AI and Software Engineering
I work in a field probably among the most immediately affected by AI: software engineering. My job is significantly different than it was a few years ago.
I know many people I work with dislike the changes. I’m not always sure I understand their exact position. They make logical arguments that don’t seem very sound to me. I think the push back is more based on anxiety and worry than anything.
With AI tools, an individual can make so much more progress and iterate much more quickly. It can be very fun working through problems while blowing by annoying minutiae that would have slowed you down before.
But it’s a major change. Who knows how it shakes out. I suspect there’s a decent chance I’m laid off in the next couple years and won’t be able to find a job as good as my current one. We basically don’t hire junior people anymore, so the ladder is also being pulled up.
It’s how it has always gone, though. Technological progress disrupts careers and livelihoods. I think some of the strong feelings here is that it feels almost out of nowhere and is affecting fields people didn’t expect.
I think there is some arrogance to this. If it was a massive advancement that was replacing even more blue collar jobs, I think many people disparaging AI would be celebrating it instead as a massive boom humanity. I don’t think many of them would be so concerned about the livelihoods of the people whose jobs were at risk.