A lot of professional skill nowadays is misdirected from ‘knowing how to do the thing’ into ‘learning how to use a computer to do the thing’.

The role of music producer includes a large chunk of ‘knowing how to program synths and samples and drums and effects’. The role of industrial designer includes a lot of ‘knowing how to model things in CAD’. Even roles like academic researchers require skills like ‘formatting LaTeX’.

I’m genuinely quite excited for a shift in human computer interaction which reduces that ‘knowing how to do things on the computer’ tax.

But there are a whole swathe of jobs where a lot of what people do is ‘know how to do the thing on a computer’. Some of that is really because the bureaucracy has been embodied in a computer system so for example the job of handling an insurance claim seems to involve a lot of ‘knowing how to operate the claims computer system’ - actually that person’s skill is ‘knowing how to navigate the claims bureaucracy’.

Completely agree. How many people over the past 20 years have been musically gifted, but found ProTools or Logic impenetrable? The AI unlock is about enabling that creativity, not replacing it.