If a Veteran Is Skeptical About AI, We Shouldn't Worry About Our Jobs

24 Feb 2025 #misc

Pierre started coding back in the 60s and still maintains a 30-year-old codebase.

Thanks to the magic of the Internet, and to one of my posts going viral, I’ve exchanged a couple of emails with Pierre. I don’t know him in real life, just on the Internet.

His story has captivated me from the beginning.

I know only about a few industry veterans, and even fewer who are still actively coding.

Another of those veterans is Leslie at one of my past jobs. He was a Distinguished Engineer, a title created just for him. He was in charge of reviewing every single one of our PRs. He didn’t miss a single comma.

After going through every boom and hype, here’s a veteran’s take on AI

Since the 60s, Pierre has gone through every boom and hype in this industry.

He witnessed the Y2K panic, the birth of Java, the rise of Agile, and probably more that I don’t remember now.

In one of our emails, I asked Pierre about his take on AI. Today, we only see headlines of CEOs claiming AI generates most of their code, along with headlines saying coders are doomed.

But, here’s what Pierre, with his wealth of experience, told me about AI (slightly edited for brevity):

I’m skeptical about AI. I just don’t see automatically generating code from typical imprecise specifications…Apparently we’ve run out of Internet on which to train AI. It is now feeding on its own hallucinations, like mad cows eating their own prion-riddled offal, or the inbred Hapsburg dynasty.

If Pierre, who has seen quite a lot, is skeptical, we shouldn’t be worried. I’m not.

Pierre reminded me of that joke/meme that we’re still safe because AI needs unambiguous and well-written requirements. As long as clients who don’t know what they want exist, we’re still in business.

I don’t think AI is taking our jobs anytime soon. Sure, we have to adapt. AI is changing the landscape. For sure, coding in 2034 will look different. We can’t ignore it.

AI is like using calculators in math classes. They make us faster, sure, but they can’t do the thinking for us.