Hmm, here's a thought... If you want to stand out, it doesn't matter that some things now are easier for everybody, what matters is that that you are able to get better results than others. Learning multiple languages gives you more the ability to use them. It improves your thinking, makes you a better coder, and more able to understand different techniques. LLMs are tools, to use them better than the next person you need to understand what to ask, and what a good answer looks like.
replyExactly. If nothing else, writing a solver in Python or Java might take dozens or hundreds of lines more code than Prolog, so simply knowing what tools are best for what jobs helps you be a better developer, whether you're using a compiler or an agent.
replySure, but that's about thinking and describing in more high-level English, not individual programming languages. That era is over.
replyAdvice to juniors (say) to spend time learning multiple programming languages over good command of a single one, deep expertise in LLM use and basic software engineering principles is going to severely undermine their value in an already tough field for entrants. For seniors there will generally already be a reasonable grounding in multiple paradigms; delving much further into legacy manual coding styles is going to see them leapfrogged by experts in modern (ie AI-assisted) approaches.
Not at all. That’s like saying learning how different kinds of engines work is redundant in the age of taxis. You don’t have to know any of this stuff in order to get from A to B. But if you want to understand the processes involved in getting there, or you maybe want to be the one that builds a better self-driving vehicle, this is where you should start.
replyThese are tools for thinking with, so not obsolete.
replyAgree (redundant, not obsolete), but there are better tools for the job in terms of the production value gained in terms time and mental energy spent in mastering them. You can certainly think less as tech becomes more powerful in a domain; I wouldn't advise that either.
replyGP is just trying to convince you that thinking is "rapidly redundant in the LLM age".
reply(GP here) Its true that we need to be cautious about continuing to exercise our thinking muscles, undoubtedly. Ofc you can do that without using legacy techniques, but each to their own.
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replyYou're right. We should just run everything in java-script because that's what LLMs are good at right?
replyMake sure to let it pull in as many npm dependencies as it can.
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