reflections

I’ve been reflecting on what kind of effect AI has on everything. There is a sense of doomerism about AI, at least on social media; that it will take away all jobs. And yet at work, there is a sense of complacency; people use it, but only up to a certain extent. Feels like both these attitudes contain some element of truth, but then, how do you reconcile the two?

Being able to ask AI (really any one of them out there will do, but in my case Claude) questions has been extremely enjoyable; it’s been like rediscovering what Google felt like, so long ago. I use it largely for direction, or base templates that I rearrange to be closer to my truer vision; for one offs with low context required it’s quite good, but significantly more complicated things I’ve noticed it is quite bad at. As bullish as I am on AI, I also have seen the results of decades of Google existing; its mere existence doesn’t make anyone more curious, or more educated. It certainly lowers the barrier to entry, but it doesn’t make it any more likely people will willingly pass that barrier.

Jury is out though if I’ve become a better programmer, though.