5 ms·

My opinion is that these are not analogous. Programming takes practice. And if all of your code is generated via LLM, then you're not getting any practice. I

My opinion is that these are not analogous. Programming takes practice. And if all of your code is generated via LLM, then you're not getting any practice. It's the same as saying using genAI will make you a bad artist. In the sense that putting hands-to-medium makes you a good artist, that is true. Unless you take deliberate steps to learn, your skills will attrophe. However, being a good programmer|artist is different from being a successful programmer|artist. GenAI can help you churn out tons of content, and if you can turn that content into income, you'll be successful. Even before LLMs, successful and capable were orthogonal features for most programmers. We had people who made millions churning out a crud website over a few months, and others that can build game engines, but are stuck in underpaid contracting roles.

johnfn 10mo ago
Are you not getting practice working with an LLM? Why would that not also be a skill you can practice?
- dogma1138 10mo ago
  Those are objectively different skills tho.
  - FloorEgg 10mo ago
    In the same way that using hand tools are different skills than using power tools. Or doing bookkeeping for a small business with pencil and paper is a different skill than using spreadsheets or dedicated bookkeeping software.
- FloorEgg 10mo ago
  25+ year programmer thats been using an agentic IDE for 9 months chiming in. Yes I absolutely am. Yes it's a skill. Some programmers I've discussed this with made up their mind before they tried it. If the programmers goal is to produce valuable software that works and is secure and easy to maintain then they will gravitate to LLM assisted programming. I'd their goal is to program software then they won't like the idea of the LLM doing it for them. To make the distinction more clear; if the carpenters goal is to produce chairs they may be inclined to use power tools, if their goal is to work with wood then they might not want to use power tools. So where people fall on this debate mostly depends on their values and priorities (wants). The thing about wants is they are almost never changed with logical arguments. Some people just want to write the code themselves. Some people also want other people to write the code themselves. I don't know why, but I know that logical arguments are unlikely to change these people's minds because our wants are so entangled in our sense of self that they exist outside of the context of pure logic, and probably for valid evolutionary beneficial reasons. To be clear, programmers working on very novel niche use cases where LLMs genuinely aren't useful have valid case of "it's not helpful to me yet", and these people are distinct from what I'm mostly referring to. If someone is open minded, tried their best to make it work, and decided it's not good enough yet, that's totally fair and unrelated to my main point.
  - throwaway2016a 10mo ago
    > If the programmers goal is to produce valuable software that works and is secure and easy to maintain then they will gravitate to LLM assisted programming. Just this week alone I had the LLMs: - Introduce a serious security flaw. - Decided it was better to duplicate the same 5 lines of code 20 times instead of making a function and calling that. And that is actually just this week. And to be clear, I am not making that up to prove a point, I use AI day in and day out and it happens consistently. Which is fine, humans can do that too, the issue is when there is a whole new generation of "programmers" that have absolutely zero clue how to spot those issues when (not if) they come up. And as AI gets better (which it will) it actually makes it more dangerous because people start blindly trusting the code it produces.
    - FloorEgg 10mo ago
      If that's happening then you're most likely not using the best tools (best model and IDE) for agentic coding and/or not using them right. How an experienced developer uses LLMs to program is different than how a new developer should use LLMs to learn programming principles. I don't have a CS degree. I never programmed in assembly. Before LLMs I could pump out functional secure LAMP stack and JS web apps productively after years of practice. Some curmudgeon CS expert might scrutinize my code for being not optimally efficient or engineered. Maybe I reinvented some algorithm instead of using a standard function or library. Yet my code worked and the users got what they wanted. If you're not using the best tools and you're not using them properly and then they produce a result you don't like, while thousands of developers are using the tools productively, does that say something about you or the tools? Also, if you use an LLM haphazardly and it introduces a security flaw, you as the user are responsible. The LLM is a power tool, not a person. Whether the inexperienced dev uses an LLM or not doesn't change the fact that they might product bad code with security flaws. I'm not arguing that people that don't know how to program can use LLMs to replace competent programmers. I'm arguing that competent programmers can be 3-4x more productive with the current best agentic coding tools. I have extremely compelling valid evidence of this, and if you're going to try to debate me with examples of how you're unable to get these results then all it proves is you're ideologically opposed to it or not capable.
- mywittyname 10mo ago
  It's the difference between looking at someone else's work and doing it yourself. How much can you level up by watching other people do their homework?
  - johnfn 10mo ago
    Would you say that management is just a dead-end skill then, with no ability to level up your managerial experience whatsoever? Or is there a distinction I am missing?

johnfn 10mo ago

Are you not getting practice working with an LLM? Why would that not also be a skill you can practice?

dogma1138 10mo ago
Those are objectively different skills tho.
- FloorEgg 10mo ago
  In the same way that using hand tools are different skills than using power tools. Or doing bookkeeping for a small business with pencil and paper is a different skill than using spreadsheets or dedicated bookkeeping software.
FloorEgg 10mo ago
25+ year programmer thats been using an agentic IDE for 9 months chiming in. Yes I absolutely am. Yes it's a skill. Some programmers I've discussed this with made up their mind before they tried it. If the programmers goal is to produce valuable software that works and is secure and easy to maintain then they will gravitate to LLM assisted programming. I'd their goal is to program software then they won't like the idea of the LLM doing it for them. To make the distinction more clear; if the carpenters goal is to produce chairs they may be inclined to use power tools, if their goal is to work with wood then they might not want to use power tools. So where people fall on this debate mostly depends on their values and priorities (wants). The thing about wants is they are almost never changed with logical arguments. Some people just want to write the code themselves. Some people also want other people to write the code themselves. I don't know why, but I know that logical arguments are unlikely to change these people's minds because our wants are so entangled in our sense of self that they exist outside of the context of pure logic, and probably for valid evolutionary beneficial reasons. To be clear, programmers working on very novel niche use cases where LLMs genuinely aren't useful have valid case of "it's not helpful to me yet", and these people are distinct from what I'm mostly referring to. If someone is open minded, tried their best to make it work, and decided it's not good enough yet, that's totally fair and unrelated to my main point.
- throwaway2016a 10mo ago
  > If the programmers goal is to produce valuable software that works and is secure and easy to maintain then they will gravitate to LLM assisted programming. Just this week alone I had the LLMs: - Introduce a serious security flaw. - Decided it was better to duplicate the same 5 lines of code 20 times instead of making a function and calling that. And that is actually just this week. And to be clear, I am not making that up to prove a point, I use AI day in and day out and it happens consistently. Which is fine, humans can do that too, the issue is when there is a whole new generation of "programmers" that have absolutely zero clue how to spot those issues when (not if) they come up. And as AI gets better (which it will) it actually makes it more dangerous because people start blindly trusting the code it produces.
  - FloorEgg 10mo ago
    If that's happening then you're most likely not using the best tools (best model and IDE) for agentic coding and/or not using them right. How an experienced developer uses LLMs to program is different than how a new developer should use LLMs to learn programming principles. I don't have a CS degree. I never programmed in assembly. Before LLMs I could pump out functional secure LAMP stack and JS web apps productively after years of practice. Some curmudgeon CS expert might scrutinize my code for being not optimally efficient or engineered. Maybe I reinvented some algorithm instead of using a standard function or library. Yet my code worked and the users got what they wanted. If you're not using the best tools and you're not using them properly and then they produce a result you don't like, while thousands of developers are using the tools productively, does that say something about you or the tools? Also, if you use an LLM haphazardly and it introduces a security flaw, you as the user are responsible. The LLM is a power tool, not a person. Whether the inexperienced dev uses an LLM or not doesn't change the fact that they might product bad code with security flaws. I'm not arguing that people that don't know how to program can use LLMs to replace competent programmers. I'm arguing that competent programmers can be 3-4x more productive with the current best agentic coding tools. I have extremely compelling valid evidence of this, and if you're going to try to debate me with examples of how you're unable to get these results then all it proves is you're ideologically opposed to it or not capable.
mywittyname 10mo ago
It's the difference between looking at someone else's work and doing it yourself. How much can you level up by watching other people do their homework?
- johnfn 10mo ago
  Would you say that management is just a dead-end skill then, with no ability to level up your managerial experience whatsoever? Or is there a distinction I am missing?