4 ms·

How about the one some of us believe: “Isn’t it cool that I don’t have to write boiler plate and can prototype quickly? My job isn’t replaced because coding is

by wenc 1y ago

How about the one some of us believe: “Isn’t it cool that I don’t have to write boiler plate and can prototype quickly? My job isn’t replaced because coding is not my job — it’s solving domain specific problems?” I’m in my late 40s, have written code for 3 decades (yes started in my teens) and have always known that the code was never the point. Code is a means of solving a problem, mostly unrelated to computers (unless you work on pure software tooling). This is why I chose not to study computer science. I studied something else and kept coding. I’ve always felt that CS as a field is oversubscribed because of $$$ dangling due to big tech. So many fields are computational these days and the key is to apply coding to these fields. For instance, a PhD in biology gets you nowhere these days so many biologists these days are computational biologists or statisticians. Same with computational chemists, etc. For most of my career I’ve written code, but in service of solving a real world physical problem (sensor based monitoring, logistics, mathematical modeling, optimization).

righthand 1y ago
And we must all enjoy using Llms because it helps us code? Even if you enjoy coding? What if coding helps me relax? Relaxing isn’t my job. I didn’t have to write boiler plate before Llms with a code scaffolding tool like create-express-app.
- bananapub 1y ago
  literally no one is telling you to do anything. you can just chill out and have whatever hobbies you want, using whatever tools you want.
  - righthand 1y ago
    Just not make money at it, that’s for Llm Ceos.
    - eyesofgod 1y ago
      [flagged]
allturtles 1y ago
> My job isn’t replaced because coding is not my job — it’s solving domain specific problems? I would wonder why you are so complacent as to think next year's models won't be able to solve domain-specific problems? Look at how bad text generation, code generation, audio generation, image generation was five years ago versus how capable it is today. Video generation wasn't even conceivable then. As an equally middle-aged person with children I'm less worried about myself than the next generation. What are people still in school right now, with dreams of being architects or lawyers or artists or writers or doctors or podcasters or youtubers, actually going to do with their lives? How will they find satisfaction in a job well done? How will they make money and feed and house themselves?
- wenc 1y ago
  > I would wonder why you are so complacent as to think next year's models won't be able to solve domain-specific problems? If your domain is complex enough as well as have a critical people-facing component you generally still have some runway. If it’s not then it’s ripe for disruption anyway, if not by LLMs then by something else. I pivoted at age 32 because of this. I pivoted again at age 40 (I took a two level title drop (principal engineer to midlevel), but I got to learn a new domain - and got promoted back to one level below and now make more money). I always treat my marketability not as a one and done but a perishable quantity. I’ve never taken for granted that I’ll have job security if I don’t strategize — because I grew up in a time of uncertainty and in a society where a high paying job was not guaranteed (some jobs like grocery clerk were however). People talk about “job security” as an entitlement of life are the first ones to be wiped out. That said, not everyone is capable of constantly upgrading their skills and pivoting — we need some cushion for economic disruption for folks who have limited retrainability. But suspect this is not everyone — most people just haven’t had to do it so they think they can’t. Americans have not had to face this en mass in the last 30 years but many people around the world have had to. If you’ve lived in competitive societies where there is job scarcity you get quickly used to this reality. > What are people still in school right now, with dreams of being architects or lawyers or artists or writers or doctors or podcasters or youtubers, actually going to do with their lives? How will they find satisfaction in a job well done? How will they make money and feed and house themselves? I think those jobs will still exist in some form but there will be a painful period where everyone figures out how to be differentiated. I’m a hobbyist YouTuber in my free time (YouTuber was a job that didn’t exist before) and I think it’s hard to replace parasocial relationships — AI slop already exists on YouTube which gets views but few subscriptions. The scope of jobs will also shift, and we will see things moving toward realms requiring human judgment — delivering things that require interpretation. Job scopes today are actually already much more than people think. Again no guarantee against disruption but job security was always an illusion anyway and the sooner we realize this the sooner we can adopt a preparatory mindset. (In a way, Americans are actually well positioned due to our relationship with capitalism) Even the demise of radiologists has been overstated because being a radiologists is much more than just detecting disease from an image. Writers will still be around — they might not be able to charge per word, but they’ll pivot to a new model. The transactional model will be gone but I’m convince something else will replace it. I’m not sure about any of this because I can’t predict the future, but I have seen the past and the doomsday scenario doesn’t seem to me the inexorable one.

by wenc 1y ago

righthand 1y ago

And we must all enjoy using Llms because it helps us code? Even if you enjoy coding? What if coding helps me relax? Relaxing isn’t my job. I didn’t have to write boiler plate before Llms with a code scaffolding tool like create-express-app.

bananapub 1y ago
literally no one is telling you to do anything. you can just chill out and have whatever hobbies you want, using whatever tools you want.
- righthand 1y ago
  Just not make money at it, that’s for Llm Ceos.
  - eyesofgod 1y ago
    [flagged]

allturtles 1y ago

> My job isn’t replaced because coding is not my job — it’s solving domain specific problems? I would wonder why you are so complacent as to think next year's models won't be able to solve domain-specific problems? Look at how bad text generation, code generation, audio generation, image generation was five years ago versus how capable it is today. Video generation wasn't even conceivable then. As an equally middle-aged person with children I'm less worried about myself than the next generation. What are people still in school right now, with dreams of being architects or lawyers or artists or writers or doctors or podcasters or youtubers, actually going to do with their lives? How will they find satisfaction in a job well done? How will they make money and feed and house themselves?

wenc 1y ago
> I would wonder why you are so complacent as to think next year's models won't be able to solve domain-specific problems? If your domain is complex enough as well as have a critical people-facing component you generally still have some runway. If it’s not then it’s ripe for disruption anyway, if not by LLMs then by something else. I pivoted at age 32 because of this. I pivoted again at age 40 (I took a two level title drop (principal engineer to midlevel), but I got to learn a new domain - and got promoted back to one level below and now make more money). I always treat my marketability not as a one and done but a perishable quantity. I’ve never taken for granted that I’ll have job security if I don’t strategize — because I grew up in a time of uncertainty and in a society where a high paying job was not guaranteed (some jobs like grocery clerk were however). People talk about “job security” as an entitlement of life are the first ones to be wiped out. That said, not everyone is capable of constantly upgrading their skills and pivoting — we need some cushion for economic disruption for folks who have limited retrainability. But suspect this is not everyone — most people just haven’t had to do it so they think they can’t. Americans have not had to face this en mass in the last 30 years but many people around the world have had to. If you’ve lived in competitive societies where there is job scarcity you get quickly used to this reality. > What are people still in school right now, with dreams of being architects or lawyers or artists or writers or doctors or podcasters or youtubers, actually going to do with their lives? How will they find satisfaction in a job well done? How will they make money and feed and house themselves? I think those jobs will still exist in some form but there will be a painful period where everyone figures out how to be differentiated. I’m a hobbyist YouTuber in my free time (YouTuber was a job that didn’t exist before) and I think it’s hard to replace parasocial relationships — AI slop already exists on YouTube which gets views but few subscriptions. The scope of jobs will also shift, and we will see things moving toward realms requiring human judgment — delivering things that require interpretation. Job scopes today are actually already much more than people think. Again no guarantee against disruption but job security was always an illusion anyway and the sooner we realize this the sooner we can adopt a preparatory mindset. (In a way, Americans are actually well positioned due to our relationship with capitalism) Even the demise of radiologists has been overstated because being a radiologists is much more than just detecting disease from an image. Writers will still be around — they might not be able to charge per word, but they’ll pivot to a new model. The transactional model will be gone but I’m convince something else will replace it. I’m not sure about any of this because I can’t predict the future, but I have seen the past and the doomsday scenario doesn’t seem to me the inexorable one.