Grief is exactly what many engineers (not just programmers) are going through right now. They (we) are going through the process of coming to terms with the death of something we loved - not a transformation, but death - and figuring out what comes after that.

This isn't about having trouble adapting to change, because many engineers going through this are adapting just fine as far as others can observe, adopting LLMs, changing the way they work and whatnot.

The grief comes from either that new normal being something they don't identify with anymore, or that new normal being just... different. The former will inevitably prolong the grief, while the latter will eventually result in the grief subsiding (even though some sadness for what was lost will never really disappear).

We're being asked to adapt, but perhaps we should just accept that things are not going back to what they were, look around, and decide not to do the things we used to love in a new way that we cannot love. Others might not even notice we chose that path, and think we just "adapted".

Does this make sense?

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frays 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> Grief is exactly what many engineers (not just programmers) are going through right now. They (we) are going through the process of coming to terms with the death of something we loved - not a transformation, but death - and figuring out what comes after that.

Very well put.

A large part of that "what comes after" is grappling with the next hard question: after the death of the craft we loved, are we - our skills, our intuition, our problem solving - even needed anymore?

Even if we still are now, will there be a time when there also won't be a place for us?

	▲	CrLf 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I believe we're still needed, because AI has no "want", no intrinsic motivation, therefore no real sense of alignment with real-word goals. Without us humans in the loop, the industry would become self-drinking beer. Whether or not the folks with the money agree with this is another issue...

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slowin 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think this is true for some programmers. For others like myself, the change and constant radical improvement is what we loved about technology in the first place. I'm essentially living the dream I had when I was 5 and saw Wargames for the first time. Sure, it was fun to program by hand but now we have AI, which allows us to do even more amazing things and we're very early in the curve there.

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bluefirebrand 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> We're being asked to adapt, but perhaps we should just accept that things are not going back to what they were, look around, and decide not to do the things we used to love in a new way that we cannot love

I would love to take this path but unfortunately I have to make money to pay my bills and afford to eat. I don't know how I would afford to keep my home without continuing this career, as mangled as it is now thanks to AI

	▲	CrLf 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It doesn't have to mean abandoning this career. For example, if you used to program because you love the details and the control, doing the same with LLMs and pretend it is still about details and control will make you miserable. But you might be able to choose to leave that to others, and fill some other role in the development process where you don't have to pretend. It will still be with LLMs, though.