Future of programming

`1:31:12`

So like if you set the mode of learning, I don't want to be this sort of give up on AI. I think vibe coding is a skill. So for an experienced programmer it's too easy to dismiss vibe coding as a thing. — [DHH] I agree, I wouldn't dismiss it. — But I think you need to start building that skill and start to figure out how do you prevent the competency from slipping away from your fingers and brain. Like how do you develop that skill in parallel to the other skill? I don't know. I think it's a fascinating puzzle though. I know too many really strong programmers that just kind of avoid AI, 'cause it's currently a little too dumb. — Yes, it's a little too slow. It's actually my main problem. It's a little too dumb in some ways, but it's a little too slow in other ways. When I use Claude's code, the terminal version of a Claude, which is actually my preferred way of using it, I get too impatient.

`1:32:14`

It feels like I'm going back to a time where code had to compile and I had to go do something else. A boil some tea while the code is compiling. Well, I've been working in Ruby for 20 years. I don't have compiled weight in me anymore. So there's that aspect of it. But I think the more crucial aspect for me is I really care about the competence. And I've seen what happens to even great programmers the moment they put away the keyboard. Because even before AI, this would happen as soon as people would get promoted. Most great programmers who work in large businesses stop writing code on a daily basis because they simply have too many meetings to attend to. They have too many other things to do. And invariably they lose touch with programming. That doesn't mean they forget everything. But if you don't have your fingers in the sauce, source, you are going to lose touch with it. There's just no other way. I don't want that because I enjoy it too much. This is not just about outcomes.

`1:33:14`

This is what's crucial to understand programming for programmers who like to code is not just about the programs they get out of it. That may be the economic value. It's not the only human value. The human value is just much in the expression. When someone who sits down on a guitar and plays "Stairway to Heaven," there's a perfect recording of that that will last in eternity. You can just put it on Spotify. You don't actually need to do it. The joy is to command the guitar yourself. The joy of a programmer, of me as a programmer, is to type the code myself. If I elevate myself, if I promote myself out of programming, I turn myself into a project manager. A project manager of a murder of AI crows as I wrote the other day. I could have been become a project manager my whole career. I could have become a project manager 20 years ago if I didn't care to write code myself. And I just wanted outcomes. That's how I got started in programming. I just wanted outcomes. Then I fell in love with programming

`1:34:16`

and now I'd rather retire than giving it up. Now that doesn't mean you can't have your cake and needed to. I've done some vibe coding where I didn't care that I wasn't playing myself. I just wanted to see something. There was an idea in my head. I wanted to see something. That's fine. I also use AI all day long. In fact, I'm already at the point where if you took it away from me, I'd be like, oh my god, how do we even look things up on the internet anymore? Is Stack Overflow still around? Or I'm still a thing? Like how do I even find answers to some of these questions I have all day long. I don't wanna give up AI. In fact, I'd say the way I like to use AI, I'm getting smarter every because of AI. Because I'm using AI to have it explain things to me. Even stupid questions. I would be a little embarrassed to even enter into Google. AI is perfectly willing to give me the ELI5 explanation of some Unix command. I should have known already, but I don't, I'm sorry,

`1:35:17`

can you just explain it to me and now I know the thing. So at the end of the day of me working with AI all day long, I'm a little bit smarter. Like 5%, sorry, not 5%, half a percent maybe. That compounds over time. But what I've also seen, when I worked on the Omakub project and I tried to let AI drive for me, I felt I was maybe half a percent dumber at the end of the day. — Okay, you said a lot of interesting things. First of all, let's just start at the very fact that asking dumb questions. If you go to Stack Overflow and ask a dumb question or read somebody else's dumb question and the answer to it, there's a lot of judgment there. AI sometimes to an excessive degree has no judgment. It usually says, oh, that's a great question. — [DHH] To a fault. — Yeah, oh, that's wonderful. Yeah, I mean, it's so conducive to learning. It's such a wonderful tool of learning and I too would miss it. And it's a great basically search engine into all kinds of nuances