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Very strange if you ask me and disturbing. I don't know if I'd let such a dev touch a database. Of course nowadays we just vibe code and YOLO everything, but still. This is making me feel old.

I'm shocked, shocked to find out capitalism's tricks are going on here.

Yet we keep praying at its altars. Delta are just playing the game. It might not be the nicest thing to do, but it is honest at least. All entrepreneurs are pounding their collective fists on their skulls to think of ways to extract as much value from the market as possible. Let's blame the game instead of the players.

That's assuming there is a substrate that can be disturbed. That's where the parent's analogy breaks down.

As an example of an alternative analogy: think of how many bombs need to explode in your dreams before the "substrate" is "rippled". How big do the bombs need to be? How fast does the "matter" have to "move"? I think "reality" is more along those lines. If there is a substrate - and that's a big if - IMO it's more likely to be something pliable like "consciousness". Not in the least "disturbed" by anything moving in it.

Ah, I met my match it seems.

I confess I might be showing signs of unlawful thought patterns. I will correct that, fellowniusmonk. Thanks for pointing that out.

I am in the "code is not an asset, it's a liability"-camp and our recently acquired ability to swiftly defecate metric tons of it is not something I am particularly thrilled about. In fact, I find "senior" engineers using LoC as a productivity metric highly suspect - at best. I thought we passed that phase a decade or two ago. Not saying you are one, but in the spirit of talking past each other I thought it prudent to put up a good straw man.

All in all to be completely honest I find it hard to parse your original point so I concur I wasn't engaging properly. To be fair you opened with "in terms of code output" so that's what triggered me I guess.

Once they start making deals with the relevant organizations, book rooms, handle insurance, replacement hotels, etc, then they'll replace travel agents. These guys don't just Google a bunch of tickets you know.

There is this interesting thing called the Paradox of Automation where increasing automation increases the importance of human intervention. We are trying this out on a societal level. It will be.. interesting, to say the least.

Also, congratulations on becoming a team. I sure hope you have the mental bandwidth to check all that output carefully. If so, doubly congrats, because you might be the smartest human that ever lived.

I realize I came across as harsh and I surely don't want to judge you personally on your skills as A) that's not necessary for my point to make sense and B) uncalled for. I'm sure you are a capable C developer and I'm sorry for being an asshole - but I am one so it's hard for me to pretend otherwise...

Being able to program in C is something I can also do, but it sure as heck does not make me proficient Rust developer if I cobble some shit from a LLM together and call it a day.

I can appreciate how "businesses" think this is a valuable, but - and this is often forgotten by salaried developers - as I am not a business owner I have neither the position nor the intention of doing any "business". I am in a position to do "engineering". Business is for someone else to worry about. Shipping "valuable features" is not something I care about. Shipping working and correct features is something I worry about. Perhaps modern developers should call themselves business analysts or something if they wish to stop engineering.

LLMs are souped up Stack Overflows and I can't believe my ears if I hear a fellow developer say someone on Stack Overflow ported some of their code to Rust on request and that this feature of SO now makes them a proficient Rust developer because they can vaguely follow the code and can now "ship" valuable features.

This is like being able to vaguely follow Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, which is something any amateur can do, compared to being able to engage with it academically and rigorously. I deeply worry about the competence of the next generation - and thus my own safety - if they believe superficial understanding is equivalent to deep mastery.

Edit: interesting side note: I am writing this as a dyed in the wool generalist. Now ain't that something? I don't care if expertise dies off professionally, because I never was an "expert" in something. I always like using whatever works and all systems more or less feel equal to me yet I can also tell that this approach is deeply flawed. In many important ways deep mastery really matters and I was hoping the rest of society would keep that up and now they are all becoming generalists who don't know shit and it worries me..

You did not and you are not proficient. LLMs and AI in general cater to your insecurities. An actual good human mentor will wipe the floor with your arrogance and you'll be better for it.

Yes, this is definitely missing a /s, I hope.

Please for the love of god tell me this is a joke.

I'm nearing forty and I have a sneaky suspicion it's a weird cultural thing. A bit like the Romans lamenting the fall of their culture right at the start of their golden age and they never stopped doing that. Always looking back saying shit sucks now and how in the old days everything centered on competence and morality. Men were actual men back then. That sort of thing. Some parts of it might have made a tad kind of sense, but a lot of it was baloney.

I suspect we're becoming more realistic now about the nature of our civilization. There won't be any riding of laser-shooting cybernetic unicorns and we have to come to terms with that. There's adulting to do now. We have some climate issues and we have to deal with wealth inequality and finding and maintaining proper forms of government (worldwide). The laser-shooting unicorns have become the "maybe we can sort of survive as a species" and we need that. We always needed that, but we were too busy watching Terminator and playing GTA.

I'm not convinced it's all bad. Maybe some societal existential depression is called for and perhaps we'll awaken from our funk with some fresh ideas.

By experiencing the sheer existential horror that Nietzsche and others spoke of and coming out of it knowing the only way out is through. There is nothing to lean on. You decide you start caring and it will happen.

I think this is reasonable. Came to the same conclusion. I need to at least pretend to myself that I care, but I will not allow it to bleed into my PL. If it does I check out and chill for a bit.

I find there is middle ground between "who the fuck cares" and "I got to fight for what is righteous". Do the job best you can. Accept resources, including skilled human beings, are what they are and unless you own the place there is very little you can do about it. Try to do the best work you can with the resources you are given is all I can say. It does give pleasure to at least try to do a good job.

Yes, I am saying you should be cleaning the decks of the Titanic with all the care you can muster but without being obsessive or neurotic about it. Don't do it for the Titanic, don't do it for all the people who are about to die. Just do it for you.

Notice I included interaction with people, but you're right. I think just using books is about equal to just using apps. Both won't get you there but books will get you further along the way.

False.

Those are all things books will give and people as well and often better.

Can it be a tutor? Sure, if you squint. But "tutoring" you on some question you have is not the same as "learning a language".