market. Its effectively a n-body problem with no visibility since the measurements would ultimately be based on value which is subjective. It collapses the value of inherent skilled labor down to 0 paving the way for slavery or death when natural dynamics collapse the economic production system.

nepthar 2y ago

I've just hopped on. I agree completely and I've had the distinct pleasure of avoiding the past year's worth of churn as the tooling & best practices were changing frequently.

doctoboggan 2y ago

> It’s really easy to learn how to use software assistants. I somewhat disagree with this statement. Just look in this thread and you will see people who have tried using AI assistants and got no utility out of them. Prompting is a skill. Here are some areas that a skilled user of AI needs to develop: * What sort of questions are good for AI to answer * What context/information is needed for an AI to give a good solution. * Identify when the AI is hallucinating and going in loops. * Which of the many AI tools to use in a given situation. However I agree that engineers still need to build fundamental engineering skills. I am not sure what the next generation will do, but in general I think the kids will be alright.

klik99 2y ago
Oh the kids will be alright but what about me??!? I jest, of course, but I have very specialized skills in an industry that requires esoteric bespoke things, so I feel less at immediate risk. That said, I should start building those skills, and I do see a lot of older engineers being left in the dust if they don’t adapt. Especially web / front end dev and dev ops, any field that has a bunch of boilerplate and repeated conventions will suffer first.