The vehemence and vitriol that AI brings out in some people is both surprising to me, and exhausting. I don’t remember a technology topic as divisive or polarizing.
The first code I wrote was BASIC in the mid 1970s. I was self-taught and I was privileged enough to have a father who brought home a portable terminal that could connect to his employer’s mainframe, giving me access to a small collection games that the IT staff there had created. Later he bought an Apple 2 computer, which is when I really got into programming.
As a senior in high school I talked my way into a COBOL programming class at the local community college. One other high school student was also there, the rest of the class were all adults looking to change careers.
Over the course of my career I have worked in COBOL, and Nomad (an early 4GL). I used KnowledgeWare’s ADW, a CASE tool combined with MicroFocus COBOL to generate code from module action diagrams. Later I worked with Forté, an object oriented client-server development platform. I used UML and IBM’s WSAD tooling. I’ve gotten to work with and explore a lot of fascinating technology.
Today I work as a system administrator on Linux servers, both on premises and in the AWS cloud.
I have used different editors, different frameworks, and different debugging tools. Every handful of years there would be a new project management philosophy and so I did waterfall, and SDLC, and Agile, and TDD.
There have always been tools or technologies that caused debate. Some have become set pieces: Vim vs. EMACS or tabs vs. spaces. While there may have at times been impassioned discussions, it always felt like each side could at least see the other side.
AI has brought a new level of zealotry to the table. Those oppose to it are vehemently against it. There’s no middle ground. I understand there are ethical issues, and environmental concerns. I have mixed feelings about where the whole AI craze is going. At the same time I find use, both for agentic coding and chatbots, in my work and personal life.
Having so much negative energy focused on AI, while I am using it, has created a reverse kind of “fear of missing out” or FOMO. Maybe I am blind to the evils of AI and should shun its use. Or maybe, like every other sea change in technology, it still has some rough edges and needs lots of maturing before we will know the true scope of what it brings, both positive and negative.
I am within 2 years of retiring. The technology treadmill has only gotten wider and started moving faster in the four and half decades I’ve been making my living as a programmer. Part of my is glad that I’ll be stepping off the need-to-keep-current-professionally treadmill, and only staying on the what-interests-me treadmill. I will miss the challenge of staying current and of learning new, often complex, new tools and processes. I won’t miss the relentlessness of it all. And I won’t miss at all the divide that AI has created.