Comment by brailsafe
1 day ago
> There will still be fine programmers developing software by hand after AI is good enough for most.
This fallacy seems to be brought up very frequently, that there are still blacksmiths; people who ride horses; people who use typewriters; even people who use fountain pens, but they don't really exist in any practical or economical sense outside of 10 years ago Portland, OR.
No technological advancement that I'm aware of completely eliminates one's ability to pursue a discipline as a hobbyist or as a niche for rich people. It's rarely impossible, but I don't think that's ever anyone's point. Sometimes they even make a comeback, like vinyl records.
The scope of the topic seems to be what the usual one is, which is the chain of incentives that enable the pursuit of something as a persuasive exchange of value, particularly that of a market that needs a certain amount of volume and doesn't have shady protectionism working for it like standard textbooks.
With writing, like with other liberal arts, it's far from a new target of parental scrutiny, and it's my impression that those disciplines have long been the pursuit of people who can largely get away with not really needing a viable source of income, particularly during the apprentice and journeyman stages.
Programming has been largely been exempt from that, but if I were in the midst of a traditional comp sci program, facing the existential dreads that are U.S and Canadian economies (at least), along with the effective collapse of a path to financial stability, I'd be stupid not to be considering a major pivot; to what, I don't know.
No job is special, even though many programmers like to think of themselves as so. Everyone must learn to adapt to a changing world, just as they did a hundred years ago at the turn of the century.
I was pretty much told this in the 90s that I would have no real stability in life like my parents did and my life would be constant reinvention. That has been spot on.
It is the younger people who started their career after the financial crisis that got the wrong signaling. As if 2010-2021 was normal instead of the far from equilibrium state it was.
This current state of anxiety about the future is the normal state. That wonderful decade was the once in a lifetime event.
This is always said as if the buggy whip maker successfully transitioned to some new job. Please show me 10 actual examples of individuals in 1880 that successfully adapted to new jobs after the industrial revolution destroyed their old one, and what their life looked like before and after.
'Sure the 1880 start of the industrial revolution sucked, all the way through the end of WW2, but then we figured out jobs and middle class for a short time, so it doesn't matter you personally are being put at the 1880 starting point, because the 1950s had jobs'. Huh?
I don't have a dog in this disagreement, but putting the bar at "dig up the personal details of 10 different individual people and the changing dynamics of their lives over decades _starting from 1880_" is a pretty insane ask I'd imagine. How many resources for reliable and accurate longitudinal case studies from the 19th century are there really? I suppose we could read a couple dozen books written around then but that's just making a satisfactory reply so prohibitively time intensive as to be impossible.
1. Samuel Slater: Textile mill worker → Factory founder
Before: Born to a modest family in England, Slater worked as an apprentice in a textile mill, learning the mechanics of spinning frames.
After: In 1790 he emigrated to the United States, where he introduced British‑style water‑powered textile machinery, earning the nickname "Father of the American Industrial Revolution." He built the first successful cotton‑spinning mill in Rhode Island and became a wealthy industrialist.
2. Ellen Swallow Richards: Teacher → Pioneering chemist and sanitary engineer
Before: Taught school in Massachusetts while supporting her family after her father's death.
After: Enrolled at MIT (the first woman admitted), earned a chemistry degree, and applied scientific methods to public health, founding the first school of home economics and influencing water‑quality standards.
3. Frederick Winslow Taylor: Machinist → Scientific management consultant
Before: Trained as a mechanical engineer and worked on the shop floor of a steel plant, witnessing chaotic production practices.
After: Developed Taylorism, a systematic approach to labor efficiency, consulting for major firms and publishing The Principles of Scientific Management (1911), reshaping industrial labor organization.
4. John D. Rockefeller: Small‑scale merchant → Oil magnate
Before: Ran a modest produce‑selling business in Cleveland, Ohio, struggling after the Panic of 1873 reduced local demand.
After: Invested in the nascent petroleum industry, founded Standard Oil in 1870, and built a monopoly that made him the wealthiest person of his era.
5. Clara Barton: Teacher & clerk → Humanitarian nurse
Before: Worked as a schoolteacher and later as a clerk for the U.S. Patent Office, earning a modest living.
After: Volunteered as a nurse during the Civil War, later founding the American Red Cross in 1881, turning her wartime experience into a lifelong career in disaster relief.
6. Andrew Carnegie: Factory apprentice → Steel tycoon
Before: Began as a bobbin boy in a cotton factory in Scotland, later emigrating to the U.S. and working as a telegraph messenger.
After: Invested in railroads and iron, eventually creating Carnegie Steel Company (1901), becoming a leading philanthropist after retiring.
7. Lillian M. N. Stevens: Seamstress → Temperance leader
Before: Earned a living sewing garments in a New England workshop, a trade threatened by mechanized clothing factories.
After: Joined the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, rising to national president (1898‑1914) and influencing social reform legislation.
8. George Pullman: Cabinet‑maker → Railroad car innovator
Before: Trained as a carpenter, making furniture for a small New England firm that struggled as railroads expanded.
After: Designed and manufactured luxury sleeping cars, founding the Pullman Company (1867) and creating a model industrial town for his workers.
9. Mary Elizabeth Garrett: Schoolteacher → Medical education reformer
Before: Taught at a private academy in Baltimore, earning a modest salary.
After: Used her inheritance to fund the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (1893), insisting on admission of women and establishing the first women’s medical school in the U.S.
10. Henry Ford: Farmhand → Automobile pioneer
Before: Worked on his family farm in Michigan and later as an apprentice machinist, facing limited prospects as agriculture mechanized.
After: Built the Ford Motor Company (1903) and introduced the moving‑assembly line (1913), making automobiles affordable for the masses.
Do you think those people just starved to death? They had to find other jobs and they did. Now I'm sure I could find you 10 such examples if I trawl through historical records for a few hours but I'm not going to waste my time like that on New Year's Eve.
Why are you constructing a strawman in your second paragraph? No one said or even implied that, you just made up your own quote you're attacking for something reason?
Things that won't be automated anytime soon, like plumbers or electricians.
Or double down on applied ML?
Like hundreds of thousands other workers who had the same genius idea.
Nurses.
A lot of nurses leave the profession because of the abysmal financial and working conditions.
1 reply →
> This fallacy seems to be brought up very frequently, that there are still blacksmiths; people who ride horses; people who use typewriters; even people who use fountain pens, but they don't really exist in any practical or economical sense outside of 10 years ago Portland, OR.
Did you respond with a fallacy of your own? I can only assume you’re not in or don’t have familiarity with those worlds and that has lead you to conclude they don’t exist in any practical or economical sense. It’s not difficult to look up those industries and their economic impact. Particularly horses and fountain pens. Or are you going by your own idea of practical or economical?
No, horses and fountain pens do not exist in any real sense today vs. the economic impact they once had. They are niche hobbies that could disappear tomorrow and the economy wouldn't even notice. They used to be bedrocks where the world would stop turning without them overnight if they disappeared. The folks put out of work would be a rounding error on yearly layoffs if every horse and pen was zapped out of existence tonight.
They are incredibly niche side industries largely for the pleasure of wealthy folks. Horses still have a tiny niche industrial use.
There may not be many people whose professional job is using a typewriter, but there are still tons of writers.