Comment by cstrahan

> Any self respecting engineer should recognize that these tools and models only serve to lower the value of your labor.

Depends on what the aim of your labor is. Is it typing on a keyboard, memorizing (or looking up) whether that function was verb_noun() or noun_verb(), etc? Then, yeah, these tools will lower your value. If your aim is to get things done, and generate value, then no, I don't think these tools will lower your value.

This isn't all that different from CNC machining. A CNC machinist can generate a whole lot more value than someone manually jogging X/Y/Z axes on an old manual mill. If you absolutely love spinning handwheels, then it sucks to be you. CNC definitely didn't lower the value of my brother's labor -- there's no way he'd be able to manually machine enough of his product (https://www.trtvault.com/) to support himself and his family.

> Using these things will fry your brain's ability to think through hard solutions.

CNC hasn't made machinists forget about basic principles, like when to use conventional vs climb milling, speeds and feeds, or whatever. Same thing with AI. Same thing with induction cooktops. Same thing with any tool. Lazy, incompetent people will do lazy, incompetent things with whatever they are given. Yes, an idiot with a power tool is dangerous, as that tool magnifies and accelerates the messes they were already destined to make. But that doesn't make power tools intrinsically bad.

> Do you want your competency to be correlated 1:1 to the quality and quantity of tokens you can afford (or be loaned!!)?

We are already dependent on electricity. If the power goes out, we work around that as best as we can. If you can't run your power tool, but you absolutely need to make progress on whatever it is you're working on, then you pick up a hand tool. If you're using AI and it stops working for whatever reason, you simply continue without it.

I really dislike this anti-AI rhetoric. Not because I want to advocate for AI, but because it distracts from the real issue: if your work is crap, that's on you. Blaming a category of tool as inherently bad (with guaranteed bad results) suggests that there are tools that are inherently good (with guaranteed good results). No. That's absolutely incorrect. It is people who fall on the spectrum of mediocrity-to-greatness, and the tools merely help or hinder them. If someone uses AI and generates a bunch of slop, the focus should be on that person's ineptitude and/or poor judgement.

We'd all be a lot better off if we held each other to higher standards, rather than complaining about tools as a way to signal superiority.