Comment by lelanthran
10 hours ago
> My point is that these are not separate activities. They are drawing a false distinction between thinking and coding
I agree.
> and implying that AI only helps with the coding bit.
They did imply that. Do you think that AI only helps with the coding bit, helps with the thinking bits, or helps with neither?
> Coding and thinking are often tightly intertwined, as rarely is the coding piece so straightforward that it requires no interesting thought.
I agree with this too.
> Coding speed does matter, even if it’s not the primary bottleneck for many things.
Up to a point, sure. But without AI, we read code once while writing it, we read it again while testing it/finding errors during tests, we read it again during review.
With AI code we read it during review. Maybe.
If AI generates code faster than the time it takes to read it more than once, then it isn't "helping" in terms of sustainability. Churning out code is easy; maintaining that code is not.
> And AI can be very helpful outside the context of pure coding.
Isn't this how the author is using it? Outside the context of pure coding? I admit this is how I use it - to understand some new thing that I have to implement before I implement it.
> Do you think that AI only helps with the coding bit, helps with the thinking bits, or helps with neither?
Both. I’m effectively using AI to generate code and to help me reason through design options.
> If AI generates code faster than the time it takes to read it more than once, then it isn't "helping" in terms of sustainability
This seems rather reductionist, especially as in this scenario you described we went from reading code 3 times reading at once. If reading the code is actually the bottleneck, then you described a 3X speed up.
> Isn't this how the author is using it?
Which author are you referring to? agentultra seems to be not using it at all.